Styles may change, but murder lasts forever. Investigation Discovery's newest series, A CRIME TO REMEMBER, invites viewers to step into the past and unravel the intricacies of real-life murder cases of the '50s and '60s.
Set against the backdrop of Studebakers, fedoras, and three-martini lunches, these stories of truly
Mad Men and women reveal complicated relationships where thwarted dreams and repressed passions led to terrible crimes. With A CRIME TO REMEMBER, ID inaugurates a new high-end cinematic style, using the visual grammar of movies to bring the era to life. To properly illustrate each time period, the series stays true to the fashion and styles while highlighting the cultural taboos and social norms that informed each case. Each story is driven by the narrative of a fictional bystander who "knew" the victim, while reporters who covered the case explain how the crime and investigation impacted society.
With six episodes, each hour in this limited series plays out like a dramatic period thriller designed to have the viewer relive those "bad old days."
A Crime to Remember will air Tuesdays at 10/9c beginning tonight, November 12 on Investigation Discovery.
"A sleek and exquisitely produced series,
A Crime to Remember is Investigation Discovery's homage to a period when men, martinis and murder were often found in the same gossip column," said Henry Schleiff, Group President, Investigation Discovery, Destination America, and Military Channel. "With riveting storytelling and artfully-crafted recreations, each episode plays out like a period thriller and transports viewers back into those enthralling days of old - when the workplace was a hotbed of male entitlement while the white picket fence at home was a mask for dark suburban secrets." While murder might have been the same back then, the world was different. Scientific technology was limited... relationships were complicated, but pretended not to be... and murder was often seen as a better way out of a marriage than divorce. And for an essentially all-white, male-dominated police force operating in a gumshoe world, sometimes it was more about what someone looked like rather than what they did that determined guilt.
A Crime to Remember weaves together these cultural effects seamlessly into each story, unpacking the challenges of conducting a murder investigation in a pre-forensics, intolerant era.
A CRIME TO REMEMBER breathes life into six stories that have never been seen on Investigation Discovery, where New York high society is shocked by the mysterious shooting of one if its most eligible men; a divorcee confounds detectives with her scandalous behavior in the wake of her children's murders; and young women finding their independence as "career girls" in Manhattan wind up as victims of a deranged killer. The complete episode rundown for the premiere season is as follows:
Go Ask Alice Premieres Tuesday, November 12 at 10/9c Queens, NY, 1965. Two children are found dead and, with their parents going through a divorce,
Cops are convinced one of them is responsible. When a lie detector test clears the father, the
Cops focus on Alice Crimmins - a flame-haired vixen who has seen her fair share of bedfellows and seems more interested in perfecting her makeup than mourning her children. Police remain on the case for years, obsessing over the beautiful divorcee. With flimsy circumstantial evidence and a jury of 12 married men, they are able to convict Alice. But was she really guilty?
The Career Girl Murders Premieres Tuesday, November 19 at 10/9c New York, NY, 1963. When Patricia Tolles, an editorial assistant at Time-Life, returns to her apartment in the Upper East Side, she finds the place ransacked and covered in blood. In a bedroom are the bodies of her roommates, Newsweek researcher Janice Wylie and schoolteacher Emily Hoffert. The media dubs it "The Career Girl Murders," and fear claims the hearts of thousands of young girls who have moved to New York City to join the workforce and gain their independence. The NYPD is under enormous pressure to solve the case. When they arrest a suspect, they are so eager to get a conviction that they overlook a key detail. Four years pass before new evidence is uncovered and the real killer is caught.
Judge, Jury, Executioner Premieres Tuesday, November 26 at 10/9c West Palm Beach, FL, 1955. Esteemed Judge Curtis Chillingworth and his wife say goodbye to friends at a dinner party and are never seen again. Police search the Chillingworths' home and find a shattered porch light, drops of blood on a walkway to the beach, and two used spools of adhesive tape. Four years go by until a conversation overheard in a bar gives authorities the break they are
Looking for. With a sting-operation and a bugged Miami hotel room, they unravel a chilling tale of corruption, moonshine, the Cuban lottery and finally discover what really happened to the Chillingworths.
Time Bomb Premieres Tuesday, December 3 at 10/9c Denver, CO, 1955. When United Airlines Flight 629 explodes in mid-air, the new-to-air travel nation grieves over this terrible tragedy. In a pre-TSA, pre-Black Box world, it takes painstaking police and FBI work to rummage through the wreckage. Investigators discover an elaborate murder plot from a
Twisted mother/son relationship and the first-ever act of sabotage to a commercial airline in the U.S. A well-planted bomb and a few life insurance policies later (purchased out of an airport vending machine) and the murderer had succeeded in killing his victim - as well as 43 innocent travelers.
A New Kind of Monster Premieres Tuesday, December 10 at 10/9c Michigan, 1967-69. A series of young females from various southern Michigan universities are murdered one by one. These once carefree and enthusiastic co-eds are terrified of a man dubbed "The Co-Ed Killer." Six women die before a rookie cop is able to infiltrate the closed society of college fraternities and root out one of the nation's first nationally known serial killers.
Who Killed Mr. Woodward? Premieres Tuesday, December 17 at 10/9c New York, NY, 1955. Ann and Billy Woodward are the darlings of New York society until a drunken evening at a dinner party for the Duchess of Windsor ends with Billy lying in a pool of blood in the Woodwards' mansion. Ann admits to pulling the trigger but swears it was an accident. But when investigators dig deeper, her working-class past is revealed and the swells of New York society close ranks, ultimately leading to deadly consequences for Ann.
A CRIME TO REMEMBER is produced for
Investigation Discovery by XCON Productions. For XCON, Christine Connor is executive producer. For Investigation Discovery, Thomas Cutler is executive producer, Sara Kozak is SVP of production, and Henry Schleiff is Group President, Investigation Discovery, Destination America, and Military Channel.
About Investigation Discovery
Investigation Discovery (ID) is the leading mystery-and-suspense network on television and America's favorite "guilty pleasure." From harrowing crimes and salacious scandals to the in-depth investigations and heart-breaking mysteries that result, ID challenges our everyday understanding of culture, society and the human condition. One of our nation's fastest growing cable networks, ID delivers the highest-quality programming to nearly 85 million U.S. households and is available in both high definition (HD) and standard definition (SD). For more information, please visit InvestigationDiscovery.com, facebook.com/InvestigationDiscovery, or twitter.com/DiscoveryID.
Investigation Discovery is part of Discovery Communications (Nasdaq: DISCA, DISCB, DISCK), the world's #1 nonfiction media company reaching more than 1.8 billion cumulative subscribers in 218 countries and territories.
