Real-life 'Happy Face' daughter astonished by truth in Ashford-Quaid performances

NEW YORK, April 30 (UPI) -- Author and podcaster Melissa Moore says most of her loved ones backed her decision to share their unique experience of having a serial killer in the family for the new limited drama series Happy Face.

"My adult children are supportive. My husband's supportive. My mother's passed away. I don't know about my father, if he's supportive," Moore told UPI with a laugh in a recent Zoom interview. "But I feel the love of my children, my husband and that carries me through."

Wrapping up on Paramount+ Thursday, the fact-based show follows a fictionalized version of Moore played by Annaleigh Ashford.

Here, Melissa is a married TV talk-show makeup artist and the mother of two kids, who is forced to reunite with her serial-killer father Keith Jesperson (Dennis Quaid) to get innocent Elijah (Damon Gupton) -- who was wrongly convicted of one of the Happy Face Killer's crimes -- released from death row.

"I've received lots of letters, so I'm sure if I open one of them, there's some comments about Dennis Quaid. I'm confident," Moore said of her real-life, estranged father Jesperson, who was convicted of murdering at least eight women in the early 1990s.

"I know he's aware of [Quaid playing him] because I've had reporters message me and I've had podcasters reach out to me that my father is in communication with and he's letting them know about it."

What is accurately reflected in the series is that Moore has grappled for most of her life with the memories of the fun and loving dad she knew when she was a child and the monster he was later revealed to be.

Jesperson has also deluged Moore with letters over the years in an attempt to continue a relationship with her, while Moore largely ignores the communication.

Moore said she wanted to tell her story because she hadn't seen many films or TV shows about the families of people who commit evil deeds.

"I wanted people to understand what the relationship is like with my father and myself," she explained.

"The public have always asked me, 'How did you not know?' -- about my father's crimes, obviously -- and I feel like this series will show more about how I didn't know and maybe it's more like a show versus tell."

Happy Face show-runner Jennifer Cacicio said she was also excited to tell a serial-killer story from the fresh perspective of a daughter who once loved him.

"I just felt like there was such a wonderful, innate conflict for a character to kind of struggle through that," Cacicio said.

"This could be Melissa's story and really focus on what it means to be a family member of someone who's committed a crime," she added. "We're always focusing on the perpetrator or we're focusing on seeing the acts of violence and I really kind of wanted to just tell this story in a new way, through a new lens."

Moore said she and Cacicio immediately connected and shared a singular vision for the project.

"Right from the beginning, Jen made me feel that she understood what it's like to have a family member that is in jail, that you are ashamed of, that you have to wrestle with the conflict within yourself of how to make choices of whether to keep that relationship or not," Moore noted.

"These are things I think that not everybody would have a deep understanding about or even have personal experience with and Jen did and she definitely stood out," she added. "I felt that she would be respectful, just from her being vulnerable and sharing her story with me."

Cacicio said Ashford was always at the top of her wish list to play Melissa and not just because the two women look so similar.

"She has so much empathy and compassion, just like Melissa," Cacicio said of Ashford. "She just feels like a real, grounded person and someone you believe would encourage people to open up to her, which is exactly what Melissa is."

Quaid was hired later on.

"I always knew that I wanted to cast someone who didn't always play a villain," Cacicio said.

"I kind of wanted more of an 'American sweetheart,' which is what I think Dennis is. He's the Parent Trap dad and, so, I really wanted to create that conflict for the viewer that you sort of see why Melissa loves him and, also, struggles with with him."

Moore said she was amazed the actors were able to capture the emotionally fraught energy between her and her father.

"He's always going to be my father for life and, yet, he preys upon that, in a sense, my desires to have that loving father that I used to have and then when I'm vulnerable and I start having contact, then he betrays my trust," she said.

"That relationship between Dennis Quaid and Annaleigh Ashford portrayed my real-life relationship with my father to an astonishing level. The accuracy was all there."

The limited series also co-stars as James Wolk, Tamera Tomakili and David Harewood.