The Daily Beast Podcast - How Amanda Knox and Monica Lewinsky Survived Hell

Episode Date: August 21, 2025

Monica Lewinsky joins Joanna Coles for an unflinching look at the new Hulu limited series 'The Twisted Tale of Amanda Knox'—and why the story we think we know is nothing like the truth. From Knox’s wrongful conviction and years in an Italian prison, to the media’s obsession with “Foxy Knoxy” and the anatomy of bias that fueled it, Lewinsky reveals how her own experience being dissected by the press helped her connect with Knox and bring her story to the screen. With behind-the-scenes details on persuading Amanda to say yes, building a powerhouse creative team, and the haunting parallels between two women thrust into the global spotlight, this episode uncovers how narratives are twisted, who benefits, and what gets lost along the way.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We didn't know how this political world worked. People often ask me, how did you end up with a malpractice attorney as your lawyer? It was because my dad was a doctor and we didn't know whom we could trust. You know, this was Republicans and Democrats and neither wanted me. It was a terrifying time. I'm Joanna Coles. This is the Daily Beast podcast. Today we're taking a slight break from full-on politics. We're kind of politics adjacent because we're talking to Monica Lewinsky, who you will

remember burst onto our global consciousness in 1998 after her relationship with President Clinton was revealed to the world. She's now become an executive producer. She told her own story, and if you haven't watched it, impeachment is such a good television series. She made it with Ryan Murphy, and it really shines a light on the horrors that she went through as a young 24-year-old managing the global media. But she's now produced a new story, the twisted tale of Amanda Knox with Amanda Knox, who you will probably remember is the American college student who got falsely accused and wrongly imprisoned for murdering her college roommate. I found the story fascinating. It's on Hulu. It launches this week. And I couldn't wait to talk to Monica about what it was

like when she and Amanda Knox met and shared their frankly incredible and almost unique stories of being young vulnerable women at the center of a global media firestorm where it felt like they were animals being feasted on by the media. So let's get into it. Monica Lewinsky, I feel like I just saw you. We were together last night at the screening for the twisted tale of Amanda Knox. And I had the enormous fun of moderating a panel with you, with Amanda, with Grace Van Patten, who plays her with KJ Steinberg, who runs. wrote it, and of course, with Warren Littlefield, whose production company made it. How did this project, which I found I couldn't stop watching, and the first episode was so tense. I was almost in the

fetal position, and I knew what happened. This is a story that we know how it ends. But what made you want to do the project? Well, I think exactly in a way what you're talking about, Joanna, is that it's one of those stories that we think we know, but we really don't when we start to see the context. And I find that incredibly fascinating in today's times. That coupled with the fact that we've started to look back at a bunch of young women's stories that played out in the world stage decades, ago, and revisiting them through a modern lens. So I think that kind of interest was there. And then I had met Amanda in 2017. We were both speaking in the same conference.

It was her first talk. I gave her a cup of tea like we have here together today. We both have our teas, virtual tea. Exactly. We're not going to spill it though, okay? So you meet Amanda Knox in 2017. Right. And I met someone who, there's so few women who have found themselves in, you know,

even though my situation was so different from Amanda's, I don't know what it's like to be wrongfully convicted and spend four years improperly imprisoned. But we both were thrust onto the world stage without choosing it at very young ages. Amanda was 20, I was 24, and had been completely dissected, torn apart, put back together as versions of ourselves that we didn't recognize. And at the time, I saw, you know, Amanda's ordeal didn't actually really finish for her until 2015. That's when she was exonerated. And so this was, I saw a kind of pain in her that I recognized I had felt myself. And I was only a few years into this process of trying to reclaim my own narrative. And so that was sort of when we met in 2017 and stayed in touch.

here and there. And I came across this interview she had done for the New York Times in 2021. And I could just see from what I was reading she had blossomed. You know, she had started to find herself again. And she was talking about wanting to make a film of her first memoir. So I had a first look deal with 20th television at the time. And I thought, okay, not a film, but what about a limited series, went to my executive, who was savvy enough to go to all the, to go to all the right people, including our mutual friend, the amazing Carrie Burke president of 20th television. And Carrie having young daughters was on board with this for a moment one. I got a very fast, get going, went back to Amanda and, you know, within a few weeks,

brought everybody to the table within several. more months, we were then looking for a showrunner. So how did you persuade Amanda? Because one of the things she said last night was everybody had approached her to do this story and she'd said no to everybody. What was it? And I think at one point, I remember you saying you referred to the two of you as the sisterhood of ill repute, which I thought was very funny.

I don't want to credit for Amanda. That's actually Amanda's quote. Was that Amanda's quote about the two of you? I thought it was a great quote. What was it about you, do you think, that made her decide, yes, I'm going to do this with Monica Lewinsky? Well, I was fresh off the heels of having done this very unique thing, which it doesn't sound unique at first, because we've seen so many projects where we're seeing something dramatized of a real person who's still living. But what we don't realize very often as an audience member is that the person, the subject of that might be involved in very little ways, but especially if it's a controversial

story, one where people could easily go, oh, this is just a hagiography, because the person was involved, they, you know, whitewashed their whole history, whatever. There are few people who were actually involved as a producer. And thanks to Ryan Murphy, I had been a producer on American Crime Story impeachment. So I was fresh off this experience of being both a subject. and a producer at the same time. And I think that that helped Amanda know that I had a sense of the terrain that she would need to traverse in this process so that, you know, there would be somebody who would be able to say, okay, this is the really hard part or this might, you know, this is the fun part. This is the, you know, these things. I think I was really, I think back to how nervous I was for her to see the first draft of the pilot episode of just this sense of what it is to see someone else's interpretation of you of some of your deepest moments on a piece of paper on the page or the screen, I guess, in today's world.

But so, but she was, she was great with it. So I think I might have joked last night. She was a lot more flexible than I was. Talk a little bit about the process of actually bringing together Warren Littlefield, the executive producer, K.J. Steinberg, the writer. We know all these projects start with an amazing vision. And you've got an incredible vision, I think, with KJ. Steimberg. But it all sounds so easy in hindsight.

It's incredibly difficult to, A, get people to read the research, materials to come to the table, any good writer is always involved in one or two projects that are ongoing. How did you manage to corral everybody? You know, it's so interesting. I'm looking at the piece of art behind you with the Handmaid's Tale, you know, imagery. And that, you know, that was, that's a show that Warren Littlefield and the Littlefield Company produces on. And so, you know, it was interesting. We actually had KJ before Warren, but since that's there, I think that once we had KJ, and I'll go back to how that happened, we always knew we'd need a rock star producer. I mean, I was a very, and still I'm a green executive producer.

So I wasn't going to be able to do this on my own, and we all knew that. And to have someone like Warren who has this history in television of having a nose for things that people connect to. But then having had this more recent experience in production of, I mean, what sort of could feel more like Amanda's show than The Handmaid's Tale and Doke Sick? You know, we're trying to like, trying to hide some vitamins in the entertainment of getting people to self-reflect and also looking at some of the horrors of the world we all live in today, right? So that's in so many ways why Warren and Lisa Harrison and Ann Johnson were amazing for this. How did you persuade KJ to do this? And what was it about her and her voice that you were able to settle on? So Taylor Morgan, my executive at 20th, had given me a pilot that KJ had written for another project. And I devoured it. And there was something magical about what she had.

had created there. It was about a real person. It was about, she had reveals in there that were both story points and psychological. And that she had drawn these complex characters that had qualities that we might normally not like in someone. And that you're just sort of drawn to them in that way. So I then had lunch with KJ. This is a woman who wears her heart on her sleeve. She had not only you know, read Amanda's memoir. She'd watched the documentary. She'd listened to numerous interviews Amanda had done. She started looking at the trial transcripts, the few that had been translated. And she came to this meeting, both understanding Amanda as a person and her uniqueness and having a vision that was breaking the mold on true crime and biopic. And also, I think she had an innate

sense of what's a vision for this show that will also appeal to Amanda and feel like Amanda, you know? And so in that way, it was really, we cried three times in that meeting. Wow. And KJ, myself, Chris Robinson, who's Amanda's partner in life and partner in their production company, we were, we all teared up. And it was, it was, it was, really magical. Like it was, you know, it took Amanda about five seconds after to say yes. Also, too, something that I found fascinating was that films are a director's medium and television are a writer's medium. And so it, that is a different orientation, right? We were living this with Amanda and Chris when Amanda, when they went back to Italy to meet with her prosecutor. So this 22 story that

book ends the film, I mean, the series. We were, you know, biting our nails, reading to hear, did she get in okay? Was she, you know, just like, how did it all go? And I think that, I think that there was so much of that felt sense that people will get in the series coming from us having been in that moment. Obviously, we weren't there in Italy, but we were there hearing Amanda's, reactions on Zoom and, you know, the worry and all those things there. So. And it starts with that. For those who haven't yet seen the series, it starts with an incredibly tense moment of, and this is a bit of a spoiler alert, but not really because it's literally the first scene, is Amanda being smuggled back into Italy to confront her

prosecutor. And her mother played brilliantly by the wonderful Sharon Hogan. is terrified that it's all a setup. And I was on the edge of my chair. And incredible writing and acting also, because we know the end of the story. We know that Amanda is living in the US and she's back here, but you still manage to create that incredible tension. How did you select Grace Van Patten,

who is almost a dead ringer for her, and yet not at all? When you see them next to each other, you think they're completely different. and yet she morphs into Amanda Knox on the screen. Mm-hmm. We, you know, it was, we had, I think with grace, what was incredible for me was I actually didn't know her work.

I didn't realize I had, I knew I had seen her in certain things that I'd already seen. And Carmen Cuba cast the show with us alongside some Italian casting directors that she works with. And we were so lucky to have Carmen. And Carmen really helped some of us who weren't as familiar with Grace's work, see what she was seeing. So she was on nine perfect strangers, Tell Me Lies. Yes. I mean, she has held her own. As a young actor, she's held her own in scenes with Nicole Kidman, with Adam Sandler, with Michael Sheen.

I mean, she's incredible. And, you know, everybody at Hulu has had such extraordinary experiences with her on Tell Me Lies. So it was, you know, I think once we met Grace and you see that she brings both like an innocence and a complexity to moments and that's something that's innate to grace, but it's also something she needed to bring to the screen with Amanda. And she just was, I don't, I mean, you've seen the series so you know she's in almost like. Like almost every scene, she learned Italian for this. And because we weren't able to shoot sequentially, it meant that, you know, one scene, she was barely new Italian. And the next scene, she might have to be fluent in Italian. I mean, she just, what she carried in this on screen was amazing.

And she also, I had the privilege of seeing her on set in Italy. and you could just see there was a light about her that was so needed, because this is a dark, heavy project. You know, we're telling this story inspired by Amanda's experiences, but it starts with the tragic death of a young woman. Monica, just hold on one second while we take these messages. And we are back talking to Monica Lewinsky about her new show, twisted tale of Amanda Knox.

Let me ask you then about something which emerged very much as the theme that was important to both you and to Amanda, which is this media obsession with young women, and particularly young women who get into trouble. You went through it, Amanda went through it. I was, I mean, we were mentioning also the case of Louise Woodward that had happened in 97, a young British nanny. It was a story I remembered well because I'd covered it, but this sense in which the media become rapacious about trying to...

It's everything. Everything. And young men do not get the same attention. What was... I mean, I'm assuming that you and Amanda bonded over having been the subject of that. And also, your line about this is a story we think we know because it was in the headlines forever. Yet I remember it as a story, but I never paid attention to the detail.

But I do remember people saying things like, oh, she's obviously guilty. It's completely, you know, her name was Foxy-Noxy. She's so guilty. And in fact, people feel entitled to proclaim on a story about which they know absolutely nothing. Yeah. Can you talk a little bit about A, what it's like being the subject of that, but B, how you and Amanda talked about it, because it very much becomes part of the show, too. Right.

It is. you know, KJ built the spine of this series to be the anatomy of bias, to help reflect to all of us. What are the, you know, what are all the different things that we bring to a moment that shape our beliefs, that shape our perceptions, to shape what we say and think and click on and all the other things. And the anatomy of a bias, it's such a good line. Yeah. It is very powerful. And I think one of the ways that we probably, one thing. The one thing we could probably all agree on today is that a lot of our views are shaped by the media.

So this idea of being feasted on as red meat. And I remember, in fact, my lawyer, my first lawyer at the time, Bill Ginsburg, used to say, we have to feed the bear. You have to feed the bear. And what did he mean by that, that you were supposed to go out and give press conferences No, it meant that the press was always going to need to do their job. And so they're either going to find something or make something up. I don't want to say make something up, but make something up. So it's hard.

I don't want to lump everybody together. You're a journalist. You know, I mean, you've done incredible work. They're friends of mine are journalists who have an enormous amount of integrity and whose work have helped shape are the better things that have happened in the last decade in our world. So I don't want to be shitting on everybody. But I think what can happen is, or at least what my experience was at the time, I was 24. I had a lot of insecurity. I'd always had insecurities. And I also, in a sort of contradiction, had always had a bright light to me.

But my insecurities, I mean, I laugh about it with my friends now. When I was in college, I was someone who would always reintroduce myself because I thought, well, I'm just not the girl that someone's going to remember having met me and remember my name. So, you know, be careful what you wish for. People remembering your name. So I think that to then have this magnifying glass on you, then become a sort of, fun house mirror of the worst things that you fear about yourself ever being true or things you never even thought about yourself. If enough people start to project it and project it loudly,

you start to believe it yourself. And I think for me, I have sometimes talked about this, that there were two Monica Lewinsky's, that there was me, the person that I knew, my friends and family knew. And then there was the monster that had been created by the media, cherry picking certain things that some of which might have been facts that were taken out of context, some of which, you know, I'm going to digress for a second, but there used to be a kind of journalistic rule that you could not impugn someone's character without two on the record sources. And that completely had gone out the window, whether that was with this story or shortly before I don't know. And also, I think in your story in particular, there were sides drawn, right? You were either on

Monica's side or you were on the then-president side. And they had so much more power than you do. And they had existing relationships with the media that you couldn't possibly, as a girl of 24, have had. So you were up against a machine, is actually what I'm trying to say. People forget often that the court case was the United States of America versus Lewinsky. You know, I was the target of the investigation that the grand jury was seated in that name. And I was very lucky to come from an upper middle class family. My dad is an upstanding doctor, although he just retired. And but we had, even having been in Washington,

for a few years. We didn't know how this political world worked. We didn't know right away. People often ask me, how did you end up with a malpractice attorney as your lawyer? And it was because my dad was a doctor and his best friend was a malpractice attorney. And we didn't know whom we could trust in D.C. among the D.C. lawyers, because exactly as you're saying, this was the two most powerful, you know, this was Republicans and Democrats. And neither wanted me. So it was, it was a terrifying time. And yes, you know, going back to this story, Amanda and I both sort of contributed our experiences with the media to KJ and to the, you know, there's incredible writers on the show. It was, for people to understand with the pilot, there were 450 writer submissions to be in the writer's room.

Wow. Yeah, when people read KJ's pilot. So, well, the texture of your experience comes out in the show, which is what makes it so interesting. And also for Amanda, Amanda was pronounced guilty. Yeah. Basically the minute the minute the sort of prosecutor became public in a sense. Well, I think, you know, they're so, I hope what people will take away from the show, too, are, are recognizing these strands of bias, you know, the American versus Italian, the young woman,

the young woman versus the more seasoned women who were investigating, the language barriers, the fact that Amanda was beautiful. That was something, you know, that there's a line in the show that much later in the season where it was sort of, I don't remember it exactly, but the concept was like, if Amanda had gained weight in prison, the story wouldn't be interesting anymore. So interesting. Well, yeah, and the obsession with the fact that she was called Foxy Noxie, that she was very pretty, that she had an Italian boyfriend. In the first episode, one of the roommates says, oh, you know, Meredith, the girl that got murdered, had a problem with Amanda because Amanda was always bringing guys back. And the sort of the anatomy of bias, as you say, very good phrase just settles in and you see how the miscarriage of justice unfold.

Well, I think to, you know, I don't know what your experience was with it. When I started, you know, came into the story as we started working on this, I was so embarrassed and surprised to learn that we actually had known. who killed Meredith from several weeks after her tragic death. I didn't know that. I didn't know his name was Rudy Gadee. And I think what, you know, is an underpinning of this series is also asking that question of why? Why did we not know the name Rudy Gidey, but we all remember Foxy Noxie. What was interesting for me, and I think that parallel in impeachment, we were talking about this

in the hallway last night. Episode 6 was all about my interrogation that happened several days before the rest of the world learned about this legal nightmare that was happening. And that had become known to people. It had been written about that I had been sequestered in a hotel room in the Ritz Carlton within the first month, if not six weeks of the investigation. But no one remembered that because that didn't fit a narrative of how people wanted to see me. And that's always been one of the most fascinating aspects to me of these kinds of collective stories. And we're just going to take a break for some ads. And we are back talking with Monica Lewinsky.

I was so shocked when I watched impeachment and saw that episode at what you've gone through. And you were very funny on the panel last night where we were discussing Amanda's 53-hour interrogation in a language. Over five days. Over five days in a language with which she's not fluent. And you said, well, at least when I was interrogated, it was in the Ritz Carlson, which brought the house down. So it's good that you maintained a sense of humor about it. Oh, you know, I think, you know, you were asking us about the kind of cohesiveness of the group last night and how did we bond? And it I think it was through Gallo's humor that we'd all have these different kind of experience.

And my family and I would not have survived without Gallo's humor. I mean, it is just the unimaginable that is so far outside what one ever expects to be happening in your life. And these are all stories that seem to happen to young women, too. In the first episode, there's an extraordinary incident that KJ writes in where Grace or Amanda is crossing an Italian square in Perugia where she was living at the time, and a motorbike nips past her and almost knocks her over. And you get this sense of this young, beautiful woman, so vulnerable as we all are. Every day we venture out. I mean, I think about e-bikes and delivery guys. And you walk out on the street and there's always one coming towards you. But how

vulnerable we all are. And in particular, you know, young women going to live abroad who don't speak the language and who get caught up in a system and frankly a corrupt system of justice in Italy and really, you know, get caught in a in a nightmareish spiral. Her whole story is completely out of Kafka. Yeah. Yeah. It is. And I mean, it's something I've been really grateful to see in our society that we've started to reexamine some of these stories. And it's part of it's the kind of storytelling I'm really interested in doing, too. Well, do you think that will continue? Because obviously, since you started making this show, we've had a change of government.

And now there's much less emphasis on women's stories. There's been a move to get companies to move away from DEI and inclusion. Do you think that women's stories will continue to get commissioned and get, you know? I hope so. You know, I hope so. I don't know. you know, I want to really sort of point out to that Disney and Hulu and 20th television, we're really brave in making this story. So in sticking by it, we, something else that was

important to Amanda and myself was that this show not just end in the courtroom, where normally we see these kinds of stories, you know, the moment has happened. And now, now we're just going to go home. And it's, and we spend a solid, solid episode and a half, if not two episodes in the aftermath of the show. And that was risky. That was really risky for them to do. But it was so important to us and KJ understood right away, as did Warren and the other executive producers that, you know, we, we all on the, on the freeway. We all slow down when we see it. a car accident. But I can tell you, I never think five minutes later or five days or five weeks. I never go, I wonder if that person's okay. I wonder what happened to them. And really helping

people try to understand that for the subject of these things, the headlines might move on, but their life is still in tatters. Well, your life continues. And you've turned your own experiences into a telling your own story and impeachment and now telling Amanda Knox is in the Twisted Tale for Hulu. I would urge everybody to watch it. Anybody that remembers Foxy Noxie, this will completely change your view, I think, of the narrative. Many congratulations. What comes next for you, Monica? I, you know, I launched a podcast earlier this year, and I thought it would sort of be a little side gig.

And it's a full-time job, as you probably know. It's a full-time job. It is. So I love doing it, even though it's a lot more work than I imagined. And I'm really excited to, I'm excited to just kind of dive into that for a bit to just solely focus on that, maybe have one full-time job instead of two. And go from there. But I'm very interested to see what comes to me, whether. that's from other people or kind of through the universe into an idea. It's a pretty, I feel very grateful that I had my friends and family that helped me survive, all the Eastern and Western helpers that have helped me survive. And it is to sort of feel like I'm able to use this pain that I went through to somehow help other people feel less alone, even though they clearly didn't go through the same thing. It's an extraordinary privilege. And so I feel very grateful. Well, you've used what you call a privilege wisely. This is an extraordinary series. And I look

forward to seeing more things executive produced by Monica Lewinsky. Thank you very much for joining us. Thank you, Joanna. I'll see you soon. Safe Travels. Thank you and safe travels to you. I'm sure Monica Lewinsky and Amanda Knox will be the best of friends now, not only having made this show together, but also bonding over their shared experience of what it's like being at the center of a global media firestorm. Anyway, you can watch the twisted tale of Amanda Knox. It's on Hulu. It's released this week.

You can make your own mind up. Leave us a comment. Tell us what you think. I loved it. And tell us what you think of the podcast, too. and other guests that we've had. We had John Bolton. Many of you were vocal about what you thought of him. A lot of you didn't like his former policies. You thought he was a warmonger, but you also thought that on Donald Trump, he was incredibly accurate. So we appreciated those comments. Please subscribe to the Daily Beast podcast, wherever you get your podcast. And also our new spin-off podcast with Michael Wolf inside Trump's head. If you watch on YouTube, you're fine. Just keep watching us. And we drop that podcast, Inside Trump. Trump's head on Tuesdays and Thursdays in the evening. If you listen on Apple or Spotify or anywhere else,

sign up for it separately inside Trump's head, where Michael and I go deep into the cavern of Donald Trump's brain. Anyway, thank you to our production team, Devin Roderino, Anna von Erson and Jesse Milwood. And don't forget, as our first lady, wherever she may be these days, as our first lady reminds us every day, do your duty and be be. Want more great listens? Check out our comedy podcast, The Last Laugh, and our star-studded The Daily Beast podcast at the Daily Beast.com slash podcasts. If you enjoyed this episode, consider becoming a Daily Beast subscriber. Subscribing is the best way to feed the beast and support all of your podcasts as we cover

what might become the darkest timeline. Head to the DailyBeast.com slash membership slash podcast and sign up today.