Hollywood comes to Braintree: 'Boston Strangler' films at old Foster School

Movie magic brought the 1960s back to life in Braintree.

The former Josephine M. Foster Elementary School was transformed into a movie set Jan. 26-27 to shoot scenes for the upcoming true-crime movie about the Boston Strangler, one of history’s most infamous serial killers.

Titled “Boston Strangler,” the film centers on how the late Milton journalist Loretta McLaughlin (Keira Knightley) and her fellow Boston Record American reporter, Scituate native Jean (Cole) Harris, challenged the sexism of the early 1960s in covering the story. They were the first reporters to connect the murders to one suspect now known as the Boston Strangler. Kingston’s Chris Cooper, an Oscar winner for “Adaptation,” co-stars in the movie.

Several ‘60s-era vehicles, including cars with “Michigan State Police” on the doors, were parked at the school and in the driveways of nearby homes on Thursday.

Written and directed by Matt Ruskin (“Crown Heights”), the movie began shooting Dec. 6 at a school in Belmont that was temporarily turned into a Cambridge police station. Other shooting locations are in Roxbury, Roslindale, Jamaica Plain, Braintree, Lynn, Lowell, Wellesley and Malden. Filming is expected to wrap in March.

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Thirteen Boston-area women, ages 19 to 67, were sexually assaulted and killed between 1962 and 1964, crimes that terrorized the region and grabbed national headlines. All the victims were strangled with articles of their own clothing; one also was stabbed repeatedly.

In 1967, Albert DeSalvo – who confessed to the crimes but was never charged – was convicted on unrelated armed robbery and sexual assault charges. He was sentenced to life, but was stabbed to death in 1973 at the state prison in Walpole.

Joining Knightley (“Pirates of the Caribbean”) in the cast are Alessandro Nivola (“Many Saints of Newark”), Carrie Coon (“Gone Girl”) and Rory Cochrane (“Hostiles”). David Dastmalchian (“Suicide Squad”) is rumored to be playing DeSalvo.

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The Foster School is at 30 Foster Road in Braintree Highlands. It had seven classrooms and an all-purpose open space that served as gym, auditorium and cafeteria. It could hold 210 students. It closed in 1976. Foster was a teacher in Braintree for 45 years before her death, one month before the school opened in September 1953. The building was also a care facility for the elderly.

Shot on the South Shore

"Boston Strangler" is the third high-profile film in recent months to film in Braintree. Ben Affleck's "The Tender Bar" shot last spring and can be streamed on Amazon Prime. The Christmas movie-musical “Spirited," which filmed scenes at the South Shore Plaza and stars Ryan Reynolds and Will Ferrell, will premiere on Apple TV+ this December.

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Other films to shoot on the South Shore in the past year include "Confess, Fletch," the crime-comedy reboot with Jon Hamm in the title role, and the Whitney Houston biopic "I Wanna Dance with Somebody," hitting theaters Dec. 23. Scenes for "Julia," the upcoming HBO Max original series about chef Julia Childs, were shot at Adams Shore Supermarket in Quincy last year.

Boston true-crime craze

“Boston Strangler” is the latest in a series of film projects focusing on high-profile Boston crimes, including “Black Mass,” about notorious gangster James “Whitey” Bulger; “Patriots Day,” about the Boston Marathon bombings; and the Netflix documentary “This Is a Robbery,” about the Gardner museum heist. The Hulu series “The Girl from Plainville,” about the Michelle Carter texting-suicide case, will be released this spring.

The Boston Strangler has long been the subject of movies and books. Tony Curtis played DeSalvo in the 1968 movie that also featured Henry Fonda and George Kennedy. Marshfield author Casey Sherman, a nephew of victim Mary Sullivan, wrote “A Rose for Mary,” a 2003 book about the case. Sullivan, 19, had moved from Whitman to Boston just three days before she became the final victim.

Milton and Scituate connections to 'Strangler'

Loretta McLaughlin (Knightley), a longtime Braintree and Milton resident, died in 2018 at age 90. She was a recipient of the Abigail Adams Tribute award for 1995. The award, given by the Massachusetts Women's Political Caucus, honors outstanding Massachusetts women leaders who have made significant contributions to the political, economic and social rights for women. She had a long career in journalism, starting as a beat reporter covering Massachusetts politics for State House News Service. She also covered the 1950s Brinks robbery and was a medical reporter for the Boston Herald.

McLaughlin retired from journalism as the editorial page editor of The Boston Globe. She wrote the Globe’s endorsements of William Weld for governor of Massachusetts, Bill Clinton for president of the United States and Thomas Menino for mayor of Boston.

Jean Cole Harris (Coon) died in 2015 at age 89. She grew up in Scituate, one of six children of the town’s fire chief, Howard Cole, and his wife, Margaret. She began a long career in newspapers as a “copy boy” for the Boston Daily Record in 1944. From 1972 until her retirement in 1981, she wrote for the Boston Herald American. Much of her work involved investigative reporting, twice exposing deficiencies in the state’s nursing homes after going undercover as a nurse’s aide. She also helped chronicle the criminal elements operating in downtown Boston, coining the moniker “the Combat Zone.”

"Boston Strangler" is produced by 20th Century Studios. A release date hasn’t been set.

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Reach Dana Barbuto at dbarbuto@patriotledger.com.

This article originally appeared on The Patriot Ledger: Keira Knightley 'Boston Strangler' movie films scenes in Braintree