Kaley Cuoco, Chris Messina star in 'Based on a True Story,' a tale of a killer idea that goes awry

Kaley Cuoco, Chris Messina star in ‘Based on a True Story,’ a tale of a killer idea that goes awry

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Kaley Cuoco and Chris Messina co-star in the new Peacock series “Based on a True Story” as a couple who decide to tap into the public’s fascination with true crime by hosting a podcast where they interview a serial killer. (June 5)

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Chris Messina, left, and Kaley Cuoco, cast members in the Peacock series “Based on a True Story,” pose for a portrait, Wednesday, May 24, 2023, at the London Hotel in West Hollywood, Calif. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)

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Kaley Cuoco, a cast member in the Peacock series “Based on a True Story,” poses for a portrait, Wednesday, May 24, 2023, at the London Hotel in West Hollywood, Calif. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)

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Kaley Cuoco, a cast member in the Peacock series “Based on a True Story,” poses for a portrait, Wednesday, May 24, 2023, at the London Hotel in West Hollywood, Calif. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)

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Chris Messina, a cast member in the Peacock series “Based on a True Story,” poses for a portrait, Wednesday, May 24, 2023, at the London Hotel in West Hollywood, Calif. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)

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Chris Messina, a cast member in the Peacock series “Based on a True Story,” poses for a portrait, Wednesday, May 24, 2023, at the London Hotel in West Hollywood, Calif. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)

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Chris Messina, a cast member in the Peacock series “Based on a True Story,” poses for a portrait, Wednesday, May 24, 2023, at the London Hotel in West Hollywood, Calif. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)

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Chris Messina, a cast member in the Peacock series “Based on a True Story,” poses for a portrait, Wednesday, May 24, 2023, at the London Hotel in West Hollywood, Calif. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)

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Priscilla Quintana, right, and Liana Liberato, cast members in the Peacock series “Based on a True Story,” pose for a portrait, Wednesday, May 24, 2023, at the London Hotel in West Hollywood, Calif. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)

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Priscilla Quintana, left, and Liana Liberato, cast members in the Peacock series “Based on a True Story,” pose for a portrait, Wednesday, May 24, 2023, at the London Hotel in West Hollywood, Calif. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)

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Priscilla Quintana, a cast member in the Peacock series “Based on a True Story,” poses for a portrait, Wednesday, May 24, 2023, at the London Hotel in West Hollywood, Calif. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)

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Alexander Buono, Chris Messina, Kaley Cuoco, Tom Bateman, Liana Liberato and Priscilla Quintana, from left, arrive at the Los Angeles premiere of “Based On A True Story,” Thursday, June 1, 2023, at Pacific Design Center in West Hollywood, Calif. (Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP)

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Liana Liberato, a cast member in the Peacock series “Based on a True Story,” poses for a portrait, Wednesday, May 24, 2023, at the London Hotel in West Hollywood, Calif. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)

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This image released by Peacock shows Kaley Cuoco in a scene from “Based on a True Story.” (Peacock via AP)

By Alicia Rancilio

In the new Peacock series “ Based on a True Story,” debuting Thursday, Kaley Cuoco plays Ava, a woman obsessed with true crime. She consumes these dark stories all day, analyzes the cases with her friends and murder-centric podcasts help lull her to sleep at night.

“Do we have to wake up to murder every morning?” her husband Nathan, played by Chris Messina, asks in a scene.

The series highlights an explosion of coverage of true crime in recent years. It is the subject of podcasts, documentary series, books, and social media posts where amateur sleuths breathlessly weigh in on the latest crime du jour.

In “Based on a True Story,’' Ava hatches a plan to start a podcast — hosted by the couple — to interview a serial killer. She is confident that it will be lucrative and add excitement into their otherwise middle-aged monotony.

The choices made by Ava and Nathan in the series, argues Cuoco, are similar to the subjects of actual true crime stories whose fate is determined by one bad decision.

“It happens all the time,” said Cuoco. “That’s why this was very believable to me. They are in a desperate situation, make a really ridiculous choice out of desperation and end up in a very bad place. In my opinion, they’re as bad as the killer by the end of this,” she said.

Cuoco admits to being a fan of true crime herself and likens it to “looking at an accident” on the road. “We’re rubberneckers,” she said.

Co-star Liana Liberato, who plays Ava’s younger sister, has a list of true crime podcasts to recommend. “Some of my favorites are ‘S-Town’, ‘Root of Evil’, ' To Live and Die in LA. ' I’m a little too obsessed. I relate very much to Kaley’s character,” Liberato said.

She’s not the only one. On the morning of the cast’s interviews, Priscilla Quintana, who plays Ava’s friend Ruby on the show, woke extra early and tuned into, what else but true crime.

“I woke up at 4:30 a.m., and I didn’t have to be here until like seven, so I cleaned my whole kitchen (and) listened to the newest episode of ‘Crime Junkie.’ Why is it the first thing I do when I wake up in the morning,” she wondered aloud.

In one episode, Cuoco and Messina’s characters attend CrimeCon in Las Vegas — which is similar to Comic-Con but for fans of true crime. It’s an actual event, by the way, that will be held later this year in Orlando.

“I see the addiction of it,” Messina said who doesn’t seek out the genre but can get caught up by an episode of say, “ Dateline,” like the rest of us. He likes to use it as his own mental exercise to be prepared if things go south. “For me, it’s always a nice puzzle to figure out how people got into this situation and how can I not. And if I do, how can I be saved?”

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Follow Alicia Rancilio at http://www.twitter.com/aliciar