Geena Davis is taking on the most chilling role of her career. HBO is developing "Dorothea", a true-crime drama series starring the Oscar winner as Dorothea Puente — the sweet-faced Sacramento landlady known as the "Death House Landlady", who ran a boarding house for society's most vulnerable in the 1980s, drugged and killed her elderly and disabled tenants, buried seven of them in her garden at 1426 F Street, and quietly kept cashing their Social Security checks. The casting was first reported by Variety and Deadline on July 8, 2026. Up front: it's in development at HBO — no premiere date yet.
Is There a Movie About Dorothea Puente? What HBO Just Announced
Per Variety and Deadline, "Dorothea" is a drama series in development at HBO with Davis attached to star and executive produce. Joshua Michael Stern ("Jobs") wrote the series and will serve as showrunner, from a story he co-wrote with actor Michael Rosenbaum (Smallville's Lex Luthor) and Jane Whitney. Rosenbaum pitched it to Jeff Frost's Bristol Circle Entertainment, which sold it to HBO; Rosenbaum and Frost executive produce alongside Davis.
This would be Davis's first lead series role since ABC's "Commander in Chief" two decades ago. And "in development" means exactly that: no series order yet, no other cast announced, no release date.
Who Was Dorothea Puente, the Real 'Death House Landlady'?
To neighbors and social workers, Puente looked like the perfect grandmother — white hair, floral dresses, home-cooked meals at her Victorian boarding house at 1426 F Street in downtown Sacramento. Caseworkers referred their hardest-to-place clients to her: elderly people, recovering addicts, tenants with mental illness or disabilities.
Behind the lace curtains, Puente was sedating tenants, killing them, and still collecting their monthly government benefit checks. She had already served prison time in the early 1980s for drugging and robbing older people she met in bars — and her parole terms barred her from handling the elderly's finances. She ran the boarding house anyway.
It unraveled on November 11, 1988, when police — following a social worker's missing-person report about tenant Alvaro "Bert" Montoya — began digging in her yard and found human remains. Mid-excavation, Puente calmly told officers she was stepping out for coffee and fled to Los Angeles, where days later a retiree she was chatting up in a bar recognized her from TV news. She was arrested November 16.
How Many Victims Did Dorothea Puente Have?
Investigators pulled seven bodies from the F Street property: tenants Leona Carpenter, Dorothy Miller, Benjamin Fink, James Gallop, Vera Faye Martin, Betty Palmer, and Alvaro Montoya — victims ranging from their early 50s to their 80s. She was charged with nine murders in total, including 1982 business partner Ruth Munroe and onetime boyfriend Everson Gillmouth, found in a homemade box beside the Sacramento River.
At her 1993 trial — moved to Monterey County because of the media frenzy — the jury convicted her of three murders (two first-degree, one second-degree) and deadlocked on the remaining six. She received life without parole, insisting to the end that her tenants died naturally — and died herself, of natural causes, on March 27, 2011, at age 82, at the Central California Women's Facility in Chowchilla.
Is the Dorothea Puente House Still Standing?
Yes. The boarding house at 1426 F Street still stands in Sacramento's Mansion Flats neighborhood — and it's a private home. The couple who bought it in 2010 embraced its dark history with gallows humor (including a fake "buried" leg sticking out of the garden), a story told in the 2015 short documentary "The House Is Innocent." Travel Channel's Ghost Adventures filmed its "Dorothea Puente Murder House" episode there in 2016, and the house remains a stop on Sacramento true-crime and ghost tours, with occasional charity open-house events. If you visit, remember people live there — admire it from the sidewalk.
Where to Watch the Dorothea Puente Movie (and What to Stream Right Now)
Honest answer: you can't watch HBO's "Dorothea" yet. There's no premiere date, and a series still in development is realistically a year or more from screens even if greenlit quickly. When it arrives, expect HBO and HBO Max.
Until then, the case is well covered:
- "Worst Roommate Ever" (Netflix, 2022): the episode "Call Me Grandma" covers the Puente case.
- "Murders at the Boarding House" (Oxygen, 2021): a deeper docuseries dive with original investigators.
- "The House Is Innocent" (2015): a short doc about the couple now living at 1426 F Street.
- Ghost Adventures: "Dorothea Puente Murder House" (2016): the paranormal take on the property.
Previous Portrayals of Dorothea Puente
Puente has rarely been dramatized. An independent film titled "Dorothea", from writer-director Chad Ferrin and starring Susan Priver, got a limited release in late 2025, and Carla Norton's bestselling book "Disturbed Ground" remains the definitive account. That's what makes the HBO project a big swing: a prestige network and an Oscar winner playing one of American true crime's most disturbing figures.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
Is there a movie about Dorothea Puente?
Yes — HBO is developing "Dorothea", a true-crime drama series starring and executive produced by Geena Davis, first reported by Variety and Deadline in July 2026. A 2025 indie film "Dorothea" also exists, and Netflix's "Worst Roommate Ever" covers her case.
Where can I watch the Dorothea Puente movie?
Not yet — HBO's "Dorothea" is in development with no release date; when it premieres it will air on HBO and stream on HBO Max. Meanwhile, stream "Worst Roommate Ever" on Netflix or "Murders at the Boarding House" on Oxygen.
How many victims did Dorothea Puente have?
Seven bodies were dug up from her Sacramento boarding house yard in November 1988; she was charged with nine murders, convicted of three in 1993, and sentenced to life in prison without parole.
How did Dorothea Puente die?
She died of natural causes on March 27, 2011, at age 82, at the Central California Women's Facility in Chowchilla, California, still insisting her tenants had died naturally.
