Gray hair. Cozy cardigan. Warm smile. Lemonade in hand. Who’s more comforting than a grandmother?
The not-so-benign subjects of Killer Grannies broke the stereotype — not to mention the law, the rules of nature and possibly any string of pearls they might have been wearing when committing murder. Oscar-nominated actress June Squibb introduces them to true-crime fans every week on Oxygen.
Squibb graciously took time out from rehearsing for the Broadway play Marjorie Prime, with Cynthia Nixon, and turning 96 (“We celebrated with crepes from Lady M and chocolate cupcakes”) to exclusively fill Us Weekly in on these senior sinners.
“I once wrote a play about a true unsolved double murder that took place in 1922 in Somerset [County], New Jersey,” she reveals. “It was a scandalous affair between a priest and a member of his church choir. It made headlines in national newspapers, and the trial resulted in an acquittal of the [man’s] wife and her brothers.”
To digress a moment, we have to thank Ms. Squibb for alerting Us to this fascinating case of Edward Hall and Eleanor Mills, who, before their bodies were found near a notorious lovers’ lane, would exchange love notes in hymnals! Their story marked one of the first media circuses in the U.S., with looky-loos trampling the crime scene, vendors selling balloons and tabloids covering every single detail. Or creating them: One newspaper even staged a séance on the site. The most dramatic moment came in 1926 during the trial when a colorful local farm worker — dubbed “The Pig Lady” — came to the courtroom in her hospital bed. Battling cancer, she nonetheless managed to rise and point theatrically at the defendants when asked to ID the perps. Alas, she was belittled more than believed.
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But the widow, Mrs. Hall, was acquitted and thus no killer, so back to our grannies. Squibb tells Us she signed on because “I found it interesting to be a narrator for a true crime series — and then to find out the granny did it!” The ones whodunit have included Oregon’s Nancy Crampton Brophy, convicted of shooting her husband, beloved chef Dan Brophy, in the hopes of cashing in various insurance policies worth $800K. (You probably remember the footnote that novelist Nancy had once blogged a piece titled “How to Murder Your Husband.”) We’ve also met Florida’s Barbara Scott, who buried her spouse, Benny Scott, in the herb garden. She said she panicked after he died suddenly and buried him, but no one was expecting a bullet wound when he was unearthed. (She died in prison less than a year after her conviction.)
June Squibb in ‘Killer Grannies.’ Courtesy of Oxygen
Squibb — who most recently starred as a woman pretending to be a Holocaust survivor in Scarlett Johannson’s directorial debut, Eleanor the Great — is giving her narration an edge suited to the subject matter. (She delivers it from an overstuffed, Victorian-styled parlor, throw blanket on her lap.) “The director guides me on specific points of intrigue, compelling moments or tantalizing facts to draw out,” Squibb notes. These grandmothers appear to be “unassuming,” she adds — and the reenactments support that with cozy scenes of the ladies stitching needlepoint, baking cookies and giving out hugs.
Scarlett Johansson has been acting for more than three decades, but when she read the script for Eleanor the Great, she knew it was finally time to take her talents behind the camera. “There were so many things about the story that were both surprising and attractive to me,” Johansson, 40, told Us Weekly exclusively […]
Of course, those warm-and-fuzzy activities run counter to the geriatric criminals’ real deeds. In a few of the upcoming episodes, we meet a senior citizen who served lethal gravy, another who stashed the corpse of her hubby in a wishing well and a third who ran a boarding house where tenants kept expiring.
Does Squibb have anything in common with these women other than occupying the same demo? “The most ‘granny’ thing about me is my age,” she acknowledges. “The least ‘granny’ thing is that I’m interested in everything.” Just not committing murder.
If you’re interested in Killer Grannies, new episodes air Sundays at 8 p.m. ET on Oxygen.
