Charles, Oliver and Mabel are taking on billionaires this season. Or as Martin Short‘s character puts it, “The new mob of New York.”
Only Murders in the Building looked to real-life billionaires for inspiration for new characters in Season 5: tech billionaire Sebastian “Bash” Steed (Christoph Waltz), heir of a pharmaceutical magnate Jay Pflug (Logan Lerman), and Camila White (Renée Zellweger), a lifestyle Queen who owns half of New York’s hotels.
“All three were an amalgamation of various people,” showrunner John Hoffman exclusively told Parade, though he didn’t specify who exactly.
Christoph Waltz as Sebastian “Bash” Steed
“I know those people have a lot of money still and can be litigious,” the show’s co-creator joked, before hinting, “Go down the list of those people in mind for the tech wizards of the world, the children of famous families with tons of money and style inspirations who have built fortunes off of hotels and every other thing. All of that felt like fun, particular, specific New York types, too.”
For the fifth season featuring robots and billionaires, Hoffman revealed that Only Murders in the Building pulled a little from present-day headlines. The decision to have the Arconia’s resident podcasters go up against the rich and powerful began, as it usually tends to do, with the victim, in this case, Lester, the doorman.
Renée Zellweger as Camila White with Martin Short
“There’s no more traditional, singular, distinctive role in New York than that of the doorman of a brilliant pre-war apartment building in New York City,” Hoffman noted. “It’s a job that doesn’t exist in all places, and it’s got a storied history, and they’ve seen the view of power in New York as it shifted, and they’ve had to navigate personally. All those questions came up.”
“So there were a couple of other things that came up in development for the season about power in a big city like New York and the way in which the old wielding of power was very complicated and also right in your face at times, is now matched with a more subterranean, a little bit moneyed in a bigger way than anyone could have ever imagined way to sort of make power grabs in New York, and how all of that sits on either side of our little trio investigating their doorman’s death,” Hoffman continued. “It just felt like ‘Ooo that’s a season.’ I could see that’s an area we haven’t gone before and we actually pull from the headlines a little bit of today in New York City.”
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In addition to Lester, there’s another murder to solve this season with the death of Nicky Caccimelio. While the latter’s body was technically found outside of the apartment building, in the attached dry cleaners, Hoffman confirmed that the Arconia has not reached its body count cap.
Nicky and Lester are the victims in Season 5 of ‘Only Murders in the Building’
“Hell to the no!” he laughed. “I mean, I think they’ve opened up a can of worms… As things will be in media or in New York or in sort of the world anymore, a lot of people jumping on a bandwagon once things get started.”
Hoffman added, “My gut is until I have no inspiration and the rest of us look at each other going, ‘Gosh, I got nothing.’ We’re just gonna keep plugging away and trying because it feels like a little spot of joy in the world, oddly, in a murder show.”
Season 5 of Only Murders in the Building premiered Sept. 9 with three episodes. New episodes will be released weekly on Hulu.
Related: ‘Only Murders in the Building’ Season 5 Gets a Premiere Date: Everything to Know
This story was originally reported by Parade on Sep 16, 2025, where it first appeared in the TV section. Add Parade as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
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