‘Yoga Teacher Killer: The Kaitlin Armstrong Story’s Caity Lotz and Kyle Schmid Talk Shocking True Crime
Written by Rtradio on June 13, 2024
Married actors Kyle Schmid and Caity Lotz are teaming up for their new Lifetime movie, Yoga Teacher Killer: The Kaitlin Armstrong Story, and sharing what it was like transforming into the real-life inspirations of the film.
Sitting down with ET’s Kevin Frazier in an exclusive interview, Lotz and Schmid opened up about everything from the beginning of their relationship to the new project, which tells the true story of Kaitlin Armstrong, a yoga instructor turned killer.
In the film, the Mad Men actress, 37, plays Armstrong, the woman who shot and killed cyclist Moriah “Mo” Wilson in May 2022. The murder was triggered by Armstrong’s jealousy of Wilson’s illicit relationship with her boyfriend, Colin Strickland (Schmid). Actress Larissa Dias portrays the murdered cyclist.
Lotz tells ET that she found it difficult to step into the shoes of the titular murderer — who fled the country after killing Wilson, spending more than a month on the lam and drastically changing her appearance to hide from the law. She did, however, find one major thing she could relate to.
“The one thing that just struck me with her… is like when you try so hard, you want something so bad and [want it] to work and it’s not working, but you just keep trying to force it,” Lotz said of her character. “I think that’s really what happened with her and she just tried so hard.”
The actress, who called Armstrong “highly emotional and volatile,” continued, “I tried to connect with that aspect of it, of like when you want something so desperately and you, no matter what you do, it’s like you just keep making it worse.”
Lotz and Schmid — who tied the knot in Colombia in 2023 — announced in April that they are expecting their first child together later this year, a baby girl. They shared the happy news in an Instagram post showing off her bump and his stomach, touching for dramatic effect. “Gaining weight for the role of a lifetime 🤰🏼🥰 👋,” Lotz captioned the post.
According to the actress, she was in the early stages of her pregnancy as they were filming in Canada. Luckily, they were able to keep the baby news under wraps and hide the pregnancy from the audience thanks to the production team’s help. Looking back, however, they say the film will forever be infamous in their household, especially when their daughter is older.
“And now we get to tell our little girl when she grows up that, ‘You’re in this movie,'” Lotz said. “Mom’s murdering someone while you’re in her belly.”
Schmid shares that while others may watch in shock and horror (rightfully so) at the actions of the film’s main character, he will always be in awe of Lotz’s ability to play the role in a nuanced and layered fashion.
“I’d never seen Caity play a character anything like this,” he shared. “To see her do it and balance the character kind of so well in a way that made it interesting, dynamic and kind of like fun to watch in a weird way was kind of cool.”
He added of his wife’s portrayal, “When I had read the script, I didn’t see it the way that she kind of performed it and that was fun.”
As for the subject material, the couple told ET that while they were not strangers to the headline-making case, it was only after they read the scripts and signed onto the project that they fully understood the extent of the situation.
“She’s a yoga teacher so you — it’s the opposite of what you think somebody like that would be and going on the run and plastic surgery and all this like crazy stuff, it was pretty — it’s a pretty dramatic story,” Lotz said.
“I had heard about the story, I mean, it was in the news, all over the place. It was pretty widely publicized,” Schmid added. “When we got the script, I thought, ‘No way. Really?'”
As the case played out fairly recently in the courts — Armstrong was found guilty of first-degree murder in November and sentenced to 90 years in prison — the couple gave credit to the film’s writer-director Katie Boland, who they say tastefully tackled the source material.
“I think she did a good job kind of balancing the characters and [she] made it interesting,” Schmid said. “It’ll be a good watch.”
Yoga Teacher Killer: The Kaitlin Armstrong Story airs on Lifetime on June 15 at 8 p.m. EST.
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