Photo: Leah Gallo/Netflix

Anna Kendrick’s new true crime movie on Netflix Woman of the Hour relives a terrifying true crime story, but the real Rodney Alcala, aka “the Dating Game Killer,” was more terrifying than the film suggests.

In her directorial debut, which premiered at the 2023 Toronto International Film Festival, Kendrick plays Cheryl Bradshaw, who appeared in an episode of The dating game in 1978. Daniel Zovatto plays Alcala, a serial killer who appeared on the show just a year before he was accused of kidnapping and murdering his last known victim, 12-year-old Robin Samsoe. Although the verdict was overturned, retried and upheld several times, Alcala remained imprisoned until his death from natural causes in 2021.

Woman of the Hour spends some time with both Bradshaw and Alcala leading up to the episode (with some fictional embellishments). But while Kendrick’s scenes seem to flow in sequential order, covering a short window of time before filming, Zovatto’s timeline feels more spread out; Some events take place in the present, and some of the murders we witness seem to have been inspired by attacks that took place years before he showed up. Dating game. As shown in the film, prosecutors have said Alcala tortured his victims by repeatedly strangling them and bringing them back to life.

An equally gruesome portrait Woman of the Hour could paint from Alcala, the film practically glosses over the most chilling aspect of his backstory: even before appearing on the dating show, Alcala had already been arrested multiple times, including for murder, and was on the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted list.

National crime databases did not exist when Alcala committed his crimes, so TV background checks were not possible. The dating game producers had no idea (and could not easily find out) that Alcala had already served three years for child molestation related to his attack on an eight-year-old. Woman of the Hour acknowledges in a postscript that survivors and other private citizens had reported Alcala to the police for a decade, but this retrospective treatment almost downplays the extent of his previous crimes.

Alcala’s first known attack occurred in 1968 – ten years before his appearance The dating game. Morgan Rowan, who was 16 at the time, says he lured her and two friends to his home in California, where he assaulted and raped her. “I saw his face turn purple,” Rowan said People earlier this year. “He hit me between the eyes with a belt buckle. I saw stars shooting and fell to my knees.” During the attack, she said, “I didn’t pray to live. I prayed to die.” Eventually, she says, one of her friends entered the room by breaking a window and they all escaped.

Weeks later, Alcala lured 8-year-old Tali Shapiro into his car and took her to his home, where he beat and raped her. According to PeopleAlcala was still attacking Shapiro when police arrived and then fled. Shapiro, who was near death and in a coma, says police “made a choice to save me or chase him.” She was in a coma for over a month. Woman of the Hour, which takes place years later, does not specifically mention Alcala’s attacks on any of the girls.

Police issued an arrest warrant for Alcala and he fled to New York, where New York said After and as mentioned in the movie, he enrolled at NYU under the assumed name “John Berger” and studied film under director Roman Polanski (who, coincidentally, would later flee the country after pleading guilty to unlawful sex with a minor).

Alcala’s next known murder victim, Cornelia Crilley, appears to be making it Woman of the Hour, but with a different name: Charlie. As in the film, Crilley worked as a flight attendant and moved into a Manhattan apartment on the day she and Alcala are said to have met. Speaking to CBS News 48 hoursManhattan prosecutor Melissa Mourges recalled that after Alcala’s attack, authorities encountered a “terrible scene” in her apartment and found Crilley dead. She had been stripped naked and strangled with her own stockings, with a bite wound on her chest. Without solid leads or forensics, the case remained cold for decades.

Months after Crilley’s murder, in the summer of 1971, Alcala was arrested in New Hampshire, where he used the lightly edited alias “John Burger” while working as a counselor for a girls’ summer camp. (Rodney tells Charlie about the upcoming gig shortly after they meet in the movie.) According to 48 hourstwo campers recognized his photo on an FBI poster. Alcala was arrested and extradited to California in connection with the outstanding warrant for his attack on Shapiro. But prosecutors declined to charge Alcala with the rape and attempted murder because her parents refused to let her testify. Instead, Alcala served less than three years after pleading guilty to the lesser charge of child abuse. Although Crilley’s murder, which occurred earlier, appears to appear in the film, the rest does not.

Less than two months after Alcala’s release from prison in 1974, police arrested him again for assaulting a 13-year-old girl identified only as “Julie J,” Justia said. She also does not appear Woman of the Hour. As shown in the film, Alcala got a job with Los Angeles Times as a typesetter in September 1977 – just a year before it was published The dating game. During that time he posed as a fashion photographer and took pictures of hundreds of men and women. As seen in Woman of the Hourhis portfolio is said to be filled with explicit nude photos, including of teenage boys. The dating game introduced him as a photographer, as the film shows.

Not much is known about the real Cheryl Bradshaw. Kendrick’s film portrays her as a frustrated Juilliard graduate who just shows up The dating game because her agent says it will get her seen (and that she needs rent money). As her woes unfold on the show, she reminds herself several times that Sally Field once did the exact same thing – and whether it worked for Sally…

Although the film portrays Bradshaw as a rebel who went off-script and held her bachelors’ feet to the fire, the real Dating game The episode unfolded with the usual suggestive, slightly sleazy banter. For example, at one point Bradshaw introduced a scenario in which she served Alcala for dinner and asked what his name would be and what he would look like. His response? “My name is the banana and I look really good.” When she asked him to be “a little more descriptive,” he added, “Peel me.”

Some of what we see in the Netflix movie version of The dating game is true to real life. For example: Alcala bragged to fellow contestants that he “always” gets the girl. Jed Mills, who appeared as Bachelor Number Two, told ABC’s 20/20 in 2021, Alcala told him exactly that in the green room.

Yet Kendrick and screenwriter Ian McDonald also add a few dramatic touches. Some are minor: while Alcala appears in the film’s retelling as bachelor number three, he actually acted The dating game as Bachelor Number One in real life. Other inventions are a little more drastic – like Laura, a seemingly made-up audience member at a game show taping who happens to be a friend of one of Alcala’s victims. Another slight difference: In the film, Rodney and Cheryl receive an all-expenses-paid trip to Hawaii—an ominous prospect considering everything we know about him. In real life, the prize was only tennis lessons and a trip to Magic Mountain theme park in California.

But it’s the movie version of what happens after filming that seems to be a complete invention. Although Kendrick’s character agrees to go on a date with Alcala, where the energy quickly turns disturbing, the real Bradshaw called a Dating game employee to cancel the date she had agreed with Alcala.

Speak with 20/20former Dating game participant coordinator Ellen Metzger recalled Bradshaw telling her, “Ellen, I can’t date this man. Strange vibrations are coming from him. He’s very strange. I’m not at ease. Is that going to be a problem?” As you would hope, Metzger’s answer was simply: “No.”

In February 1979, prosecutors say Alcala raped 15-year-old Monique Hoyt; he allegedly knocked her unconscious while she posed for photos. That also ends up in the film, although Monique has been renamed ‘Amy’. Alcala attacked his last known victim, Robin Samsoe, months later in June 1979; in 1980 he was sentenced to death for her kidnapping and murder. The verdict was overturned in 1984 and in 1986 Alcala was sentenced to death again after a retrial. A federal appeals court overturned the verdict in 2003, and in 2010 Alcala received the death penalty again, not only for Samsoe’s murder, but also for his attacks on Jill Barcomb, Georgia Wixted, Charlotte Lamb and Jill Parenteau. Alcala pleaded guilty in 2012 to the murders of both Crilley and Ellen Jane Hover. If Woman of the Hour acknowledges, authorities estimate that his actual number of victims is much higher than the seven for which he was convicted – “as many as 130.”