Growing up in Boston, writer and director Matt Ruskin heard about the Boston Strangler most of his life. But it wasn’t until a few years ago while researching the complex case that he was inspired to write his latest film, Boston Strangler, from a different point of view.

Matt Ruskin

“When I started reading about the case, I realized I didn’t know anything about it. And I discovered this really layered, fascinating murder mystery. There was a much bigger story both about the city and the time with a lot of twists and turns that I found to be so compelling that I thought would make for a really great film,” Ruskin told Deadline during a recent interview. “I just could never really get excited about doing a hard-boiled detective version of this story. There are a lot of aspects to it that are critical of the police...