Since its inception, Only Murders in the Building has been about loneliness, says John Hoffman, who created the series with its co-lead, Steve Martin. In its most recent season, its fifth, which wrapped in October, the Emmy-winning series continued to hit all the familiar marks as its main trio, Mabel Mora (Selena Gomez), Charles-Hayden Savage (Martin) and Oliver Putnam (Martin Short) uncover both the murder of a beloved yet overlooked doorman, Lester (Teddy Coluca), and a major conspiracy involving Bobby Cannavale’s mobster character, Nicky Caccimelio, that threatens the very building that brought them together in the first place. Before the show launches its sixth season later this year, Hoffman unpacked a scene in the season five opener that sets up the surprising mystery the podcasters scurry to solve.
Disney
This episode is an example of what makes the murder mystery conceit of OMITB special, Hoffman says. “I’ve watched so many brilliant writers come in and they look at the task ahead and they think, ‘Wait a minute, comedic set pieces, arcs that are personal and emotional for the main characters, ridiculous twists, and the whole thing has to unspool over 10 episodes of a real mystery that has to keep people on their toes!’ Episode one is so critical. At the end, you want to go, ‘Are you on the ride?’ We have a lot going on in these two sequences that has all kinds of answers to questions that [the audience] didn’t see coming, hopefully.”
