Debra Tate, sister of celebrated actress and Manson Family murder victim Sharon Tate, has insisted on a boycott of NBC’s Manson series Aquarius Variety reports.
Aquarius, which follows David Duchovny as a detective going undercover to track the Manson Family and prevent their killing spree, just began its second season. A plot point of this season will be the Tate/LaBianca murders, the most publicized and widely known of the horrendous crimes perpetuated by the cult. Debra Tate was not pleased with this naturally, but the way her sister’s murder is being handled by the show is what drove her to speak out on social media and call for a boycott against the series.
“Do it tastefully, or at least give us courtesy of knowing what you guys are doing. It’s extremely insensitive to be portraying people in an untruthful manner,” said Tate. “If it were our dead bodies lying on the floor, you don’t want the world witnessing that.”
Tate said that she was ignored by NBC when she requested to speak with them about the content of the show. Tate was also caught off-guard when an ad for the series appeared that consisted of a slow close-up on the face of a dead Sharon Tate as Manson walked over her.
True crime shows, both docuseries and dramatizations, have become more and more popular recently. This rise in popularity has caused Tate to team up with friend Kim Goldman, sister of murder victim Ron Goldman, to speak out against true crime dramatizations like Aquarius and People v. O.J. Simpson. Tate said, “I would like to see the industry take a different attitude. At the very least they could apologize.”
There have been a handful of TV and film adaptations of the Manson Family murders, but for the most complete, detailed account of the case read Manson prosecuting attorney Vincent Bugliosi’s book Helter Skelter: The True Story of The Manson Murders.