In an era of TV police and crime series like CSI and The Killing, using the forensic investigation of a crime scene, including DNA and fingerprints, to help find a killer and solve a murder.

Monica Beletsky, the creator of Apple TV+ Manhunt miniseries, was challenged when adapting the pursuit of Abraham Lincoln’s killer as a true-crime detective thriller, because Lincoln’s assassination in 1865, and the 12-day hunt for John Wilkes Booth, took place before real-life forensic science and gathering of evidence at crime scenes had been established.

Leading the chase for Lincoln’s killer in the period drama is Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, played by Emmy Award winner Tobias Menzies (“The Crown”).

Lincoln hired Stanton to run the War Department during the Civil War. That changed when Stanton, in the aftermath of the assassination, took charge of the country for around 12 hours until Vice President Andrew Johnson was sworn in as Lincoln’s successor.

In Manhunt, Stanton is without crime scene investigation protocol, as at one point he picks up Wilkes Booth’s gun without a glove.

Beletsky’s limited series is based on the book Manhunt: The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln’s Killer by writer James L. Swanson.

Known for work in The Leftovers, Friday Night Lights and Fargo’s third season, Beletsky talked about structuring a very public and political murder in 1865 as a detective procedural, and going well beyond getting the bad guy to portray an American tragedy about a divided nation in the wake of the U.S. Civil War. The seven-part true crime drama, which launched with the first two episodes, also stars Anthony Boyle, Lovie Simone, Will Harrison, Brandon Flynn, Patton Oswalt, Matt Walsh and Hamish Linklater. Read on for the chat, below.

A key American historical event as neo-noir true-crime drama?

A thriller about politician as detective going after the bad guy well before today’s police procedurals

I was excited by the fact that this is a crime show taking place before forensics. We’ve seen hundreds of episodes of procedurals where it’s about clues and cat-verse-mouse, who’s going outsmart each other? This story has that, and I really enjoy all that. But I’m also really interested in the psychology and stories of the people surrounding an investigation, maybe even more than I am in the actual plot and clues. And what was fascinating about this is because it’s pre-forensics, there’s lots of scenes that are tropes in these kinds of shows, like an interrogation or evidence. And at this time, there’s no fingerprinting. So Stanton just picks up the gun without a glove on. That was all fun to play with in a way where I could invert scenes that we know and have seen a hundred times, but it’s going to be have to be different.

This manhunt focus on Stanton, not on Lincoln