‘The Jinx — Part Two’ Revisits Bombshell Robert Durst Hot Mic Confession

Jackie Strause
·4 min read
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Robert Durst is back as an HBO subject with the follow-up to the bombshell 2015 docuseries The Jinx.

The Jinx — Part Two, which is coming April 21 and nearly a decade after the first installment, is a six-episode continuation of Andrew Jarecki’s Emmy-winning docuseries, The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst, that made Durst a household name and kicked off the ongoing wave of true-crime docuseries.

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The New York real estate heir was arrested on first-degree murder charges for the death of his best friend, Susan Berman — less than 24 hours before the Jinx finale aired in an episode that shocked the country when Durst, who was unknowingly still mic’d, is heard saying, “What did I do? Killed them all, of course.”

After an ensuing trial, Durst was convicted for the first-degree murder of Berman in September 2021, and later sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole.

In January 2022, Durst died of natural causes in a hospital outside the California prison where he was serving his life sentence, at age 78.

The Jinx — Part Two, which released a trailer along with the premiere date on Wednesday, travels back to the moment when the filmmakers ended the doc with the “five words everyone is talking about.”

An investigator who speaks to the cameras recalls thinking at the time, “This is going to be the biggest thing to hit my office since O.J. [Simpson].” The trailer then touts the Durst story as continuing, as Durst himself is heard saying, “I heard Jarecki is doing a sequel.”

Jarecki then appears in the trailer, saying he has come across an audio recording that has “changed my perception of something I’ve been working on for 17 years.”

An unidentified woman is heard beginning to share her story, and the footage ends with Durst promising “surprises and surprises.”

The logline for Part Two says, “the filmmakers continue their investigation for the next eight years, uncovering hidden material, Durst’s prison calls and interviews with witnesses who had not come forward until now.”

When Durst was convicted, Jarecki reacted by saying, “I can’t say I was surprised because if you watch the trial it was extraordinary. Bob admits in the trial that he lied five times and perjured himself in this trial. He also admits that he lied in his prior trial. … You can’t be amazed by it, but at the same time it’s very gratifying because you also know this is a man who’s evaded justice for so long that all you can do is hope for the families of the victims that there are not going to be surprises.”

In interviews since The Jinx released, Jarecki has stood by Durst’s final words in the series (“I think that’s certainly what he says, and I have no reason to believe that that’s not the case”), though he said the timing of the arrest was a coincidence.

Jarecki also went on to direct the 2010 fictional film based on Durst’s life, All Good Things, starring Ryan Gosling and Kirsten Dunst. Even after the conviction, he said he didn’t think the story was over.

Berman was shot dead in December 2000. Along with Berman’s death and the death and dismemberment of Durst’s neighbor, Morris Black, the first series investigated the 1982 disappearance of Durst’s wife, Kathie. Durst denied killing her and was never charged with a crime connected to her disappearance. Her body has never been found; Berman was killed as the district attorney was preparing to speak with her about the unsolved case.

The Jinx — Part Two is a Hit The Ground Running Production directed by Jarecki; executive produced by Zac Stuart-Pontier, Jarecki and Kyle Martin; produced by Charlotte Kaufman and Sam Neave; co-produced by Richard Hankin and Susan Lazarus; and executive produced by Nancy Abraham, Lisa Heller and Sara Rodriguez for HBO.

Part Two releases April 21 at 10 p.m. ET/PT, with new episodes debuting weekly on HBO and streaming on Max. In the U.K., the series will be available on Sky Documentaries and streaming service NOW starting Monday, April 22.

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