Team of the Woman of the Hour depicts the violent murders of Rodney Alcala

SPOILER ALERT: This story contains mild spoilers for “Woman of the Hour,” now streaming on Netflix.

“Woman of the Hour” screenwriter Ian McDonald faced a unique challenge with his second feature: tell a true crime story that felt “necessary and useful.” Luckily, the stranger story of Rodney Alcala, who won “The Dating Game” in 1978 while performing in the midst of a serial murder, was ripe for investigation.

“There are many cases where a serial killer attacks a group of women and there is absolutely no reason to tell,” McDonald says. “There was something about it that felt like it could be socially and culturally relevant now. Sometimes you hear people say, “Rodney is a bit like Ted Bundy,” by which I think they mean he is handsome and educated. But he was actually completely different: he was a chameleon. He was good at pretending to be something he wasn't. That’s exactly what I found interesting, because it was the culture that regularly looked the other way and that enabled him.”

Directed by Anna Kendrick, who also plays Cheryl, an actress who chooses Alcala as the game show winner, the film premiered to critical acclaim at the 2023 Toronto International Film Festival and premiered on Netflix on October 18. Days later, it's in theaters and is at the top of the streaming service's list of most-watched films, which could be evidence of a compelling story with unconventional storytelling.

McDonald says that an important element in creating the script was narrowing down which victim interactions he wanted to portray, since Alcala may have killed up to 130 people.

“That was the thing that changed the most over the course of development,” he says. “It was less about the question 'Which victim do we want to write about personally?' Furthermore, the way one opens and closes a film says a lot about the thematic intent of the film and has enormous dramatic impact. You can do this chronologically by starting with his earliest murder and then moving on to his most recent. You can approach it thematically and find specific events that you think build upon one another in insightful ways or are based on character. How does each crime reveal something new about the murderer? It was a mix of the last two – so to speak, we landed.”

When re-enacting the murders, McDonald and Kendrick are consciously careful not to display unnecessary levels of violence, but also not to make light of McDonald's terrible crimes.

“Any of the moments of violence were something I really pondered about because this isn't (David Fincher's influential 1995 crime thriller) 'Seven.'” I love “Seven,” but in this movie you just go because of the fact that “It’s a true crime story, assuming it’s about real people,” he says. “They had families and their world was taken away from them. You want to make sure you do it in a way that responsibly reveals the killer for what he was, and that accurately reflects the darkness he represents without being unnecessary. It's a difficult path, but I took it very seriously. There was a lot of 'add this line, cut this line' – cutting and moving around just to make sure the story was complete.”

This empathy for the victims was also reflected in the script's point of view as the characters deal with Alcala's increasingly sinister nice guy. A standout scene – in which Cheryl leaves a bar with Alcala and then walks away while he casually follows her – was written with sensitivity by McDonald.

“Men also find themselves in compromising situations, usually with other men,” he says. “You know when things suddenly feel awkward and uncomfortable and perhaps threatening. I've been in some scary situations and was able to draw from my personal experience on that level. But it's not the same either, because I'm 1.90 meters tall and weigh 90 kilos. It will definitely always be different. At this point, all that matters is listening. At the very beginning of writing this, I turned to a few friends and said, “Hey, can we grab some lunch?” Can you tell me stories about your experiences where you went on a date and it felt threatening or felt disturbing? “What did that actually look like?” That’s something that was refined as the script developed.”

Beyond this involvement, McDonald says Kendrick was also actively involved in exploring the film's themes with him.

“There was a scene between the hitchhiker and Rodney,” McDonald says. “Anna looked at the script and said, 'I really like that you're writing her with so much agency, but you have to give her less because she's very direct and kind of combative with him at the moment. “The truth is, we have to do this little dance where we're polite and appeasing, but without contradicting them.” At that point, you just listen to people who have experiences you don't have and try to to be honest and make sure it finds its way into the document.”

Watch the trailer for “Woman of the Hour” below.