TELEVISION : Warning: The Menendez Boys Are Back in Town

Menendezmania II.

Last month brought Fox’s quickie rendering of the Menendez murder case, two hours of mindless muck so thick you needed a chainsaw to cut through it. Now, again testing the public’s lust for the sensational, comes the two-part “Menendez: A Killing in Beverly Hills” on CBS. It’s the entertainment industry’s latest effort to make a killing on the Case That Won’t Die.

From its opening pan of the 1989 murder scene, with shotgunned Jose and Kitty Menendez sprawled twisted and bloodied in the den of their posh Beverly Hills home, to its hung-jury finale, this Zev Braun production is much more watchable than its Fox predecessor. The performances are very good, and director Larry Elikann pushes the four hours along at a snappy pace, skillfully guiding viewers through the murkiness.

If pairing snappy with grisly isn’t your taste, however, cable’s ever-valuable Court TV network has crafted its own two-hour digest of this complex and bizarre case for Sunday, “The Menendez Brothers on Trial: The Real Story,” centering on two financially privileged brothers who claimed in court that they brutally slew their parents thinking that their parents were about to slay them. The prosecution claimed they killed out of greed, to inherit the estate.

A primer for the masses, Court TV’s trial-analysis gem not only is fairer and more enlightening than “A Killing in Beverly Hills,” it’s also more compelling as entertainment, using interviews with lawyers, jurors and witnesses on both sides of the case to meticulously chart a step-by-step, strategy-by-strategy course that straightens some of the curves thrown viewers by the CBS docudrama.

What Court TV doesn’t have, of course, is Edward James Olmos’ steely, tyrannical Jose Menendez, whose familial ruthlessness hangs heavily over Sunday’s Part 1 of “A Killing in Beverly Hills” like a gloomy, chilling, dark cloud until he and the pliant Kitty (Beverly D’Angelo) are blasted to bits by their sons at the end of these first two hours. As for the brothers, Damian Chapa’s older Lyle Menendez is the more arrogant, callous and menacing, Travis Fine’s Erik the more sensitive and vulnerable.

Philip Rosenberg’s script has both being bullied and slapped around by their despotic father even as he pampers and immerses them in luxury.

A difficult, even tormented life, yes. But nothing in this selective account supports the brothers’ self-defense contention that they were terrorized to the extent that they believed their parents were going to kill them. Things don’t get nearly that dicey for them in this drama, which is based in part on a strongly worded article by writer Dominick Dunne, who attended the trial and is outspoken about believing that Lyle and Erik are cold-blooded murderers.

There is no mention, for example, of Jose Menendez’s alleged sexual molestation of his sons--which was never aggressively challenged by the prosecution--until the final hour of Part 2 on Tuesday, when the brothers testify about it in court. You either believe their tearful accounts or you don’t.

Fair enough. But “A Killing in Beverly Hills” uses a double standard: Other unsupported material that casts doubt on the veracity of Lyle and Erik is depicted as factual.

Jose Menendez a monster? In one scene, a philandering Jose is seen under the sheets with an unnamed woman after they’ve had sex, wondering aloud if he’s been too tough on his sons in preparing them for life’s hard knocks. The scene does nothing for his image as a husband, but it humanizes him as a caring father despite his flaws. What is the basis for this pillow talk depiction? Even if there is a legitimate source, we don’t know who it is; viewers are asked to accept the account on faith.

In another early scene, Lyle admiringly calls Cuban immigrant Jose “a great man” for overcoming hardship to achieve enormous business success in the United States. Erik is aghast at his brother’s seeming affection for their tormentor. “How can you love a man like that?” he asks. “Love him?” Lyle responds coldly. “Are you crazy? I hate his guts!”

This dialogue undercuts the brothers’ contention that they did not kill their parents out of hatred. As they are the only ones present, however, where does it come from? Who’s the source? Is it merely an extrapolation based on the unsubstantiated “hatred” testimony of Dr. L. Jerome Oziel, the brothers’ controversial psychiatrist, whose own credibility has become an epic issue in the case?

“A Killing in Beverly Hills” has a right to its own perspective, premature as it may be given that a retrial looms. But what gives the drama’s creators special knowledge--motivating them to choose sides--is not immediately apparent.

It was Oziel (Dwight Schultz), meanwhile, who tape-recorded the brothers saying to him that they killed their parents, and it was his former girlfriend, Judalon Smith (Debrah Farentino), who blew the whistle, leading to the arrest of Lyle and Eric and to the crucial tapes ultimately being admitted into evidence at their trial before separate juries. The volatile Oziel/Smith relationship becomes a fascinatingly weird subtext in this account.

The courtroom sequences are artfully staged, with Margaret Whitton (toting enough blond curls to give most people a hernia) especially persuasive as Eric’s shrill, caustic but effective attorney, Leslie Abramson.

Viewers are also taken inside the separate jury rooms, where there is general agreement on facts, but not on what they mean. Some filmmakers apparently face no such dilemma.

* “Menendez: A Killing in Beverly Hills” airs 9-11 p.m. Sunday and Tuesday on CBS (Channels 2 and 8). “The Menendez Brothers on Trial: The Real Story” airs at 5 p.m. and 9 p.m. Sunday on Court TV.