Most people have seenRyan Murphy’s work, even if they don’t realize it. He has created over 35 movies and television shows in countless genres, with many of his shows spanning several seasons andgaining cult followings. While his work covers topics anywhere from true crime to plastic surgery and even teenage musicals, a few central themes throughout his work have completely reinvented genres and changed television. Ryan Murphy has a love of melodrama, underdogs, utter strangeness, and telling stories that might otherwise be silenced, and his boldness has made him beloved.
Ryan Murphy’s Flair for Drama
Murphy is seemingly incapable of writing a story with boring characters and a lagging plot. He creates angry, unique, raw characters and places them into colorful and dangerous worlds that push them to their breaking point. Every story he tells has a conflict that is so intense it might as well always be life or death. Despite these worlds and characters being so original and often scary, their humanity, humor, and complexity draw in the masses just in time for him to hold a mirror to society.
Unstoppable Underdogs
Murphy’s stories oftencenter around an underdog, whether that’s a societal underdog or one specific to his world. This creates a very particular type of relatability that is scarce in other television shows and movies. He doesn’t just overcome the bullies, he fills his shows chock-full of underdogs and makes them the antagonist of another story. His work shows that someone can be the victim and the villain at the same time, which makes his characters much more human and somehow more worthy of being rooted for.
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InAmerican Horror Story, his characters might be monsters, but usually, they are monsters with long, deep backstories of how they became the way they are, and sometimes he even puts a spark of change in them to want to be better. One of his most popular shows,Glee, centers outcasts in a high school show choir. That topic is arguably one of the things most viewers couldn’t care less about, but with his tactful character and plot-building skills, it is still a part of pop culture today despite the show ending in 2015.
Bringing New and Old Stories to Light
A namesake of Ryan Murphy’s work that goes along with his love of the underdogs of the world is his desire to tell stories that usually wouldn’t see the light of day otherwise. This is present in his stories and in the actors he chooses to tell them. His miniseriesHollywoodhas inclusivity as the cornerstone of the plot. Set in the 1940s, a young filmmaker rewrites his screenplay to accommodate a Black female lead, and it is a sweeping success, thus changing the entertainment industry in that world. Many stories set in that time period are exclusive because writers claim it was a different time and subsequently only reflect stereotypical norms in their stories, but Murphy realizes that fiction can break barriers and that he can rewrite history within the worlds he creates.
Murphy also tells stories of people who can’t tell their story, or it’s been skewed by media in hisAmerican Crime Storyseries. Those seasons tackle the trial of OJ Simpson, the murder of Gianni Versace, and the often-misunderstood story of Monica Lewinsky. He brings popular stories to the surface and retells them in a stylized way that catches viewers' attention much more than a documentary.
He takes his passion for diversity off the camera as well. Over 60% of directing jobs on his shows are held by women, and he founded a mentorship initiative called Half which helps women, people of color, and members of the LGBTQ+ community to make up at least half of his directing staff and also to give opportunities to new directors in those communities.
Circus Chic and Gore Glam
Murphy is very smart about the shows he creates and has a way of catering to a niche crowd through a large audience. The stories he tells draw in a large crowd even if the contents aren’t something they would normally be drawn to because he glamorizes the ordinary. Everything in his work is attractive. Not in a necessarily aesthetically beautiful way, but in the sense that viewers can’t look away. His shows are bold and vibrant capturing a very appealing aesthetic even if the story is gore or dark.
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Despite the gore and horror inAmerican Horror Story: Freak Show, the show itself is still very aesthetically pleasing. He placesa murderous clownand a band of misfits in a 1952 Florida town where he offsets the discomfort of the show with luxurious clothes, sensuality, and a nostalgic nod to the 1950s. These elements of glamour and despair are present in a lot of his shows. Whether it’s the fancy cars and broken dreams ofHollywoodor the lush glimpse into Gianni Versace’s fame coupled with his troubled life and death, Ryan Murphy knows how to balance the scales to be dark enough that viewers want to look away but too intoxicating to break their stare.
So What Has Ryan Murphy Really Done?
With all this talk of success, what has Ryan Murphy actually done? With 39 credits under his belt and three more on the way, Murphy and written and produced countless hits spanning and recreating various genres. Some of his most popular hits includeGlee, American Horror Story, Pose, Scream Queens, The Politician, 9-1-1, Nip/Tuck, Dahmer, Ratched,andAmerican Crime Story. He also directed the film adaptation of the hit Broadway musicalThe Prom.
With all these successes in his pocket, the shows no signs of stopping. His work spans several streaming services, but most of his hits can be found between Hulu and Netflix. At the end of the day, Ryan Murphy’s series are popular because he creates exciting and original work that keeps a broad audience on the edge of their seat for more.
