That Colin Firth seems like such a nice guy—ever since playing Darcy in the BBC’s 1995 Pride and Prejudice retelling, he’s exemplified “husband material” for countless viewers around the world too.
Which is why he’s so well-cast as Michael Peterson, the North Carolina man who found himself at the centre of true crime scandal when his wife was found dead in their home back in 2001. The Staircase premieres on Sky TV and NOW on May 5, adapting the troubling events you might recall from Netflix’s docuseries of the same name.
There will be a triple-episode premiere on May 5 with new episodes dropping weekly from there. That’s plenty of time to read up on Peterson’s case, and to consider whether Firth’s face could change your feelings about the mysterious murder conviction.
Firth is innately trustworthy, the perfect suburban husband to Toni Collette’s housewife Kathleen. Both of them speak in convincing American accents in the trailer below, celebrating their lovely family at the dinner table.
The kids are played by GoT‘s Sophie Turner, Dane Dehaan, Patrick Schwarzenegger, and Olivia DeJonge, who will soon appear as Priscilla Presley soon in Baz Luhrmann’s Elvis.
Michael Stuhlbarg and Parker Posey also star as the lawyers who will hash out Peterson’s case in court. “It’s a witch hunt”, he proclaims to them as the press begin to swarm, and that’s before a French documentarian shows up asking to chronicle the story in that aforementioned series.
One of the most fascinating proposals for Kathleen’s death was that an owl may have swept inside the house and caused the clawmarks found on her body, a surreal version of events that tells a distinct visual story.
