Andrew Garfield was nominated for an Emmy for his performance in “Under the Banner of Heaven.” Variety reported that Garfield was nominated for best actor in a limited series. He plays detective Jeb Pyre, a Latter-day Saint detective who investigates the murders of Brenda and Erica Lafferty. His character has a faith crisis during his investigation.
Was Jeb Pyre a real detective on the case?
No, he was not.
The credits for “Under the Banner of Heaven” read, “This program is inspired by actual true crime events. Some characters in the program are fictional and some scenes and dialogues are invented for creative and storyline purposes.”
Pyre is an invented character who does not exist in real life as one of the detectives who investigated the murders.
The detective who investigated the double homicide was primarily Terry Fox, who was the American Fork police chief.
Why did Dustin Lance Black make up Pyre?
Show writer Dustin Lance Black stated why he created Pyre. “That started as a notion when I was having conversations with an actual investigator who worked on the case, who was very helpful but asked to not be depicted as himself; he didn’t want to have to live through that again, and I understood that.”
This led Black to create detective Bill Taba as well, because he wanted the audience to be an investigator while watching the series. He said, “Well, I’d love to put the viewer there so let’s create an investigator, and in fact let’s create two investigators so that we have one who comes from within, and one who comes from the outside”
What did Garfield say influenced him in that role?
According to Newsweek, Garfield said that conversations with a different detective influenced his portrayal of Pyre.
In an interview with Variety, Garfield also stated, “I traveled to Utah for a little research trip with some friends of Dustin Lance’s and met countless ex-Mormons, current Mormons, future ex-Mormons, cop Mormons, I just asked lots and lots of questions and tried to immerse myself in that culture as much as possible and made sure that there wasn’t a hair out of place in that way.”