HBO Documentary Films announced production is now underway on I’ll Be Gone in the Dark: One Woman’s Obsessive Search for the Golden State Killer. The documentary series is based on Michelle McNamara’s bestselling book and has Oscar nominee and Emmy Award winner Liz Garbus (Nothing Left Unsaid: Gloria Vanderbilt & Anderson Cooper, There’s Something Wrong with Aunt Diane, What Happened, Miss Simone) on board as director.
Michelle McNamara’s book was published in early 2018 and immediately took the #1 spot on the New York Times combined print and e-book bestseller list.
Details on I’ll Be Gone in the Dark: Journalist Michelle McNamara was determined to find the violent psychopath she dubbed “The Golden State Killer,” who terrorized California in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s, committing 50 home-invasion sexual assaults and ten murders. He then disappeared for more than three decades, eluding multiple police forces and some of the best detectives in the area. On Tuesday, April 24, 2018, the Sacramento Sheriff’s Office arrested former police officer Joseph James DeAngelo at his home in a nearby suburb, identifying him through DNA evidence as the notorious serial killer and charging him with a number of the crimes.
I’ll Be Gone in the Dark is a comprehensive exploration of the case of an elusive, violent predator by McNamara, who died suddenly while investigating the unsolved crimes. It is also a haunting personal memoir and self-examination of McNamara’s obsessive quest for justice on behalf of the victims and survivors of the crimes. Framed by an introduction by Gillian Flynn and afterword by McNamara’s husband, Patton Oswalt, the book was completed by McNamara’s lead researcher, Paul Haynes, and a close colleague, Billy Jenkins.
Creator of the popular website TrueCrimeDiary.com, McNamara was determined to find the violent psychopath she dubbed The Golden State Killer, who committed 50 home-invasion sexual assaults in Northern California before moving south, where he perpetrated ten murders. Then he disappeared, eluding multiple police forces and some of the best detectives in the area. Obsessed with the case three decades later, McNamara pored over police reports, interviewed victims and embedded herself in the online communities that were as obsessed with the case as she was. I’ll Be Gone in the Dark also explores her own past, including her years growing up in Oak Park, Ill. in a large family, and the reverberations of the unsolved murder that haunted her youth.
