A Friend of the Family Sneak Peek: Jake Lacy Eerily Prepares to Abduct Teen as Kidnapper Robert Berchtold
Jake Lacy enters unsettling territory in an all-new A Friend of the Family episode.
In PEOPLE's exclusive look at this week's episode, which airs on Peacock Thursday, Lacy's character Robert Berchtold — a real-life kidnapper and abuser — employs his manipulation tactics on his young neighbor, Jan Broberg (Mckenna Grace), to kidnap her for the second time. He previously kidnapped her two years prior when she was 12 years old.
Before succeeding in doing so, a very scared Broberg — now 14 — runs away from home and hops into Berchtold's car. Upon entering, Berchtold says: "Hey, angel. Hi. Follow my instructions?"
"You leave a note like I told you to?" asks Berchtold as a shaken-up Broberg responds, "Mmm-hmm."
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Noticing the worry in Broberg's demeanor, Berchtold tries to reassure her that everything will be "alright." And when that doesn't work, Berchtold suggests Broberg take a special pill "just for the jitters." (He had previously given her pills to make her fall asleep.)
"After I drop you at the airport, you do exactly like I told you to. Okay?" he continues. "My friends are going to meet you to pick you up when you land."
After telling the teenager that she looked "beautiful," Berchtold made a promise to Broberg: "I'm going to try to come out as soon as I can, so we can spend a little time together before school starts."
From there, Berchtold tells Broberg to "close your eyes" and "get some rest," explaining how they have a "long trip" ahead of them.
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A Friend of the Family, created by Nick Antosca, is based on the real-life case featured in the 2017 documentary Abducted in Plain Sight.
In the 1970s, Broberg was kidnapped twice by Berchtold, a close family friend and neighbor. But Broberg wasn't Berchtold's only victim. He eventually took his own life in November 2005 at age 69.
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"We all wanted to tell Jan and the Broberg's story in this way to serve their purpose of telling it, which is to get the message out that this still happens," Lacy, 37, recently told PEOPLE of the limited series importance. "That the sexual abuse of children has not stopped. That the abducting of children has not stopped. And that it's often done by people that the victim knows and trusts and loves and is familiar to the family."
New episodes of A Friend of the Family arrive Thursdays on Peacock.
If you suspect child abuse, call the Childhelp National Child Abuse Hotline at 1-800-4-A-Child or 1-800-422-4453, or go to www.childhelp.org. All calls are toll-free and confidential. The hotline is available 24/7 in more than 170 languages.
