I'm a big fan of a) true crime, and b) being called out, so I really enjoyed the first season of Based on a True Story.
If you did, too, here are some things you should know about it:
1. Kaley Cuoco, who plays Ava, really was pregnant during filming.
She told USA Today that she enjoyed the experience, saying, "I remember one of our producers and our showrunner was like, 'You need to eat more.' ... And I was like, 'I have never heard that before!' So I'm like, 'Sure! Happy to!' It was freeing," adding that her go-to was In-N-Out burgers.
"You've seen every part of my life — good and bad — in front of everyone. And so it was kind of cool to show this too," she says. "Why not? Why not just own it and wear short shirts and let my stomach hang out? I did the swimsuit scene, and I did all these different things, and it felt right. And I'm very proud of it, and I hope it inspires other women to be like, 'It's fine. We can still do it all.'"
2. She didn't film her character's sex scenes, though.
A stunt double wearing a prosthetic pregnant belly handled them.
"I'm past that. I'm not doing that anymore," Cuoco said in the same interview. "Also, who wants to see that? Not my thing. I'd rather let someone else do it, and that's what's movie magic [is for]. We don't have to do those things anymore. We can have someone else do it, and we can fake our way through."
3. Cuoco's onscreen husband, Chris Messina, had a stunt double for his character's tennis scenes, as well.
"You think that Chris Messina played tennis?" Cuoco asked. "Please! He was terrible! That's his double."
4. Before Cuoco's pregnancy was written into the show, Ava and her husband Nathan were going to be parents to teens.
5. Tom Bateman read The Psychopath Test as part of his research to play the Westside Ripper.
"[Author Jon Ronson] interviews all these psychopaths," Bateman explained to Entertainment Tonight. "And one of the things he said that really struck him about the people he interviewed was that they wear these masks. He said, 'I can't believe it. These people come across as charming and funny and sweet and kind and thoughtful." They remembered his birthday and things like that. And this psychiatrist that he's talking to, she said, "Well, that's what they do… They have no empathy, so they're very, very good at just performing a role."
6. The Westside Ripper isn't based on any one serial killer.
Bateman told NBC Insider that his interpretation of the character is made of "total amalgamations" that were "stitched together" to create the Ripper.
"For me, a lot of the inspiration I got was mainly from the script," he said. "Really, just seeing how [the writers] wanted this guy to operate and what interested him."
7. Bateman had a hard time filming the scene where the Ripper murders Natalia Dyer's character, Chloe.
"I’m very big and she’s a lot smaller than me, so to tower over someone and have them scream in your face in terror, it kind of eats into you after the third, fourth hour of which you’re filming it," he told NBC Insider.
8. We'll learn more about Matt's villain origin story in future seasons.
"[Executive producer Craig Rosenberg] didn’t want to spend all of his chips on Season 1," Bateman told Variety. "He wanted to hold something back, and have a few firecrackers in his pocket."
9. CrimeCon, the true crime convention featured in Episodes 4 and 5 is a real annual event.
It did indeed take place in Las Vegas in 2022.
10. The show didn't film in Vegas, however, opting instead for the more economical InterContinental Hotel in downtown Los Angeles.
11. The crew had to get creative when designing the event.
"There’s not really a lot of research out there on CrimeCon," production designer Suzuki Ingerslev told Nerds and Beyond. "We kept trying to look for things, and there wasn’t. So, we invented some of the booths, and Craig had his idea for some of the booths that he needed to tell the story."
12. Chris Messina thought the event was made up for the show.
13. According to Bateman, Messina is a "very intense kisser."
There's (sort of) a lot of kissing in Episode 4, some of which happens between Nathan and Matt out on the dancefloor during CrimeCon.
14. CrimeCon isn't the only namedropping the series does.
In addition to celebrities like Jessica Alba and Tom Hanks, other true crime podcasts like Crime Junkie are mentioned.
15. Like her character, Kaley Cuoco is a big true crime fan.
"I have always loved true crime," she told Entertainment Weekly. "I think that it's in addiction. You're watching sometimes very good people do very bad things. And it's hard to look away, which is why I loved what this project was, because it is very good people who make a bad choice and get caught in the aftermath of all that."
16. Chris Messina and Tom Bateman, on the other hand, weren't as familiar with it before joining Based on a True Story.
Messina revealed to Collider, "I’ve never listened to them. I’ve seen shows about them. It’s not where I choose to spend my time, although I see the fascination with it. When I watch them, I’m always trying to figure out how, if I’m ever in that awful situation, one gets out of it. It’s almost like taking some self-defense class by watching it. I learned a lot about them, by doing the show."
Bateman, meanwhile, told NBC Insider, "I think it might be something that’s far bigger in America than it is in the UK."