You’ve probably heard snippets of the Gianni Versace story: shot dead on the steps of his Miami Beach mansion. Allegations of connections to the Mafia. Vehement denials from his family. Heck, you might have even watched the (very) unofficial 2013 Lifetime biopic, House Of Versace; the one said house declared ‘a work of fiction’. But now, 20 years on from Gianni’s death, the iconic designer is about to get the full American Crime Story treatment.
With its first season – The People v. O.J. Simpson – proving massively successful, the team behind ACS (including Glee/American Horror Story’s Ryan Murphy) needed another dramatic real-life tale to ensure our obsession continued. And, in The Assassination Of Gianni Versace, they have the perfect crime.
Gianni was the third-born child to a dressmaker mother and a father who served as a private financier to the Italian aristocracy, coming after sister Tina (who sadly died aged just 12, due to a tetanus infection) and brother Santo. Beloved baby sister Donatella would be the fourth. After apprenticing with his mother in their Italian hometown of Reggio Calabria, and designing for brands Byblos and Complice, he launched his label – then known as Gianni Versace Donna – in 1978. A Milan boutique quickly followed, the house growing rapidly, Donatella serving as part muse, part consultant.
Realising the value of the relationship between celebrity and designer, Gianni’s campaigns were fronted by Madonna, Elton John and Prince. He famously sent supermodels Naomi Campbell, Cindy Crawford, Linda Evangelista and Christy Turlington down his Fall 1991 runway, lip-synching to George Michael’s Freedom! ’90. Gianni was even friends with Princess Diana, who he dressed in the white haute couture gown she wore for the cover of Vanity Fair’s July 1997 issue, just prior to both of their untimely deaths.
It seemed that Gianni was invincible, both professionally and personally, as the designer fought off a rare cancer of the inner ear with chemotherapy. For all his famous friendships and opulent surroundings, he was – as is the Italian way – a family man at heart, doting on his nieces and nephews. Openly gay, Gianni met his partner Antonio D’Amico in 1982, and they were still together when tragedy struck on 15 July 1997.
Gianni was at home in Miami’s South Beach, returning to his mansion (Casa Casuarina) after collecting his morning papers from News Cafe. When he reached the steps, in front of those now-infamous black and gold gates, he was shot twice in the head. He was found dead by boyfriend Antonio, who this month told* Dateline*, ‘I heard the shot. My heart just stopped to beat. I ran out and then I saw Gianni laying down on the stairs in blood.’
His murderer was serial killer Andrew Cunanan, for whom Gianni was his fifth and final victim before he turned the gun on himself, nine days later. Before that, a nationwide manhunt. Police found a truck in a nearby garage, which had been stolen from his fourth victim – William Reese – with Cunanan’s identification documents inside.
California-born and a smart student, it was after graduating high school that Cunanan’s troubles really began, with official FBI papers stating: ‘He had supplemented his earnings from an odd job here and there by serving as a male prostitute and engaging in longer-term liaisons with older homosexuals who would shower him with gifts and cash.’ According to Vanity Fair’s Maureen Orth, Cunanan and Gianni had previously met on 21 October 1990, at San Francisco nightclub Colossus.
Little is known about said meeting, or indeed Cunanan’s motives for killing Gianni and his four other victims, though he reportedly told friends before the incidents, ‘If I had AIDS or if someone did that to me I would go on a five-state killing spree and take everyone with me I could.’ Despite his autopsy showing Cunanan was HIV-negative, FBI reports say that he feared he had contracted the virus and had approached a San Diego AIDS counsellor before his suicide, though he was never tested. He shot himself on a Miami Beach houseboat, amidst a police siege, on 24 July 1997. Cunanan used the same gun he killed Gianni with.
Gianni’s Milan funeral, exactly one week after his death, was attended by the many friends and fashion industry comrades he had made throughout his life; Princess Di, a sobbing Elton accompanied by partner David Furnish, Anna Wintour, even his famed ‘rival’ – though both men denied any real competitiveness – Giorgio Armani.
What should have marked the end of the Gianni Versace story was only the beginning of 20 years of curiosity from fans, the media and the general public alike. There were the alternative theories; that Gianni had been killed by the Mafia, a dead turtle dove found beside his body supposedly the mark of a professional killer. While this was quickly deemed a coincidence – the bird was probably in the wrong place at the wrong time when Cunanan fired the gun – those allegations resurfaced in 2010, thanks to claims by former N'drangheta (Calabrian Mafia) member Giuseppe Di Bella.
In controversial book Metastasi, Di Bella claimed that Gianni’s business was being used by Godfather Paolo De Stefano as a way to launder money, taking ‘rivers of money from drugs, extortion, protection rackets, loan sharking’ and making it clean. Another source said, ‘The N'drangheta lent Gianni Versace money and he was killed because of debts he had with them.’ The Versace family was quick to deny the allegations in a statement: 'The declarations from the informer are false and shameful. We reserve the right to protect the memory and reputation of Gianni Versace in civil and criminal courts.'
The whispers about Gianni’s health were also shut down. Maureen Orth’s 1999 book Vulgar Favors, which has actually served as a basis for the ACS series, alleged that Gianni was HIV-positive when he died. At the time, the Versace family’s spokesperson said they ‘deplore this mercenary invasion of their privacy and the scurrilous assault on the reputation of someone who was the victim of a horrible crime.’
With so much material to go on, it’s hard to tell where executive producer Murphy and his team will begin, but begin they have; filming has already started in Miami, with the series slated to run in early 2018. Edgar Ramirez takes on the role of Gianni, with Ricky Martin (yes, THAT Ricky Martin) as his boyfriend Antonio and – with Ms Versace’s blessing – Penelope Cruz playing Donatella. Darren Criss, Glee’s Blaine Anderson, is killer Andrew Cunanan.
Could it be that The Assassination Of Gianni Versace will be even more compulsive viewing than it’s predecessor, The People v. O.J. Simpson? That Penelope’s Donatella will be more frequently talked about than David Schwimmer’s Robert Kardashian? We think it might just be in with a shot.
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.