Few things are more satisfying in life than a really gripping documentary. And one that probes the insanity of humanity while unveiling a mystery? Yes, please! The new HBO series The Mortician, which just aired its final episode on Sunday, definitely ticked those boxes for me. Directed by Joshua Rofé, the documentary is about what happened to the Lamb Funeral Home once it fell into the hands of great-grandson David Sconce in the 1980s, after 60 years of being a much-revered and trusted Pasadena business. This story is not for the faint of heart; it was gruesome and jaw-dropping and just like a car crash, I absolutely could not stop watching. Part of the pull is undoubtedly the interviews Rofé got with David Sconce himself, and Rofé just spoke with Slash Films about the experience. Note: No spoilers excerpted below, but if you click the link the full article has many.
How Rofé picks his subjects: It just comes down to, I can’t stop thinking about this. I feel like I’m going to die if I don’t get to make this. If I am walking around the house or I’m on the phone with a friend or a family member or whoever, and I am just saying, “Oh my God, if I get to make this thing, I think it could really be so good.” It’s that. That’s the only place it comes from. It’s just this deep, deep desire and obsession to be able to tell whatever this story is. It gets its hooks in you and you feel like you must. That’s really what it is.
LA noir, but as a documentary: And I really love L.A. noir stories — “The Long Goodbye,” “Sunset Boulevard,” “Chinatown,” “Mulholland Drive” — I love these things and I’ve always wanted to make one. And so I just went on a “L.A. noir in the form of documentary” hunt, if you will, and I ended up on these old L.A. Times articles about this story. And was immediately hit with that thing of, oh my God, if I could make this, I feel like this could be really, really special. But I knew it all depended on getting an interview with David Sconce because I feel as though if you’re going to tell a story like this and have it really feel like you’ve gone deep and it being worthy of anybody’s time, you’ve got to have the guy.
On picking up David from prison: That morning, I can’t remember what time exactly that we pulled into the parking lot at the prison. I don’t think it was 4:30, but it was soon after that. I was probably about 5 AM. And we sat and we sat and the sun comes up and other people are pulling into the parking lot waiting to pick up a person who they’re waiting for. And we see corrections officers pulling in to go to work for the day and some who are checking out people in the administrative building. And then finally around 7:45, out people come, and we’re looking for him and we thought, oh my God, there he is. And he sees us and he’s got a big smile on his face and he points at us, and we’re rolling the whole time. And he got in the car, and I don’t even know that we were three minutes down the road outside of the prison parking lot when just, on his own, brought up the mortuary, the cremations, I don’t want to say everything, but for not getting asked a question, he brought up a lot. AndI just thought, holy f—, this is going to be a crazy couple of days.
I’m avoiding spoilers of the actual deeds, because A) the subject matter is dark, and it’s a personal choice whether you want to consume that material or not, and B) I don’t want to ruin it for my fellow macabre-minded freaks. It truly cannot be overstated how insane and twisted this series is! And yes, I realize the fact that I was glued to it says something probably very concerning about me. (See also: a previous anecdote on my heritage, I can’t escape it!) But watching David Sconce speak so candidly, without a shred of remorse or any sense of morality, well, it stunned me into gaping silence. It was just pure psychopathy on display. Early on in episode one, the film crew indeed shows Sconce coming out of prison on parole after serving 10 years. And Sconce is all too eager to talk! But, to put it tamely, the man is an unreliable narrator. Enjoy your viewing, if I haven’t completely turned you off the whole thing already.
I’m curious 🤔
I heard this is being watched by so many people – like a cultural touching stone. Feels a lot like Tiger King – it took over during Covid lockdown.
But what does it mean for us as a country society that we went from Tiger King to this?
I watched it. It was memorizing in that macabre way. How he was able to help him too was insane. And he said he never ever thought about going into the family business at first. What would he have done. Yikes.
This guy is a case study in “nothing is ever MY fault.”