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Netflix's New Thriller Dangerous Lies Looks Like a Lifetime Movie Meets Riverdale


The trailer for Camila Mendes’s new Netflix movie, Dangerous Lies, just dropped, and I have a lot of thoughts.

Remember when Brenda Song starred in the Netflix thriller that gave off serious Lifetime movie vibes? You know, Secret Obsession, where she loses her memory in an accident and Mike Vogel pretends to be her husband, carting her off to a creepy house in the middle of nowhere with no cell reception and a lot of photoshopped couple pics? I think someone at Netflix went into their next pitch meeting and said, “That, but make it actually mysterious!”

ERIC MILNER/NETFLIX

“After losing her waitressing job, Katie Franklin (Mendes) takes a job as a caretaker to a wealthy elderly man in his sprawling, empty Chicago estate,” the Netflix description of Dangerous Lies reads on its press website. “The two grow close, but when he unexpectedly passes away and names Katie as his sole heir, she and her husband, Adam (Jessie T. Usher), are pulled into a complex web of lies, deception, and murder. If she’s going to survive, Katie will have to question everyone’s motives—even the people she loves.”

“Even the people she loves” means her husband, guys. Seriously, based on the trailer, Adam seems to really enjoy all that new money a bit too much, and you know how much Lifetime loves a sketchy husband. Apparently, Netflix does, too! Still, the whole thing also reads like a grown-up, movie-length episode of Riverdale with its New England landscape, noir lighting, that diner, and all the hot people (including Cam Gigandet and Jamie Chung).

Take a look at the trailer for yourself, below:

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Of course, I’d be remiss not to mention the Knives Out parallels, considering the hilarious whodunit that graced us with Chris Evans in that cozy sweater also centers around a caretaker who’s left with a fortune after her employer dies of questionable causes. (Quick question, can someone get Jessie T. Usher in the sweater, STAT?)

Dangerous Lies hits Netflix on April 30. With all these references in mind, how could you not give it a watch?



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Cheerleader Movies Are Big Business for Lifetime


I realized five minutes into Lifetime‘s Identity Theft of a Cheerleader, which premiered September 7, that it was going to be a journey. Is the made-for-TV movie good? Not in the Oscar-bait sense, of course, but it is unquestionably enjoyable. Partially-based on a real-life story, it follows Vicky (Maiara Walsh), a 30-year-old woman who steals a teen’s identity in order to re-enter high school and become a cheerleader. Her motivation? To win the affection of her mother, a former cheerleader herself, who berated Vicky as a child for not following in her footsteps.

Vicky becomes obsessed with living out this cheerleader fantasy—so much so that she kills anyone who threatens to expose her secret. “My mother always said I lacked ambition,” Vicky says right before her first kill, her eyes wide and terrifying. “That was the old Vicky. I’m Caitlin now, and Caitlin makes mommy proud.”

Maiara Walsh in Identity Theft of a Cheerleader.

Courtesy of Lifetime

The scene is creepy, but in a campy, I-can’t-believe-this-is-actually-happening way. That’s how Identity Theft of a Cheerleader hooked me. It’s no secret that Lifetime’s bread and butter are movies like this: far-fetched, head-scratching plots with lies, murder, and sex sprinkled in. What is surprising: Movies about cheerleaders are particularly successful for the network.

“Any time we had movies with a cheerleader theme, they just worked,” says Meghan Hooper, Lifetime’s SVP of original movies, co-productions, and acquisitions. “They would out-deliver and outperform.”

So Lifetime is leaning in with a month-long stunt aptly called “Cheer, Rally, Kill.” It started on September 2 with The Secret Lives of Cheerleaders, in which a high school’s new girl takes on the maniacal head cheerleader. The aforementioned Identity Theft of a Cheerleader followed soon after. This coming weekend the stunt will end with The Cheerleader Escort (September 14), about—you guessed it—a college cheerleader who moonlights as an escort, and the equally dramatic Undercover Cheerleader (September 15). These films vary as far as plot goes, but thematically they’re similar: They involve real or fake cheerleaders doing an assortment of sneaky, evil, and bonkers things.

It’s an interesting conceit. In their own bizarre way, these movies subvert the image of the Queen Bee cheerleader so often found in pop-culture. (Think Brooke Davis in One Tree Hill or Cheryl Blossom in Riverdale.) It’s a heightened, at times hilarious, look behind that “popular kid” curtain—a space I never occupied in high school. After watching a few of these Lifetime movies, I’m not too upset about that.



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Get Ready: Lifetime Is Making a Movie About the College Admissions Scandal


The college admissions scandal is tailor-made for television, and Lifetime is stepping in to bring it to life.

Yes, you read that correctly: Lifetime is making a movie about the real-life college admissions scandal, involving actresses Lori Loughlin and Felicity Huffman, that rocked the country earlier this year. If you’ll recall, a group of wealthy parents, including Huffman and Loughlin, were charged with fraud for essentially buying their children’s way into college. Lifetime obviously recognizes that this is just the kind of plot its viewers are obsessed with. On Tuesday, July 23, the network announced it’s green-lit a two-hour movie about the story with a very specific working title: College Admissions Scandal. It’s already iconic.

According to the synopsis, the film will “follow two wealthy mothers who share an obsession with getting their teenagers into the best possible college. When charismatic college admissions consultant Rick Singer offers a side door into the prestigious institutions of their dreams, they willingly partake with visions of coveted acceptance letters in their heads. But when Singer cooperates with the FBI and pleads guilty, the mothers who risked everything for their kids must face the consequences of their crimes and the loss of trust and respect from their families.”

Felicity Huffman

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The actual college admissions scandal is still in flux. In April, Huffman apologized to the public and then pled guilty to federal charges. Loughlin and her husband, Mossimo Giannulli, went with a not guilty plea and are currently awaiting trial. Their oldest daughter, Olivia Jade, has since dropped out of the University of Southern California and has lost brand partnerships with companies like Sephora and HP.

Actress Lori Loughlin and her husband Mossimo Giannulli wearing green tie at left leave the John Joseph Moakley United...

Lori Loughlin

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There’s no date for when Lifetime’s project is set to drop, but we’ll keep you posted with any and all information. Let the countdown (and the fun casting speculation) begin.



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The Trailer for Netflix's New Thriller Secret Obsession Is Serving Major Lifetime Vibes


Look out, Lifetime: It looks like Netflix is getting in on the “creepy relationship movie” game.

The streaming platform just released the trailer for a new thriller, Secret Obsession, that stars Brenda Song and Mike Vogel as a couple whose marriage isn’t all that it seems to be.

The trailer opens on Song’s character, Jennifer, waking up in the hospital, unsure of how she got there. Her husband, Russell (Vogel), says she was injured in an accident that left her with some major memory loss⁠—she has no recollection of her modern life, including who her husband is. So she takes Russell’s word at face value.

But something definitely feels off as Russell takes Jennifer home to a gorgeous home in the mountains where he says the nearest neighbor is a mile away. A detective (Dennis Haysbert) starts digging into the case and quickly discovers that this Russell isn’t actually Russell at all. “The audience actually finds out the twist before my character does. I think the thrilling part of the movie is trying help Jennifer catch up,” Song told Refinery29.

Check out the trailer for yourself, below:

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Secret Obsession is a departure from Netflix’s recent run of rom-coms like To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before, The Kissing Booth, and The Perfect Date—but we’re here for it. “I think people (me included) just love scaring themselves,” Song also told Refinery29. “Obviously having a stalker is no joking matter, but stalker movies are just so fascinating and terrifying.”

Song tweeted last month about the movie, “Sooo excited I can finally tell you guys that Secret Obsession is premiering in @Netflix on July 18th! Here’s a quick sypnopsis: Recuperating from trauma, Jennifer (Me) remains in danger as she returns to a life she doesn’t remember. Excited for you guys to see it!”

July 18 is only about a week away, people. Get ready.



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Alyssa Milano Interview Lifetime Tempting Fate Movie


As I sat and watched an early screener of Alyssa Milano‘s new Lifetime movie, Tempting Fate, I lost track of how many times I actually said out loud, “Oh shit.” In fact, there’s so many twists and turns I probably said worse than that. But when I meet up with Milano to talk about the movie and tell her this very story, she smiles in delight. “It’s really captivating, right?! This movie could have gone in a very exploitative, sensationalized direction, but there was a lot of depth and nuance. Plus, there’s the scandalous aspect of it.”

She’s not kidding. Tempting Fate is based on author Jane Green’s New York Times best-selling novel of the same name, and tells the story of what happens when wife and mom-of-two Gabby (Milano) is tempted by another man. It’s the kind of story that has been done a thousand times before, but under the direction of Kim Raver (Grey’s Anatomy) and Manu Boyer, it draws you in faster than one of Hannah Brown’s rose ceremonies on The Bachelorette.

Milano wanted to put her own spin on the character, and for that reason, didn’t read Green’s book ahead of filming. “I get really nervous reading books that people love and then going in and playing those characters,” she says. “I think I would obsessed over making sure I was giving the fans of the book what they felt they needed rather than giving the character what it needed to be a successful character.”

What the character is though is a flawed, multi-dimensional woman coming to terms with a not-so-honest husband, teenage daughters, and a life not quite as fulfilling as she’d like. “What struck me most is this is someone that was truly accountable for their actions,” she says. “Gabby’s like, ‘Yeah, I made a choice, my entire life blew up, and I gotta put the pieces back together even though I know it’s never going to be what it was.’ We don’t really see that so much in films.”

And you don’t see many actors like Milano, who are willing to pull back the curtain on the process, and what happens when life imitates art and vice-versa. Here, the impassioned activist opens up about all of that and more.

Lifetime

Glamour: Why did the role of Gabby appeal to you?



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Victoria Gotti Wants Her New Lifetime Movie to Change What You Think About the Gotti Family


As the daughter of one of the most notorious crime bosses, Victoria Gotti wants you to know there’s more to her family than you think. “We’re human,” she tells Glamour. “If people see that, that’s all they need to know.” They’ll get their chance this weekend with the latest Lifetime true crime movie Victoria Gotti: My Father’s Daughter.

Gotti executive produces and narrates the movie about her life, which does a deep dive into her childhood and teenage years. Chelsea Frei (YouTube’s Sideswiped) plays Gotti as an adult, and General Hospital Emmy-winner Maurice Benard plays her father, John Gotti. “I wanted to do justice to somebody who is alive and well,” Frei says. “I remember meeting Victoria and thinking, ‘This isn’t just the stories that I knew over the years. This is a really genuine person with a family.'”

Gotti credits Lifetime for giving her a say in the casting process, and she’s excited for people to see a different side of her family. Read more of our interview with her, Frei, and Benard, below.

Glamour: Maurice and Cheslea, how much did you know about the Gotti family before this film?

Chelsea Frei: I knew a bunch. I’m from Boston and everybody is obsessed with the Gottis there. I never saw Growing Up Gotti until I started auditioning for this film, but it’s so good.

Maurice Benard: I watched all of it, and it was a trip. I loved it. You didn’t know what was going to happen from one second to the next.

Victoria, how involved were you with Maurice and Chelsea’s casting?

Victoria Gotti: I was very much part of it, but I have to give [Lifetime] credit because I think, in the end, they wouldn’t make a decision without my final approval, which was nice. [With Maurice], I told them, ‘I think he’s the guy.’ And then Chelsea was right after that. They’re both brilliant. I thank Lifetime for [acknowledging I know] who is going to be better at playing the people that I know better than anybody else there does.

Chelsea and Maurice, how nerve-wracking was it to meet Victoria, especially given her hands-on involvement in the project?

Maurice: For Chelsea, it was difficult because Victoria’s right there [and she’s playing her]. It’s like if I had John Gotti in front of me; it’s a lot of pressure and would be very difficult. But for me, it’s a very difficult and very exhilarating role. The best advice was from Victoria when she said to play [John] like Michael Corleone in The Godfather and not Tony Soprano. And also, I had a great connection with Chelsea. It was like a father/daughter [relationship].

Lifetime

Chelsea: I’ll never forget when we met in the hotel the first day, and I was very excited because I grew up watching General Hospital. When I found out I was doing the movie, my mom was freaking out and then I was like, ‘And guess who’s playing John Gotti?!’ I mean, it was just crazy. I’m such a fan.

Victoria, you narrate the film and appear on camera. Was that your decision?

Victoria: I wish I could take the credit for that, but I can’t. The network called me…I was against it.

So why did you say yes?

Victoria: They threatened me. [Laughs] I’m kidding. They said if I didn’t like it when we finished, they’d take it out.

What was the most challenging scene?

Maurice: Everything kept me up at night. I truly wanted to be great for Victoria, because it’s her father. I wanted to be great for Chelsea, who I’m working with. Same for Catherine [Cyran], the director. And for Lifetime. So it was non-stop pressure. I haven’t seen the movie, but I’ve seen enough [clips] to know it looks amazing. Chelsea’s amazing. I’m pretty good. I think I’m actually good. [Laughs]



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