History Trivia / AmericanCrimeStory

* TroubledProduction: After the acclaimed first season, production of the second season, ''Katrina'', ran into quite a bit of trouble. The season was originally to be based on Douglas Brinkley's book ''The Great Deluge: Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans, and the Mississippi Gulf Coast'', with Creator/DennisQuaid as UsefulNotes/GeorgeWBush, Matthew Broderick as Michael D. "Brownie" Brown, and Annette Bening as Kathleen Blanco, and Creator/CubaGoodingJr. and Courtney B. Vance were set to return in new roles. All of these actors left the project when the season's focus changed considerably by changing the source material to Sheri Fink's ''Five Days at Memorial: Life and Death in a Storm-Ravaged Hospital''. Show creator Ryan Murphy had difficulty working on the project and it got "stalled," leading to a two year gap between airings and the intended third season, ''Versace'', becoming the second in place of ''Katrina'', and in turn the intended fourth season, about the impeachment of President UsefulNotes/BillClinton, became the third season as ''Impeachment''. Whether the Katrina season will actually be made or not is uncertain, especially after it was announced that the new fourth season would be about the co-founders of Studio 54 being convicted of tax evasion, pondering on whether ''Katrina'' was QuietlyCancelled or is "only" on DevelopmentHell.

* TroubledProduction: After the acclaimed first season, production of the second season, ''Katrina'', ran into quite a bit of trouble. The season was originally to be based on Douglas Brinkley's book ''The Great Deluge: Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans, and the Mississippi Gulf Coast'', with Creator/DennisQuaid as UsefulNotes/GeorgeWBush, Matthew Broderick as Michael D. "Brownie" Brown, and Annette Bening as Kathleen Blanco, and Creator/CubaGoodingJr. and Courtney B. Vance were set to return in new roles. All of these actors left the project when the season's focus changed considerably by changing the source material to Sheri Fink's ''Five Days at Memorial: Life and Death in a Storm-Ravaged Hospital''. Show creator Ryan Murphy had difficulty working on the project and it got "stalled," leading to a two year gap between airings and the intended third season, ''Versace'', becoming the second in place of ''Katrina'', and in turn the intended fourth season, about the impeachment of President UsefulNotes/BillClinton, became the third season as ''Impeachment''. [[DevelopmentHell Whether the season will actually be made or not is uncertain]].

* RealitySubtext: Thanks to behind-the-scenes difficulties, the season about the impeachment of President UsefulNotes/BillClinton--to be titled ''Impeachment''--didn't begin pre-production until the Summer of 2019. Just a few months after work began on that season, it was announced that President UsefulNotes/DonaldTrump would be facing an impeachment investigation of his own.
* ReleaseDateChange: The third installment ''Impeachment'' was intended to premiere on September 27, 2020, though its premiere has been delayed to September 7, 2021 due to the UsefulNotes/COVID19Pandemic.

* WhatCouldHaveBeen: Creator/BettyGilpin was originally announced to appear in ''Impeachment'' as Ann Coulter, but was replaced by Creator/CobieSmulders due to scheduling conflicts related to the UsefulNotes/COVID19Pandemic.

* WhatCouldHaveBeen: Creator/BettyGilpin was originally announced to appear in ''Impeachment'' as Ann Coulter, but was replaced by Creator/CobieSmulders due to scheduling conflicts.

* ReleaseDateChange: The third installment ''Impeachment'' was intended to premiere on September 27, 2020, though its premiere has been delayed to September 7, 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

* WhatCouldHaveBeen: Murphy optioned the book ''A Vast Conspiracy'' about the Monica Lewinsky scandal, but decided against doing a season based on it after running into Lewinsky and deciding it should only be done if she could be part of the production team. [[SubvertedTrope Indeed]], in August 2019, it came to light that the season, called ''Impeachment'', would air in September 2020 with Lewinsky serving as a producer for the show during the season.

* WhatCouldHaveBeen: Murphy optioned the book ''A Vast Conspiracy'' about the Monica Lewinsky scandal, but decided against doing a season based on it after running into Lewinsky and deciding it should only be done if she could be part of the production team. Indeed, in August 2019, it came to light that the season, called ''Impeachment'', would air in September 2020 with Lewinsky serving as a producer for the show during the season.

* TroubledProduction: After the acclaimed first season, production of the second season, ''Katrina'', ran into quite a bit of trouble. The season was originally to be based on Douglas Brinkley's book ''The Great Deluge: Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans, and the Mississippi Gulf Coast'', with Creator/DennisQuaid as UsefulNotes/GeorgeWBush, Matthew Broderick as Michael D. "Brownie" Brown, and Annette Bening as Kathleen Blanco, and Creator/CubaGoodingJr. and Courtney B. Vance were set to return in new roles. All of these actors left the project when the season's focus changed considerably by changing the source material to Sheri Fink's ''Five Days at Memorial: Life and Death in a Storm-Ravaged Hospital''. Show creator Ryan Murphy had difficulty working on the project and it got "stalled," leading to a two year gap between airings and the intended third season, ''Versace'', becoming the second in place of ''Katrina'', and in turn the inteded fourth season, about the impeachment of President UsefulNotes/BillClinton, became the third season as ''Impeachment''. [[DevelopmentHell Whether the season will actually be made or not is uncertain]].

* TroubledProduction: After the acclaimed first season, production of the second season, ''Katrina'', ran into quite a bit of trouble. The season was originally to be based on Douglas Brinkley's book ''The Great Deluge: Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans, and the Mississippi Gulf Coast'', with Creator/DennisQuaid as UsefulNotes/GeorgeWBush, Matthew Broderick as Michael D. "Brownie" Brown, and Annette Bening as Kathleen Blanco, and Creator/CubaGoodingJr. and Courtney B. Vance were set to return in new roles. All of these actors left the project when the season's focus changed considerably by changing the source material to Sheri Fink's ''Five Days at Memorial: Life and Death in a Storm-Ravaged Hospital''. Show creator Ryan Murphy had difficulty working on the project and it got "stalled," leading to a two year gap between airings and the intended third season, ''Versace'', becoming the second in place of ''Katrina''. [[DevelopmentHell Whether the season will actually be made or not is uncertain]].
* WhatCouldHaveBeen: Murphy optioned the book ''A Vast Conspiracy'' about the Monica Lewinsky scandal, but decided against doing a season based on it after running into Lewinsky and deciding it should only be done if she could be part of the production team.
** Subverted as of August 2019, when it came to light that [[https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/monica-lewinsky-produced-impeachment-set-as-next-american-crime-story-at-fx-1229819?utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter&utm_source=t.co&utm_medium=referral the season, called]] ''[[https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/monica-lewinsky-produced-impeachment-set-as-next-american-crime-story-at-fx-1229819?utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter&utm_source=t.co&utm_medium=referral Impeachment]]'', [[https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/monica-lewinsky-produced-impeachment-set-as-next-american-crime-story-at-fx-1229819?utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter&utm_source=t.co&utm_medium=referral would air in September 2020 with Lewinsky serving as a producer for the show during the season.]]

** Subverted as of August 2019, when it came to light that [[https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/monica-lewinsky-produced-impeachment-set-as-next-american-crime-story-at-fx-1229819?utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter&utm_source=t.co&utm_medium=referral the season, called ''Impeachment'', would air in September 2020 with Lewinsky serving as a producer for the show during the season.]]

* AdoredByTheNetwork: The series has only aired one season but has already been renewed for up to Season 4.

* TroubledProduction: After the acclaimed first season, production of the second season, ''Katrina'', ran into quite a bit of trouble. The season was originally to be based on Douglas Brinkley's book ''The Great Deluge: Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans, and the Mississippi Gulf Coast'', with Creator/DennisQuaid as UsefulNotes/GeorgeWBush, Matthew Broderick as Michael D. "Brownie" Brown, and Annette Bening as Kathleen Blanco, and Cuba Gooding Jr. and Courtney B. Vance were set to return in new roles. All of these actors left the project when the season's focus changed considerably by changing the source material to Sheri Fink's ''Five Days at Memorial: Life and Death in a Storm-Ravaged Hospital''. Show creator Ryan Murphy had difficulty working on the project and it got "stalled," leading to a two year gap between airings and the intended third season, ''Versace'', becoming the second in place of ''Katrina''. [[DevelopmentHell Whether the season will actually be made or not is uncertain]].

* AbsenteeActor:
** Kenneth Choi is credited for the entire season as Lance Ito, but since the first three episodes take place before O.J.'s trial, he obviously doesn't appear.
** Christian Clemenson is also credited for the entire run, but he doesn't appear after episode five.

* AllStarCast:
** Creator/CubaGoodingJr as O.J.
** Creator/JohnTravolta as Robert Schapiro
** Creator/DavidSchwimmer as Robert Kardashian
** Creator/NathanLane as F. Lee Bailey
** Bruce Greenwood as Gil Carcetti
** Creator/SelmaBlair as Kris Jenner
** Creator/JordanaBrewster as Denise Brown
* TheCSIEffect: [[ShownTheirWork Naturally averted]], as 1994 is still six years away from ''Series/CSICrimeSceneInvestigation'' (and two from ''Series/ForensicFiles''). In one poignant scene, O.J.'s lawyers are shown to be completely ignorant of how DNA works. However, [[CrazyPrepared they have the presence of mind]] to hire a DNA expert to teach them how to best question the value of DNA evidence, and when they learn they really can't, they decide to focus on the LAPD's alleged racism to accuse them of tampering with the evidence, thus making it appear unreliable.
* DawsonCasting: Dominick Dunne was roughly 70 years old during the trial, but is played by Robert Morse, who was 84 at the time of filming. A relatively minor case, but notable in that Morse was actually one year older than Dunne was when he passed away in 2009.
* DuelingWorks: With Creator/{{ESPN}}'s ''30 fo 30'' documentary, ''Film/OJMadeInAmerica'', which was given a limited theatrical release in January 2016, and then premiered on TV on June 11th.

** In-universe, Al Cowlings is described as an O.J.-wannabe that also goes by his initials (A.C.) and drives a car of the same model and color as his hero (this is the Bronco driven during the chase, rather than O.J.'s car, which was seized as evidence).
** ''The next day'' the first season finished airing, NBC announced production of ''Series/LawAndOrderTrueCrime'', another anthology series dramatizing a different true crime case per season, with the first season being about the Menendez Brothers case, which, like the O.J. Simpson case, was a high profile case from southern California involving Robert Shapiro.
** After the series became a success, other networks released a flood of new documentaries and specials about O.J. Simpson and the trial. And this was alongside previous programs based on the Simpson trial which were also rerun frequently.
* {{Irony}}: Courtney B. Vance, who plays Johnny Cochran, has stated that he believes Simpson "did it" in real life.
* StarMakingRole: For Sterling K. Brown, who had previously been featured as a main cast member in ''Series/ArmyWives'' and a recurring guest star in various TV projects, but was otherwise relatively unknown to the general public and industry. His performance as Chris Darden immediately earned the attention of viewers and critics and won him the Emmy award for Supporting Actor in a Limited Series or TV Movie (over his much more well known co-stars, John Travolta and David Schwimmer). Brown acknowledged this in his acceptance speech.
-->'''Sterling K. Brown:''' Thank you to the Academy. A lot of you may not have known who I was, but you ''checked the box anyway'', and that makes me very, very happy.
* TechnologyMarchesOn:
** As it is a PeriodPiece. The trial was still within relatively recent memory, occurring a little over 20 years before the TV series - two decades which saw incredibly fast advances in everyday technology, so the contrast can be jarring. Cast and crew have frequently remarked on how different the O.J. Simpson trial or the Bronco chase would have been in the present day, an era when camera-equipped iPhones are ''ubiquitous''.
** As in real life, a motorist happened to notice the white Bronco next to him on the highway, and had to pull over to use an emergency phone box to report it in - widespread cellphone ownership was still half a decade off. The White Bronco ''does'' have an early car-phone, but that's because O.J. and A.C. are well-to-do - it was still unusual for regular cars to have them (the actual police officer who called O.J. on the car phone has often remarked on how weird it was when he realized he could simply make a phone call to the Bronco in the middle of the chase - this had never happened before).
** A major plot point is that DNA evidence was still a very new technology for criminal cases at the time, and both the prosecution and defense see this trial as a template for how such cases will be handled in the future, in which they know DNA evidence will play a major role. Indeed, the televised O.J. trial is widely cited as the first time that DNA evidence entered the public consciousness - during the trial itself, several jurors and attorneys have a hard time even understanding what DNA is. In fact, many jurors confused it for blood-type because blood matching OJ's type was found at the crime scene, which they reasoned "Well lots of people have the same blood-type..."
** Dershowitz is watching the trial live on TV while he's teaching a class at Harvard (making observations about it to his lawyers-in-training). When he suddenly gets an idea that Cochran should use, you can practically see the lightbulb go off over his head when he realizes that their room has a fax machine - he makes a simple three word note ("Columbian neck tie") and seconds later, he sees Cochran pulling it out of the fax machine and using his suggestion to supreme effect. When the trial occurred, faxing him a live note like this was a nifty new idea. When the TV series ''aired'' in 2016, he'd have just sent Cochran a text message on his iPhone.

* WhatCouldHaveBeen: Music/LadyGaga was originally cast as Donatella Versace in ''Versace'', but dropped early on due to a busy schedule and was replaced by Creator/PenelopeCruz.