The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story by Ryan Murphy and Ian Brennan follows the well-known case of real-life brothers Lyle and Erik Menendez, who were convicted in 1996 of murdering their parents, José and Mary Louise “Kitty” Menendez. The first teaser for the Netflix limited series focused on a portrait of the "perfect" family, with rifts that seemed to set a dark tone, hinting at Lyle and Erik's claims that they were sexually abused by their father for years, Jose.
The first full trailer, out now on , goes much deeper, showing José (played by Javier Bardem) getting physical with his sons, but the preview hints at more. The footage begins with the brothers (played by newcomers Nicholas Alexander Chavez and Cooper Koch) arriving at their home at night, each armed with a shotgun, and walking through the front door before several shots are fired.
“Erik and I killed our parents together, so I’d say that makes us pretty close,” says Chavez, as Lyle, in a therapy session. The more-than-two-minute-long preview then follows the brothers after the murder, as they navigate the nightmares, guilt and elation that comes from the act in the time before they are arrested. “Our life was one thing, and we decided we weren’t going to take that anymore,” says Lyle in voiceover. “Starting right now, we’re gonna demand more out of life. And we are never gonna fucking go back.”
The footage then shows their arrests and trial. “You don’t murder your parents that way,” says Nathan Lane, playing investigative journalist Dominick Dunne. “Literally defacing them. That’s not about money. That’s about something else deeper and darker.”
Chloë Sevigny plays Kitty, Ari Graynor plays criminal defense attorney Leslie Abramson.
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