“It was Amanda and how she spoke about her mom, actually, how she spoke about what her mom went through while she was in prison, that made me want to do it,” Horgan told UPI.
1 of 4 | Sharon Horgan’s “The Twisted Tale of Amanda Knox” premieres on Wednesday. Photo courtesy of Hulu
Catastrophe and Bad Sisters creator and actress Sharon Horgan says she wanted to star in Hulu’s The Twisted Tale of Amanda Knox because it is a nuanced family drama as opposed to a salacious true-crime saga.
“It is looking at the story from a new perspective and sort of giving it a wider lens and not just focusing on the courtroom drama of it, but on Amanda’s journey,” Horgan, 55, told UPI in a recent Zoom interview
“A lot of what led up to it and and happened after involved her family and impacted her family and, as someone who plays her mother, I realized how much of the the story was about their relationship and what you do for the people you love.”
The actual Knox was a producer on the fact-based miniseries, which premieres Wednesday.
Horgan plays Edda Mellas, a German-born Seattle math teacher who is shocked to learn her daughter Amanda (Grace Van Patten) has been wrongfully imprisoned for the sexual assault and murder of her British flatmate while they were studying abroad in Italy in 2007.
As a real-life parent herself, Horgan couldn’t help but envision how hard she would fight to protect her own daughter if she ended up at the center of such a painful ordeal half a world away.
“I’m a mama,” she said. “I’ve got a 21-year-old girl and a 17-year-old girl, so, I, unfortunately, found it very easy to imagine either of my girls finding themselves in a terrifying situation [like this].”
Knox’s trial, conviction, retrial and eventual acquittal made news headlines around the world for more than a decade.
“There was sort of a feeding of the public’s obsession with it,” Horgan said of the non-stop media coverage of the case, which led to countless documentaries and TV news-magazine specials.
“It’s an absolutely tragic, terrible story involving two young women, so I understand why it got under people’s skin so much.”
Horgan was happy to spend time with the real Mellas and Knox when they visited the show’s set.
“When I was researching for the role, I was watching anything I could find of her online and there wasn’t really that much. There were a few interviews and [some footage of Mellas] dealing with the media, dealing with the press and I was always struck by her composure … and how calmly she dealt with the whole circus of it,” Horgan said.
“When I met her in real life, she’s just a lovely, fun, young-for-her-age woman and I liked her very much and I think it’s a testament to her strength of personality and her character that she’s managed to pull together as normal a life as possible. I don’t know if I’d have been able to manage that.”
The real Knox was involved in the project from the very first Zoom call Horgan took with the filmmakers.
“It was Amanda and how she spoke about her mom, actually, how she spoke about what her mom went through while she was in prison, that made me want to do it, if I’m honest,” Horgan said.
“She’s incredibly smart, a very emotionally intelligent, very warm, friendly mother,” Horgan said of Knox, who now has two children of her own. “She’s someone who had a real curiosity about the film and TV making process, as well. She’s very open about being so new to that and I really enjoyed having them around. Edda came down for a couple of days, as well.”
Horgan said it was easy to bond with Van Patten (Tell Me Lies, Nine Perfect Strangers) and make that mother-daughter connection seem authentic.
“I just felt incredibly motherly towards her. I was away from my girls at the time and I did not love that,” Horgan laughed, noting that Van Patten’s sister Anna played Amanda’s sister Deanna, so she also looked out for her.
“The two of them are adorable, sweet, kind girls and we hung out a bit. We did a bit of wall climbing together. We went for a few drinks,” she added. “But, really, it was something that happened very quickly and, then, after that you’re on set for so long. You have these long, long days, especially for the courtroom scenes. You really are sitting around for hours and days and, so, you do really just get to know each other.”
Horgan described the production as having a relaxed, collaborative atmosphere in which everyone involved understood the responsibility they had to get this story right after years of misinformation, misunderstandings and bias obscured the truth.
“There’s nothing about the team that made you feel anything other than protected,” she said about the cast and crew.
“You were in good company and everyone was there to take care of the story and tell it to the best of their ability. That was a good feeling. You felt like everyone was very aware of the story that they were telling and being careful with that.”
Amanda Knox returns to the U.S.
Amanda Knox, left, follows her attorney Michael Nifong as they attend a news conference held at the Seattle-Tacoma International Airport near Seattle, Washington on October 4, 2011. After spending four years in an Italian prison Knox arrived in the United States after departing Rome’s Leonardo da Vinci airport. Knox’s life turned around dramatically Monday when an Italian appeals court threw out her conviction in the sexual assault and fatal stabbing of her British roommate. UPI/Jim Bryant | License Photo
