The Charles Manson series we deserve

This could be a great Netflix series

In the course of reviewing Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Steve Sailer pulls back the curtains a bit:

Tarantino Punches the Damn Dirty Hippies

Prosecutor Vincent Bugliosi was much appreciated within the entertainment industry for portraying Manson as an LSD-crazed apocalyptic avenger. Bugliosi’s masterful job of making Manson seem like the ultimate outsider sidetracked the question of why a lowlife jailbird like Manson had become something of an insider at the best parties in the Hollywood Hills.

Why exactly did Manson know so many important people in showbiz? The answer was the same as for why Jeffrey Epstein knew so many important people in politics: He had access to jailbait girls.

Without all the Helter Skelter stuff, Manson would seem less like the Antichrist and more like an ambitious pimp, an ex-con who was adept at chatting up runaway girls fresh off the Greyhound bus.

Worth noting that the image of Manson as the acid-drenched Anti-Christ has persisted for half a century. Such is the power of the Narrative when self-interest, laziness, and ideological commitment coincide.

Here’s a throw-away passage that should be the premise for an epic revisionist streaming series:

In Philip Marlowe detective novels, murder investigations tend to turn over a lot of rocks and shine embarrassing lights on what’s underneath. The Manson case could similarly have dented the reputations of numerous celebrities who had nothing to do with the killings, but who had plenty of other secrets they didn’t want exposed.

For example, Tate’s husband Roman Polanski, Hollywood’s hottest director, fingered John Phillips of the Mamas and the Papas as a possible killer because Polanski, like much of the entertainment industry, had been sleeping with Phillips’ wife Michelle.

And we all know that Polanski and Phillips had other dark secrets separate from the murder of Sharon Tate.

A Raymond Chandler story set in the Age of Aquarius. Mean streets and the mansions of New Hollywood. In the hands of a good director and with the right cast, this would be an instant classic.

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