The upcoming crime drama web series is inspired by true events that occurred in Texas in 1980. Love & Death features Elizabeth Olsen, Jesse Plemons, Lily Rabe, Patrick Fugit and Krysten Ritter in lead roles. The show is written by Dabid E. and made under the direction of Lesli Linka Glatter. The mini-series is currently streaming on HBO.
Love & Death is based on Candy Montgomery’s story which was in the news for an elongated period. In 1990, even a movie was made by Stephen Gyllenhaal titled ‘A Killing in a small town’ on the exact circumstance. Candy is an ordinary housewife and churchgoer, who never considered doing anything immoral. But as the course of events happened, she was accused of killing her close friend Betty Gore, who was the wife of her lover.
The story begins in 1977 when Candy Montgomery arrived in Texas and got married to engineer Pat Montgomery. She was blessed with a daughter and a son and used to be a faithful member of the Church. But she comprehensively wasn’t happy with her married life as it had become monotonous for her. As per reports, she even talked to her friends about having an affair. The opening line of the trailer goes, “Would you be interested in having an affair?” this says a lot about what Candy aspired to prefer to escape from her uninteresting life.
She eventually bumped into Allan Gore, who was also a churchgoer like her and played volleyball for the church. They both first met at a benefit exhibit for the Church and their families quickly got familiar with each other. In 1978, while playing volleyball Candy was collied by Allan, that was the moment when she decided that he would be the one to elude her from her tedious life.
After a series of deep discussions filled with rules and regulations, they both agreed on having an affair. The pair started meeting in hotel rooms and restaurants accompanied by lunch and brunch dates. The relationship appeared to go quite well for some time but Allan started facing problems with his wife. Because of that, he paused meeting Candy until her wife went through her delivery. However, they both ended the agreement after an unfortunate event.
Everything was going well between the two families until one fateful day transpired a horrifying crime. On 13th June 1980, Montgomery went to Betty’s house for collecting Allan’s daughter’s swimsuit, later that day Betty was found dead in the house and was hit by an axe. Allan had called Candy to inform her about this tragic incident and she had stated that she did saw her that morning.
Everything came to a downfall when Allan confessed his affair with Montgomery and then she was kept up as the first suspect. The police had taken her for trial a few times but she had denied the accusations. On the suggestion of her lawyer Don Crowder, she went to see a hypnotherapist to recollect the string of happenings that occurred that day. After 3 meetings, it was inferred that Montgomery had killed Betty because she had shushed her, triggering a certain impulse in Candy.
As per the legal proceedings, Montgomery was found not guilty as she had hit her in self-defence. Candy remarked that when she was at Allan’s house, Betty confronted her about the affair with Gore. Subsequently, Betty bought a three-foot axe and the two of them started fighting in the act of self-defence, Candy hit her with an axe. But when Betty shushed Montgomery, in response to a childhood incident, she hit Betty 40 times.
