'It's alright, mate, I've got your back': Keira Knightley on connection with Boston Strangler co-star Carrie Coon

Back in the early 1960s, the city of Boston was under siege by a serial killer.

Between June 1962 and January 1964, 13 single women from all walks of life were killed — the youngest victim 19 and the oldest 85. Most of them had been strangled by their own nylon stockings.

While most true-crime movies tell the story through the eyes of the killer or the police working to apprehend the perpetrator, the upcoming Disney+ movie Boston Strangler brings a refreshing new perspective.

Lead actress Keira Knightley said in a press conference on March 6: "I just thought it was a really interesting way of telling the story of a serial killer but through the point-of-view of these two female journalists.

"You've got a case where most people didn't know that it was two women who broke the story, that they've largely been erased from the history of this case."

Her co-star Carrie Coon concurred: "That was the most shocking part of it for me, that these women were so integral to breaking the case and in forcing the police departments to share information, and their names are never mentioned in association with it."

Keira, 37, plays Loretta McLaughlin, the real-life journalist for the Record American who connected two-and-two and realised that the multiple murders were linked. Carrie, 42, plays fellow investigative journalist Jean Cole who worked alongside Loretta.

They were even the ones who coined the moniker 'Boston Strangler', a name which has endured the test of time.

[embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=71so3Ad9JIw&ab_channel=DisneyPlusSingapore[/embed]

The movie serves as a "love song to female investigative journalists" for Keira.

"It really highlights how important it is to have women in positions of power in storytelling, because it was these two women that really went, 'This is an important story. This is information that needs to be in the public in order to keep the women of Boston safe.'"

It wasn't just Loretta and Jean who had each other's backs on screen, but Keira and Carrie behind-the-scenes as well.

Both actresses are mums to young children, with Keira having Edie, seven, and Delilah, three, and Carrie having Heskell, five, and a daughter born in 2021.

The actresses felt a sense of camaraderie in having to juggle work and being parents.

"There is something very, very nice about coming onto a set and just looking into another woman's eyes and [having] total understanding," Keira said. "So that was just a joy. Every time she was there, it was a joy.

"We could both look at each other through our completely sleepless eyes and be like, 'It's all right, mate. I've got your back'."

Carrie joked that, while she and Keira would have prepared extra hard for their roles, even learning shorthand like journalists of the era, before they had children, being mothers meant that they had no time for that anymore.

"We just hope that [the films are] well-written and we rely on what's on the page," she added.

Keira recalled that she had to learn to touch-type for her role as a journalist in the movie and realised in the middle of shooting a scene that she didn't know how to.

She said: "And I looked over at Carrie, and said, 'I haven't learned how to touch-type,' and she said, 'That's because you have two small children.'"

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The real-life Loretta also had to juggle work and kids, and Keira felt the journalist's life story resonated with her female audience.

"I've been speaking to quite a few women who've seen the film, and this word keeps coming up, which I find fascinating, that it was 'cathartic' to watch," she said.

"I probably experienced that when I read all of the things that [Loretta] came up against, whether it was the male-dominated workplace or desperately trying to have a home life and a job, trying to raise children at the same point as trying to get justice for these women."

Keira thought that despite the story being set in the 1960s, it was "something that a lot of women today can relate to".

Carrie felt that Jean's life story was an homage to the women in her life, and the two women becoming journalists during that era were "very compelling, very moving stories" to her.

"They certainly echoed the lives of the women from my world who grew up in the Midwest. My mother was a nurse and one of my grandmothers was a teacher, and the other was a homemaker," she said.

"Those were the opportunities available to women, aside from being a secretary, so Jean's fight to become a journalist was very moving to me."

Loretta and Jean went on to have illustrious careers as journalists, while the Boston Strangler's rampage eventually came to an end, with a man named Albert DeSalvo confessing to the crimes and being convicted for the murders in 1967.

He was linked to the last victim with DNA evidence decades later, but concerns remain among true-crime enthusiasts and journalists alike as to whether he was the only killer.

Boston Strangler, which also stars Chris Cooper and Alessandro Nivola, is out on Disney+ March 17.

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drimac@asiaone.com

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