'The People v. O.J. Simpson' Creators Reveal What They Would've Included if They Had More Time
The writers explain what they had to leave out because of time constraints.
— -- "The People v. O.J. Simpson" documents the 1994 murder of Nicole Brown Simpson and the subsequent trial against her ex-husband, O.J. Simpson.
Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski, the creators of the miniseries, only had 10 hours to tell the story, and as a result, they had to leave out some vignettes.
In an interview with Vulture, Karaszewski said they "might have lost our minds" had they been given more time.
Alexander recounts how Bob Shapiro joined the legal team.
"The missing piece of the story, which is just completely berserk and interesting, is that there was a third player, a guy named Roger King, who is the owner of King World [Productions], which was a syndicator of game shows," Alexander said.
"He did not know O.J., and he did not know Bob Shapiro. He was simply following the case. I don't even think he lived in Los Angeles. He literally cold-called O.J. Simpson, saying, 'I've heard about this lawyer named Robert Shapiro who I think you should hire.' O.J. was really impressed that this man who owned this giant TV company was calling him. So O.J. said, 'Good enough for me.'"
Unfortunately, there wasn't time, Alexander explained, because they needed to reach the Bronco chase by the end of the first installment. Besides, King would not have appeared later in the miniseries and thus, "we couldn't afford the real estate."
They also had to compress Barry Scheck's presentation of DNA evidence -- a weeklong process -- into a three-minute scene.
"It's so painstaking to do, searching those transcripts for the five or six great lines that Barry said in the courtroom," Alexander continued. "Searching for those, being able to connect them, and then the presentation so people can actually see what's going on and understand what's going on, and make it entertaining."
There were other moments that they added in for color too, they said. One example, when Robert Kardashian, Simpson's attorney and the father of Kourtney, Kim, Khloé and Robert Jr., lectured his children about not becoming famous, was meant to deepen his character, they said.
"We discovered he was a good man. He was the one guy in this case that didn't have any other weird motive involved," Karaszewski said. "He was there because his best friend said he didn't do it, and he loved his friend, and he was going to remain loyal to his pal and see this to the end. Eventually, he gets very conflicted and he starts to wonder whether his friend actually did do it. For us he became a very rich, heartfelt character."