SundanceTV is bringing back The Staircase, your first/next true crime obsession
As Serial and Making A Murderer have helped turn true-crime documentaries from totally engrossing experiences that we privately obsess over to totally engrossing experiences that we openly obsess over, the hipper murder-aficionados out there have been quick to remind the world of a documentary series from 2004 called The Staircase. Chronicling the investigation and murder trial of a novelist named Michael Peterson whose wife supposedly died after falling down a set of stairs (or “staircase”), The Staircase was Serial before it was cool and Making A Murderer before we all got sick of hearing about it. Unfortunately for anyone who didn’t realize how interesting murder is until well after 2004, actually getting a copy of The Staircase is now surprisingly difficult, which has the added effect of making the series even hipper than it was before.