The phone call that led to Season 3

Almost exactly a year ago, the ID channel aired what were expected to be the final episodes of the saga of Ukrainian-born American adoptee Natalia Grace. But like Hot Snakes Media co-founders and producers Eric and Shannon Evangelista, the edit for the season two finale of The Strange Case of Natalia Gracethey received a phone call from Natalia’s new adoptive family, Bishop Antwon and Cynthia Mans. The preacher on the other end frustratedly told them: “We have a situation. Something is wrong with Natalia.”

“It was Christmas Eve and it was this bombshell phone call for us,” Shannon says now The Hollywood Reporter. “From then on we just said to get our cameras and follow them. That’s what we did.”

The Strange Case of Natalia Grace: The last chapterairing Jan. 6 and 7, answers the phone call that led the Evangelistas to Tennessee, where Natalia was living with the Mans family after years of being abused by her former adoptive parents, Kristine and Michael Barnett. The Barnetts’ claim that Natalia, who has a rare form of dwarfism known as spondyloepiphyseal dysplasia congenita, was a manipulatively dangerous adult woman pretending to be a minor was the focus of the first two seasons of The curious case. The second season confirmed that Natalia was indeed a child as she lived with the couple from 2010 to 2013 when they abandoned her in an apartment in Lafayette, Indiana, and as of 2023 she was biologically 22 years old.

Yet life as an adult with the Mans family appears to have been just as challenging, and perhaps just as challenging, as is explored in the new four-part docu-series, which claims Natalia suffered physical and financial abuse while was in their custody. Although Natalia never directly confirms or denies any of the claims, she escapes their home with the help of Nicole and Vince DePaul, a dwarf couple who first expressed a desire to adopt her in 2009, as well as her London-based boyfriend Neil , whose relationship with Natalia was one of many sources of contention in the men’s home, the documentary shows.

“There was no hesitation in continuing this story,” says ID President Jason Sarlanis THR. “We had become so invested as a network in Natalia’s story when we knew there were more twists and turns that we needed to see how it would end. That’s why we greenlit.”

Below, Sarlanis and Evangelistas talk THR about putting together The last chapterhow Natalia is doing today and what’s in store for the upcoming spinoff series The curious case of… starring legal analyst Beth Karas, premiering January 13.

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Eric, in the intro to this last series you say you thought Natalia had her happy ending. Did you have any suspicions about the Mans family or other parts of this story while you were working on season two?

ERIC EVANGELISTA No, we thought it was over, but you always have to keep an open mind. You never know when a story will end.

SHANNON EVANGELISTA To me, there was nothing to suggest that this wasn’t a completely happy ending for Natalia. We were actually shocked when the phone call came in and heard that there is a lot more to this story. We thought she was finally getting this happy ending, and instead it took a complete turn and became this murky uncertainty.

When you arrived in Tennessee after the surprise phone call, and both the Mans and Natalia told you that everything was suddenly fine, did you ask to speak to Natalia alone?

SHANNON Yes, Eric did.

ERIC Yes, we weren’t really allowed to do that. Manses was very protective of us being allowed to talk to her alone at that time.

Were you ever able to see the Facebook texts between Natalia and Neil that the Manses denied?

SHANNON No. Natalia was quite aware that her communications with Neil were private, but we had our own communications with Neil, and we were also able to see Nicole DePaul’s communications with Neil.

The document states that Neil wanted his identity hidden, why was he unwilling to appear in the series?

SHANNON I think his private relationship with Natalia wasn’t really relevant. It really came down to Natalia and that phone call (to DePaul’s) and things just changed very abruptly. And this season you will get such a deep dive into Natalia and DePauls with access not previously given to us.

The DePauls helping Natalia escape from the church at the beginning of the second part is a major turning point in her story. How much heads up did you have that this happened? What were you thinking going into that rescue mission?

SHANNON We literally had no delivery time at all.

ERIC Maybe 24 hours if that.

SHANNON It was explosive.

JASON SARLANIS I never thought in my career that we would see that kind of footage of an active escape being shot. It’s such a credit to our filmmakers and the amount of openness they had to follow the story wherever it would lead.

The first part begins to cast doubt on Manses’ intentions in adopting Natalia. It is stated at the end of the episode that they chose not to respond to the allegations of abuse made about them later in the series. When did communication with them end?

SHANNON It never quite ended, honestly. We communicated with them and were very forthright about any allegation that was ever made. They were given detailed information. They just ultimately chose not to respond to these allegations. Communication continued throughout the filming of the documentary.

Law enforcement officials also chose not to comment on those allegations. Does this suggest there is an ongoing investigation?

SHANNON When minors are involved, the police really don’t want to comment. They want to preserve the privacy of every individual. But when the charges came against Manses, we immediately notified the police.

Robert Madewell is one of the people who was willing to write about Manses’ alleged abuse of his son. However, Anna Newlin appears to change her story in the documentary from the first recorded phone call you had with her, where she also accused Manses of abusing Natalia. Why do you think that is?

SHANNON Here’s our thing, as documentarians, our job and what we want to do is go out and produce unbiased, safe spaces where people can share their side of the story and then we validate it. Why individuals act the way they do, we really leave that to the experts, like Beth Karas.

Beth Karas describes Natalia’s life situation so far as a “hell loop.” How is it that she has repeatedly found herself in the care of such questionable individuals? Does it simply come down to the vulnerabilities disabled people face in society?

SHANNON I absolutely think so. I believe that Natalia is a survivor. I think she is incredibly strong. I think right now we’re able to confirm that she’s safe and that she’s being well taken care of, and that feels great. She is a very strong, intelligent young woman. She is very, very talented and she has overcome so much in her life. We all have great respect for her resilience.

Do we know where Natalia stands financially? There is a big question in the doctor that she may have been blackmailed by the Manses and also stuck with a big tax bill as a result of their mismanagement of her disability benefits and other income. Do you know how much money she has made from appearances or how much money they have made from her being in their care?

SHANNON No, I don’t. They have a lot of things that were going on with the GoFundMes and things that we weren’t really privy to other than what Natalia had told us, so there’s no real way for us to confirm that just because we don’t have access to exactly, what is going on in their side of things.

In doc. you state that mental health services were made available to Natalia, which she chose to decline. How did she respond to your offer?

SHANNON She said she wasn’t interested in it, but it’s also something that was part of a much deeper ongoing discussion between Natalia and the DePauls. They have been her number one advocate. I don’t think anyone fully understands Natalia’s situation better than Nicole, who has the same rare form of dwarfism. So one of the things that Nicole feels very positive about is that Natalia is starting to open up different surgical options for herself. She feels that if Natalia can change her attitude about that, she can change her attitude about everything else. We always take the health and safety of all individuals involved in any of our productions extremely seriously, so we offered these services to Natalia. At the time she declined, but that doesn’t mean she won’t change her mind in the future.

In the fourth part, Natalia goes to the UK to meet Neil for the first time. Did you try to follow her on that trip?

SHANNON No, she’s doing her thing. There is no reason for that. We were very excited for Natalia, especially because Natalia has finally had her age corrected and is able to be the 21-year-old girl that she always wanted to celebrate her 21st birthday. One thing that’s amazing about this series is that you see someone who finally, for the first time in their life, gets to make their own choices. Embracing Natalia’s agency, I think, is part of the narrative of this final chapter, and it’s something we’re really proud of her and excited for her going forward.

The ongoing strife between Natalia and Manses took a toll on DePaul’s marriage and also their relationship with their biological daughter. Do you have a sense of how they feel now as a family unit?

SHANNON I don’t know what to say. All I can say is that I love a happy ending – a real one, not a fake one.

Although this iteration of the series is labeled “The Final Chapter,” is there a world where this story could continue?

SARLANIS I’ll just say that I haven’t gotten a phone call so I can promise you that so far it’s not like the last time. But I think that’s part of the reason we’re so excited to develop this with a spinoff series with Beth Karas. Whether Natalia’s story is ever repeated or not, a lot of it will have to do with Natalia, but there are so many other stories. I was shocked at what came back when we initially started developing what a spinoff could be. Natalia is nowhere near the most twisted story that Eric and Sharon have come up with, and I’m a little sad about that.

SHANNON We are talking about a multiple identity scam, a religious doomsday tax cult. Each story is crazier than the next. We have great appreciation for our audience, so we don’t want it to end for them. We are truly grateful to ID for giving us and Beth Karas this platform to continue telling these wackier, stranger-than-fiction stories. No one would let us do this other than Jason and these stories are amazing. They get even better.

SARLANIS It is a good case study for how we develop the brand at ID. Yes, we’re the home of all things true crime, but at the end of the day, we’re an investigative documentary network. And each of these episodes is its own stand-alone documentary, taking us into more and more fascinating investigations, some of which have nothing to do with true crime. So it’s really exciting to see how we can develop the brand together.

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The Curious Case of Natalia Grace: The Final Chapter airs on January 6 and 7 from 9-11 PM ET/PT and streamed on Max.