When it comes to true crime, few stories are more OG than the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln. But according to Apple TV’s Manhunt, set to premiere on March 15, 2024, the real drama happened after John Wilkes Booth pulled the trigger.
Apple TV’s Manhunt is not a documentary. It is, however, based on the New York Times bestselling nonfiction book Manhunt: The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln’s Killer, written by James L. Swanson, covering the aftermath of Lincoln’s assassination and Lincoln’s War Secretary Edwin Stanton’s effort to track and catch his assassin.
Tobias Menzies (The Crown) plays Stanton, and comedian Patton Oswalt is Detective Lafayette Baker, a true-to-history character involved in the Lincoln investigation. Hamish Linklater (The New Adventure of Old Christine) plays the doomed sixteenth president. Anthony Boyle (Masters of the Air) plays Booth.
Is Manhunt a limited series?
Edwin Stanton’s search for Booth lasted for 12 days, and accordingly, Apple TV’s Manhunt is a seven-part limited series. The show otherwise blends aspects of historical fiction and thrilling crime drama with the accuracy James L. Swanson’s source text is known for. The first two episodes drop on March 15, 2024, and the next five installments premiere weekly.
Swanson served as executive producer on the show, and all the characters in the book and series were real people. Meanwhile, Swanson drew from period documents, newspaper reports, and other first-hand accounts in his telling. On the infamous assassination, Swanson told Publishers Weekly in 2017, ” … [Lincoln] was killed so young that the country did not get the benefits of what he would have achieved if he had lived longer.”