Recreating Los Angeles in the late 20th century is no small feat, but for production designer Matthew Flood Ferguson—known for his long-time collaboration with Ryan Murphy—it’s all about spotting the subtle details that define the era.
“Whenever I’m scouting, I’m always keeping an eye out for any architectural detail that is interesting and period correct or that I can build off to create an environment,” he explained.
Ferguson is no stranger to the intricacies of period design, having earned an Emmy nomination for his work on the Netflix miniseries Hollywood. Now, he returns to Ryan Murphy’s Monster anthology series, Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story, which focuses on the infamous 1989 Menendez brothers case.
Tasked with recreating Los Angeles landmarks from the late 1980s and early ’90s, Ferguson and his team not only had to reconstruct the home of José and Kitty Menendez but also meticulously recreate the crime scene—using graphic crime scene photos to ensure the accuracy of the living room where the murders took place.
“It can be challenging at times,” Ferguson admits. “If there are photos that are graphic, I have to black them out so we can focus more on the space from the images that we don’t necessarily need to look at.”
In an interview with Awards Focus, Ferguson delves into the process of designing the Menendez family home, how the fast-paced production schedule shaped his location scouting, and the surprising period detail he uncovered on a tennis court.
Awards Focus: The reception to the show has been pretty expansive. What’s it been like for you since the show was released?
Ferguson: It’s certainly been eye-opening for all of us who worked on the show. I grew up in Texas in the 80’s and remember when the crime happened, but I only remember Dominick Dunne’s version. I wasn’t really aware of the abuse. So, doing the research really opened my eyes to the different facets of this case.
AF: Similar to Hollywood, you’re recreating an era of Los Angeles. What was your starting point with Monster: Menendez Brothers, and how did that experience help you here?
Ferguson: I’ve done a lot of period shows, and they’re always challenging because we live in 2024, or whatever year it is, and the world doesn’t look like it did back then. Los Angeles definitely doesn’t.
It really starts with quite a bit of research, which I enjoy. I love going to bookstores, or at least the ones that remain. I pull research from album covers, and once we sort of set a world, that becomes the parameter. When we go out and shoot, we recreate the different sets and locations so that they’re true to the era.
AF: When you’re looking at items and locations to bring into the show, what becomes your throughline? Is there an overarching color palette?
Ferguson: Blue was our color palette for Monsters: Menendez Brothers. When we did Dahmer, it was a very dingy yellow, and Hollywood was sort of Gold and Brown. Every show that I’ve done with Ryan [Murphy], there’s always a color palette. He talked about the color, so we knew early on it would be blue. It really helps to form a sort of base for the design, and everything builds off of it.
AF: So, coming from Dahmer, I can imagine the research is pretty confronting, particularly when you’re designing scenes of the murders. How do you approach recreating these scenes?
Ferguson: We researched a lot of crime scenes so that we could recreate the sets as historically accurate as possible. You know, it’s not that I separate myself from the story and what happened, but once I get involved in the set and the mechanics of what we’re building, it starts to become about the material and the color and the carpet and the type of wood that we then put together to create the environment.
I have found that when we recreated the bedroom of one of Dahmer’s victims, Tony Hughes, once the set was dressed, it’s almost like the person came back, and you feel that person. They sort of go away in the process of developing it, but then they come back when the set is complete.
AF: In the early part of the season, after the murders, there’s very quick movement between scenes showing Erik and Lyle moving on with life. Were you dressing certain sets for a short scene and then quickly moving on? What was the pace of production like?
Ferguson: Absolutely. There were many scenes in the scripts, and a lot of them were about half a page. So, in terms of making the days work, I would have to go out when we were shooting on location and find locations that could serve as three different sets but also be under one roof. So, whenever I’m scouting, I’m always keeping an eye out for any architectural detail that is interesting and period-correct or that I can build off to create an environment.
We shot at a bank in Woodland Hills that was empty. It was a gutted building, and there was one area that had a concrete header and a brick wall, so I built a three-wall set attached to it. That became the adoption agency when Leslie Abramson went to talk about adopting a child. The other side of the bank had a very low ceiling and storefront windows. We built walls and made the Wilshire Hair Replacement Center, where Jose takes Lyle to get his first toupee. So, many locations doubled up to look like different sets.
AF: How much time do you have before you go into production, and do you have all the scripts in pre-production?
Ferguson: It’s very fast. We didn’t have all the scripts, and then other scenes would come in. So, you have to move very quickly. I almost have to anticipate the unknown.
For instance, I knew that episode five was going to be a single take because Ryan had mentioned it early on. I built the interview room before we built any of the other prisons, and I wanted the space to be big enough and believable enough that there was an opportunity to film the scene in one continuous take. It was important to have some visual interest on the walls, so I put these interior windows that looked to an outer hallway so there was light coming into the scene.
The day I met with Ryan and [cinematographer] Jason McCormick, they came on set, and we talked about the placement of the table. We ended up breaking one wall that we had built so that Jason could get his camera in and take this long shot.
AF: When it came to the courtroom scenes, were you able to transpose a courtroom from the inside into multiple filming locations, or did you construct these sets?
Ferguson: When I got the job, I asked the executive producer whether we would build a courtroom. He said no, that this is not going to be a courtroom drama. So, around episode five or six, suddenly, you could see this will become a courtroom drama. I quickly scouted what was available, and it wasn’t much. We ended up building one main courtroom, but I had four different walls behind the judge’s bench that were on chain motors, so we could switch them out so they could play as different courtrooms. We had different carpets, too. The jury box was on casters, and we could roll it out and put it on the other side of the room.
AF: What was the most difficult location or item to source for the show?
Ferguson: Believe it or not, the Menendez family home was a challenge to find. We built the interior on the sound stage, but the exterior needed to have a motor court right in front of the door because it was scripted where you walk in the door, go to the TV room, commit the crime, and come back out. We also needed a pool, a tennis court, and a guest house to [laughs].
It wasn’t easy to find that in LA, so we ended up using three different locations for that one house. The front of the Menendez house was one location where we built the metal fence that they had with the electric gates and the back of the house with a pool. The guest house was the second location, and then the tennis court was in Sherman Oaks because in 2004, the Nation Tennis Association changed the color of the tennis courts.
AF: It’s fascinating to hear about the level of detail and the things a viewer just wouldn’t think about, but it maintains that believability while watching the series.
Ferguson: Totally, and it helps tell the story because it keeps you in the period. Going back to the research and setting the tone and the world that we’re going to create, you have to stay in it with every set. The minute you step out, or you let your guard down, you give it away.