‘Law & Order: True Crime’ coming in wake of ‘The People v. OJ Simpson: American Crime Story’

Clearly, plenty of people out there have taken notice of the success of “The People v. OJ Simpson: America Crime Story” over the past couple of months. We also knew that NBC was looking for a way to expand upon the “Law & Order” brand (they considered bringing back the original show at one point), and we’ve seemingly now settled with this: There is a new anthology spin-off coming to NBC in “Law & Order: True Crime.”

Basically, what this is going to be (at least for the first season) is an eight-part series telling the story of Lyle and Erik Menendez, brothers who were convicting of murdering their parents. In a statement, NBC Entertainment President Jennifer Salke had the following to say:

“We’ve been talking with Dick about how to create an event series coming out of the Law & Order ripped-from-the-headlines brand … This case captured the public’s attention like nothing before it as it examined taboo issues such as patricide and matricide in gruesome detail, all against a backdrop of privilege and wealth. We will recreate the cultural and societal surroundings of both the murders and trials when people were not only obsessed with the case but examining how and why these brothers committed these heinous crimes.”

Obviously true-crime is super-popular right now in between the previously-mentioned FX series and also “Serial,” “Making a Murderer,” and some other projects that are out there. Eventually there will be a tipping point where it is clear that audiences are tired of this genre … but it’s clear that we have not quite got there yet. Also, we think “American Crime Story” is making a mistake by moving the second season away from true-crime and into a slightly different subject in Hurricane Katrina.

Photo: NBC