Max Winkler Takes the Chair for Monster's Lizzie Borden Chapter
Max Winkler is the director behind the camera for Monster: The Lizzie Borden Story, the next chapter in Ryan Murphy's true-crime anthology on Netflix. An anthology, meaning each season tells a standalone story with a new cast and case. Ella Beatty stars as Lizzie Borden, with the season billed as the fourth instalment of the Monster franchise, according to Variety.
Winkler came to the project at full speed. He was shooting Love Story and editing the Monster season about Ed Gein when he first read pages for the Borden story. He laid out that overlap in a feature interview published by Variety on 25 September 2026.
That juggling act caps a long climb through television. In the 2010s Winkler directed episodes of the comedies New Girl, Brooklyn Nine-Nine and Fresh Off the Boat. He moved into film with the 2017 dark comedy Flower. He followed it with Jungleland, a boxing drama starring Charlie Hunnam and Jack O'Connell that debuted at the Toronto International Film Festival.
Winkler first entered Murphy's orbit in 2021. He directed episodes of American Horror Stories and American Horror Story that year. Since then he has stayed inside that universe as both director and executive producer, a senior role that includes creative and financial oversight as well as directing. That run includes the Monster franchise, Love Story, The Shards and Feud: Capote vs. The Swans.
The slate around him is crowded. Hunnam plays killer Ed Gein in the third season of Monster, according to Variety. Love Story: John F. Kennedy Jr. & Carolyn Bessette started with three episodes on 12 February on FX and Hulu, as reported by Variety. That series later passed 65 million hours streamed on Hulu, according to Variety. Murphy is also developing The Shards with Kaia Gerber attached.
An FX Networks listing had Winkler attached to direct the pilot, meaning the first episode made to launch a series, for the Borden season starring Beatty. He discussed the Murphy projects in more detail in a Gold Derby interview published in June 2026.
What makes this stand out is continuity. Winkler worked with Hunnam on Jungleland years before directing him as Gein. He has now carried that working relationship into Lizzie Borden, with one nineteenth-century murder case next in the queue.
