What’s the best way to tell a true story? Television loves a drama with a “following is inspired by real events” caption to cover any embellishments added to the bare facts, but it also loves a true-crime documentary about felonies so outrageous their narratives don’t need a boost.
Occasionally, television gets so excited about a particular case it does a drama and a documentary about it, and sometimes the documentary wins. Last year, you could safely swerve The Thief, His Wife and the Canoe on ITV in favour of the same channel’s punchier The Thief, His Wife and the Canoe: The Real Story. Right now, iPlayer’s evocative four-part documentary Secrets of the Chippendales Murders means you needn’t bother with the gaudy re-enactments of Welcome to Chippendales on Disney+. Following the brilliant recent drama series The Gold, however, is an impossible task for The Gold: The Inside Story.
