CHARLOTTE, N.C. — As he prepares to dive into the first episode of HBO Max’s “The Staircase,” David Rudolf takes a deep breath. The Charlotte-based criminal defense attorney is no stranger to seeing himself on a TV screen in a depiction of one of North Carolina’s longest and most high-profile murder trials ever, having been immortalized via his omnipresence in the 2004-French-miniseries-turned-2018-Netflix-sensation of the same name. That, however, was a pure documentary. This new “Staircase” — the first three episodes of which are landing on HBO’s streaming service Thursday — is a much diffe…
