Netflix's latest true-crime series Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story brings one of the world's most sensationalized cases to life, with the help of rising star Nicholas Chavez. In the Ryan Murphy-produced Netflix series, Chavez plays Lyle Menendez, the older brother of the real-life pair who was sentenced to life in prison for the 1989 murders of their parents Jose and Kitty Menendez.
Though the 25-year-old actor makes his Netflix debut in the harrowing series, Chavez is already an award-winning actor who has found fame through one of Hollywood's most intense subcultures: the soap opera world. Read on to learn more about the Monsters star, including the surprising friend he made while starring in another Ryan Murphy series.
Nicholas Chavez found his love for acting as a high schooler.
Nicholas Alexander Chavez, 25, was born in Houston, Texas, and spent part of his childhood there before relocating to Denver, Colorado. According to SoapHub, he majored in acting at the Mason Gross School of the Arts Acting Conservatory in New Brunswick, New Jersey, before moving to L.A., where he landed his first-ever acting role on General Hospital.
Speaking with PEOPLE in 2022, Chavez revealed that he became interested in acting when he got to play Atticus Finch in a high school production of To Kill a Mockingbird, after another student called out sick.
"I didn't really know what I wanted to do with my life when I was in high school," he told the outlet. "So when the faculty all came and saw the production, I had multiple people pull me aside and say, 'You should consider doing this as a profession,' which sounded really, really crazy to me because that wasn't generally something you did for work in Denver."
Nicholas Chavez is a Daytime Emmy winner who started his acting career on the soap opera 'General Hospital.'
Chavez made his TV debut as another rich kid with a run-in with the law, Spencer Cassadine, on the legendary soap opera in 2021, and quickly became a breakout star. In June 2022, less than a year after joining the series, he won a Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Younger Performer in a Drama Series.
"12 months before I received that award, I was selling cars down in Florida so it was a paradigm shift of epic proportions," he told PEOPLE in September 2022. "It was very, very surreal to stand up on that stage and be recognized for the thing that I'm more passionate about than anything else in life. It was a real dream come true, and I'm incredibly thankful—and still now, months later, in disbelief quite frankly."
Unfortunately for soap fans (but less so for Netflix fans), Chavez made his last appearance on General Hospital in January 2024. He took a leave of absence from the show to film in Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story, before confirming his exit from the soap in May, per Deadline.
Nicholas Chavez is the Ryan Murphy-verse's newest star (and he's friends with fellow newbie Travis Kelce).
Monsters isn't the only Murphy-verse show that Chavez stars in this month. He'll also have a leading role as Father Charlie Mayhew in the FX series Grotesquerie, which premieres on Wednesday, September 25, less than a week after Monsters hit streaming on Netflix. Details on his character have been sparse, but his storyline will probably intertwine with the character Sister Megan (Micaela Diamond), a journalist nun who helps Detective Lois Tryon (Niecy Nash-Betts) investigate a series of crimes.
While Chavez has remained tight-lipped on his character, he has joined some of his co-stars in singing the praises of Travis Kelce, who makes his acting debut in the series. Speaking to PEOPLE at the Grotesquerie premiere, Chavez said that he "really enjoyed getting to know" Kelce on set and that the football star is a "friendly and cool guy."
“He has such an exciting character in this show, and I think that people should be looking forward to seeing Travis shine because guy's a star,” he said, teasing that Kelce “handled the material like a pro. He’s awesome.”
Nicholas Chavez is a fitness buff and avid traveler.
Chavez's Instagram is best described as curated. Though he only has a couple dozen posts, it's easy to tell upon browsing that the actor is passionate about fitness and world travel. According to his feed, some countries he's visited include Italy, Japan, Ireland, Mexico, Greece, and Turkey. The rising star also told PEOPLE in 2022 that he booked his spur-of-the-moment trip to Istanbul, Athens, and Rome four days before he left.
Nicholas Chavez is dating fellow actor Victoria Abbott.
As for his romantic life, Chavez is happily taken. The Monsters star has been dating Victoria Abbott for several months, with the two actors appearing in each other's Instagram posts since spring 2024. It's unknown how the couple met, but they could have started as an on-set romance, as Abbott is also set to appear in a recurring role in Grotesquerie.
Before Grotesquerie, Abbott had her breakout role in Netflix's 2022 thriller series Echoes.
Nicholas Chavez hadn't heard of the Menendez murders before landing the role in 'Monsters.'
Though the Menendez brothers' case is a well-known true-crime story (that has been adapted to screen before), Chavez did not know about the events before landing the role in Monsters. In an interview with TheWrap, he revealed that he watched footage from the trial and "several" documentaries as part of his research for the show.
“The first thing that I did was called the people who I love who were alive at the time, and then I asked them what their perspective was and what their impression was,” he told the outlet.
Chavez also said of the new series, “This show is going to present the facts from so many different perspectives. Ultimately, it’s going to allow people to make their own judgments about this family and the events that transpired, and I think that that’s one of the more compelling aspects of the show."
