5 Impeachment: American Crime Story Cast Members Vs. Their Real-Life Counterparts

FX’s Impeachment: American Crime Story chronicles Bill Clinton’s scandalous relationship with then-White House intern Monica Lewinsky, Paula Jones’ sexual harassment suit against him, and the infamous Starr Report that led to his 1999 impeachment by the House of Representatives.

Creator Ryan Murphy crafted Impeachment with an emphasis on Lewinsky and Jones, who were highly criticized by the media and society as the events originally unfolded. Sarah Paulson and Beanie Feldstein lead the cast; here’s how each star compares to their real-life counterpart.

Feldstein stars as Lewinsky and recently told Rolling Stone about carefully approaching the role: “I expressed to her very early on that I see myself as her bodyguard; I’m going to put my body in front of hers, and I’m going to protect her. I promised her that, and she heard me.”

Co-producer Lewinsky spoke about revisiting the story on Today: “It is a dramatization, but there is an enormous amount of emotional truth. ... A lot of people know about this story, but people are going to be very surprised when they watch it, at things they didn’t know happened.”

Paulson plays Linda Tripp, who secretly taped conversations during which Lewinsky, a young co-worker, detailed her relations with Clinton. Tripp then gave the recordings to investigators. “This is a real woman who did a hideous thing, who I ultimately think was not a hideous person,” Paulson recently told Elle.

“I came to feel a tremendous amount of empathy, more than sympathy, for [Tripp],” continued Paulson. “I think, in my heart, she didn’t know the extent of the fallout. I think, if she had known what would have happened to Monica, I believe in my heart, she would not have done it.”

Annaleigh Ashford portrays Jones, whose 1994 lawsuit against Clinton caused his relationship with Lewinsky to be scrutinized. “I knew just from my own knowledge of this era, that Paula Jones’ story needed to be uncovered a little bit more than it had,” Ashford told Town & Country.

“I specifically remember [Jones] being made fun of [for] her nose [and] looks, and often being called trailer trash, even though she never lived in a trailer park,” Ashford recently told Entertainment Weekly. “I find her to be much more heartbreaking than I would have imagined.”

Playing Hillary Clinton is Edie Falco, who detailed her approach to The New York Times: “[Clinton] has been imitated on late-night talk shows and on [SNL] by pretty much every cast member. So that was troubling to me. I was not interested in being another interpretation.”

On the then-First Lady’s role in the scandal, Falco said: “Everybody I know has wondered... What the hell was that like, when she found out? How did [she] make sense of any of this? There was nothing she could do that was right — her glasses, her last name, the way she talked.”

English actor Clive Owen told Vanity Fair he was surprised to be considered to play Clinton but excited by the challenge. “It’s nerve-racking because they are moments that everybody knows. ... It’s very clear,” he said. “It’s not about an interpretation where you can make the wrong choice.”

Clinton hasn’t commented on the series, but Owen says he approached the role with care: “I felt like the whole thing has been done as sensitively as it can. I don’t know what he’ll think about it. I just played the part as best I could and that was what I felt my job was, really.”