Charles Manson
On two nights in early August of 1969, two horrible murder sprees were committed in Los Angeles. The first night there were five victims, including the actress Sharon Tate, wife of the director Roman Polanski. The second night, a wealthy couple in another section of the city were murdered. The crimes were extraordinarily brutal, committed by gun and knife; the stab wounds were in the hundreds.
It was months before the perpetrators were arrested. The leader was Charles Manson, the small, bizarre ex-convict and hippie-like guru of a loosely associated group that was known as the Family. The others were some of his followers, including four middle-class girls, dropouts from society who were fanatically devoted to him.
Charles Manson traces Charles Manson's past from birth through the days when he collected followers in Northern and Southern California through the crimes, the arrests, the trial, and the more than 25 years that have passed since.
Through recent interviews with Manson, three followers (Patricia Krenwinkel, Leslie Van Houten, and Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme), and contemporary observers of the Family and the crimes, the program looks back at the events with the new perspective that a quarter-century has provided. Charles Manson and "Squeaky" Fromme are still unapologetic for what happened, but Patricia Krenwinkel and Leslie Van Houten understand fully now what they did and they express it forcefully and eloquently.
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