Decider spoke with Quinn Shephard and Samir Mehta about their research process to tell the true story of Reena Virk’s murder in ‘Under the Bridge’ on Hulu.
To tell the tragic true story behind Canadian teen Reena Virk’s murder in the new Hulu crime drama Under the Bridge, creator/executive producer Quinn Shephard and showrunner Samir Mehta turned to multiple resources.
The eight-part limited series, starring Riley Keough and Lily Gladstone, is based on Rebecca Godfrey’s best-selling book of the same name. The show premiered its first two episodes on Apr. 17, with the rest of the season airing weekly on Wednesdays.
While crafting the sensitive story, Mehta told Decider that he was in contact with the late teen’s father Manjit Virk.
“I was in touch with Reena’s father, actually, and we also optioned his book,” the showrunner says. “That was a big part of the telling of the story.”
Ahead of the release of the series, Decider spoke with Shephard and Mehta about their research process and how they gained a “local perspective” of the complex murder case.
Under the Bridge was filmed in Vancouver, near the location of Virk’s murder, which Mehta says added depth to the story they set out to tell.
“Just shooting the show so close to where it happened in Vancouver, almost every week, we encountered somebody who had some personal connection,” Mehta shares. “In the process, I feel like [the show] started becoming imbued with that local perspective because we were surrounded by people who lived this.”
Godfrey, whose book won British Columbia’s National Award for Canadian Non-Fiction in 2006 and was first optioned by Reese Witherspoon’s Type A Productions, died in 2022 from complications of lung cancer.
