Louis Theroux on the myth of the abolition of culture and the making of documentaries that confuse viewers (2023)

luis therouxhe doesn't like the nickname disruptor. He almost flinches at the idea, leans back in his chair, chewing on the word and its literal, historical, and symbolic connotations. “It has become a cliché; It's definitely a cliché," he finally says.

But then comes one of the pensive expressions Theroux is known for. His eyes swore behind black-rimmed glasses. A man who quietly argues with himself strives for clarity of thought. Suddenly, a revelation. Maybe he is a disruptor after all, or at least he used to be.

"In a sense, I showed up at my presentation job and I was a bit of a nuisance," Theroux decides. "I took elements of conventional presentation and elements of classic vérité cinema and combined them."

Her talent for the camera was discovered by Michael Moore, who gave her a lead role on NBC.tv nation, questioning evangelical Christians about the end of the world and firing mortars at a shooting range in Arkansas. By 1998 he had graduated to his own BBC show,Louis Theroux: Strange Weekends, and has been a permanent presence on the screen ever since.

Theroux enjoys an almost unique status in the UK. He is a respected journalist, author and interviewer whose brand of comprehensive reporting is doing well for the BBC and Netflix, which licenses his films. He's also adored by legions of internet fans, who emblazoned his face on T-shirts, flooded social media with Theroux memes and turned his viral rap "Jiggle Jiggle" into a Jason Derulo hit. Some even describe it as a national treasure.

“Once you become recognizable and your shows do well, audiences will respond and come to your shows in the future,” he says of longevity.

So it might surprise you to learn that Theroux intentionally does less than what made him successful. For the second act of his career, the filmmaker hands over the keys to the presentation to others through his production company,Mindhouse. He still has a hand on the screen, but right now Theroux is intent on building something bigger than himself.

He agreed to this interview because he wants to raise awareness of his first reincarnation as a producer, claiming that Mindhouse is now a serious player in the documentary and podcast space. The company, co-founded by Theroux's wife Nancy Strang and former BBC producer Aaron Fellows, has 16 employees and the same number of advertised commissions.

This includes Prime Video moviesKSI: in real life, highlighting the outrageously successful YouTube star JJ Olatunji, andReal sex with Alice Levine, now in its second season for Channel 4. Theroux also talks vividly about itgods of billiards, a three-part BBC show that takes a deep dive into the rising stars of British boardsport. Theroux does not appear in theSnookerseries, but recently I saw him again drunk and beaming with pride at what Mindhouse is trying to achieve. "That's very smug of me," he says with a telling smile.

Four years ago Theroux was still employed by the BBC, producing and showing only his own films in a small enclave at the BBC studio. He remains umbilically linked to his former employer through a development deal, which Mindhouse recently renewed for 12 months. He also continues to host shows for the British broadcaster, although he feels the success of his back catalog on Netflix means the public no longer sees him as a BBC star.

How would he fare if he ran past Gary Lineker's challenge? Or, to put it another way: if, like the Premier League presenter, Theroux were to criticize the government's asylum policy on Twitter, would that send the BBC spiraling into an impartiality crisis because he is perceived as a Premier League presenter? BBC? Not his answer, but that's mostly because he wouldn't tweet in such an overtly political way in the first place.

"It's always been more useful for my work if my real opinions remain somewhat ambiguous," he says. "My job as a presenter and journalist is to have a nonchalant critical attitude; to have a polyvalent and polyvalent sense of subversion to upset any political orthodoxy”.

Theroux adds that this goes to the heart of his documentary making: “I try not to make the audience feel too comfortable and I try to challenge the viewer in whatever particular way of seeing they have. If you have an attitude that's capable of surprising, that's unpredictable, then I think it's a much more interesting place."

Much of Theroux's work is marked by his desire to find nuance, to spend time with people to understand their point of view, no matter how extreme their viewpoints. He recently recorded with Nick Fuentes, a leading figure in the American far-right white nationalist movement. Previous documentaries have seen him research Scientology and delve into the Westboro Baptist Church, an organized group that carries incendiary homophobic banners at funerals.

Does Theroux think people are less tolerant of those they disagree with? Your answer is carefully worded. Theroux believes that social media has "collapsed" the public and private spheres, meaning that we all know what others are thinking and are "constantly shocked and outraged" by others. However, he does not agree with the idea of ​​abolishing culture, which he considers simple and useless.

"There are people who are censorious, quick to judge and oversensitive. There are also people who are trolls and trolls who get clicks and views based on being outrageous,” he says. "Can cancellation culture be a real thing in a world where Andrew Tate can get hundreds of millions of views and build a media empire by promoting misogynistic messages?"

Theroux believes that troublemakers can be undone in a very literal sense, such as blocking social media or being banned from college campuses, but is skeptical of the idea of ​​stifling free speech. "The idea that we are in a suffocating and censorious atmosphere, pushed and reinforced by people like Piers Morgan, is obviously not that simple and straightforward," he adds.

However, Theroux admits that certain issues have become increasingly difficult to discuss. He agrees that his 2015 documentary would have been "harder" to make.transgender children, in a climate where gender identity has become one of the fashionable topics of the so-called culture wars.

Ironically, he praises the one-shot for charting a successful path through the debate, saying he enjoyed itThe witch trials of J.K. RowlingPodcast by Megan Phelps-Roper, Reformed member of Westboro Baptist Church. Phelps-Roper took her own journey from extreme to enlightenment and applied that experience to hours of interviews with Rowling, who became equal parts outcast and hero for her stance on transgender ideology.

Podcasting is a medium that comes naturally to Theroux after launching his own BBC talk show during the 2020 quarantine.Punished with Louis Therouxbecame a Spotify exclusivePodcast Louisa Therouxa, a full-length interview format produced by Mindhouse. “Podcasting at its best is all about authenticity, and that's very much in the DNA of all the shows I've done. I've always appreciated parts of my shows that are real and unexpected,” he says.

Mindhouse is building its podcast business with another series starring Rylan Clark, the British host known for his work onThe oldest brotherithe Eurovision Song Contest. The interview podcast is titledRylan: How to be a manand guest-star comedian Phil Wang Theroux interviewed Clark and says he's an exceptional broadcaster. "It's like spraying warm maple syrup in your ear," he laughs.

Theroux closes a piece of paper with what appear to be instructions for our interview. There are many presenters with whom she develops projects, she says, including Amelia Dimoldenberg, whose YouTubechicken shop datumThe series spawned Theroux's "Jiggle Jiggle" rap. He is also developing projects with Netflix and A24, although he is reluctant to reveal further details. Theroux also refuses to comment on the newly announced documentary Mindhouse is making for CNN and the BBC about the 2003 space shuttle Columbia disaster.

Scripting is another area of ​​interest for the company. "There's something beautiful about telling stories where you don't have that restraining influence of caring about the real-life people behind it, whether it's the platform or their vulnerability," Theroux says. Coming into the drama would be a full-circle moment for Theroux, who wrote television scripts as a child.

His love for the medium is obvious, but are we getting to the point where the public has too much of a good thing? Is there too much television?

"There seems to be a reduction in the herd," he says. “It seemed to me that the tipping point was when CNN+ broke their data. They pitched in with tens, if not hundreds of millions of dollars, and then discovered that only 10,000 people a day were watching in America. A mid-level TikToker or YouTuber was getting bigger numbers than CNN's streaming service, which tells you everything you need to know about television in 2023.”

What was the last thing you saw that left you speechless? "Probablyvigils, Damon Lindelof's HBO series,” he says. It is mentioned there forwhite lotusalso. "I like very good television. I mean, I'll watch trashy TV too. But I prefer to watch television that is extremely creative and interesting.”

The conversation brings us back to the BBC, which it says is "at odds" with the big streaming services. Theroux would like the license fee to survive beyond 2027, when the British government says it plans to remove the funding mechanism, raising questions about the corporation's future. "If you look at the television landscape in the United States, it's far from ideal," he says. “I know it does some of the best shows in the world, but when you go there you miss the BBC. You miss that feeling of a calm, focused voice.”

You can take Theroux out of the BBC and into the world of independent production, but you'll never take the BBC out of Theroux.