Anyone familiar with the mysterious death of Kathleen Peterson knows that we may never know what really happened. Her husband, Michael, was ultimately convicted of her murder, though he would be granted a new trial after eight years in prison. This twisting case is chronicled in Jean-Xavier de Lestrade’s 2004 docuseries The Staircase, which focuses mainly on the accused man’s protracted legal battles. Lestrade asks us to decide whether Kathleen’s death was a crime or an accident while ignoring a popular conspiracy theory.
Many believe that rather than falling or being pushed down the flight of stairs, Kathleen Peterson was actually attacked by an owl, which caused the fatal scalp lacerations when the creature’s claws got tangled in her hair. Director Antonio Campos brings this theory to life in the second half of his fictionalized adaptation, HBO’s 2022 series The Staircase. We watch a painstaking recreation of this suspected attack while exploring the appeal of this bizarre explanation.
In the latest episode of Bloody FM’s Murder Made Fiction podcast, Jenn and Joe debate the plausibility of this infamous theory and the reason it was excluded from the original docuseries.
And if you want even more Murder Made Fiction, be sure to check out the pod’s Patreon feed, where Jenn and Joe have ~120 hours of content including episode by episode coverage of the original docuseries The Staircase.
The post The Owl Makes an Appearance in Antonio Campos’ Fictionalized ‘The Staircase’ [Murder Made Fiction Podcast] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.