Louis Theroux interviewed on stage ahead of season three podcast launch
Louis Theroux was interviewed by Adam Buxton onstage last night at Spotify in London to celebrate the season three launch of The Louis Theroux podcast.
During his conversation with Adam, he spoke about the ‘Heavens Gate’ UFO cult who committed a mass suicide days after his team reached out for an interview, not wanting to be ‘unnecessarily intrusive’ with vulnerable guests on his podcast and why he believes he brings a difference within the crowded podcast market.
Talking about the UFO cult, Louis said that when he was making the first series of weird weekends, he had given his team instructions to find a cult. One of the guys said he’d found a good one but then he got ill was off work for 3 or 4 days.
“Meanwhile in the news it was reported that a UFO cult had killed themselves,” Louis explained. “They committed mass suicide; they were called Heavens Gate and I thought that’s weird (…) my producer came back and said ‘those were the guys I was in touch with’.
“And not only that, but there was also an envelope on his desk, and it contained instructions…on the fact that they were about to kill themselves and by the time we received it, they wouldn’t have already ‘exited their vehicles’ and they wanted us to be the first on the scene to report this exciting event after they died.”
Louis also spoke about not wanting to be ‘unnecessarily intrusive’ with guests who he feels might be vulnerable: “The aim is not to make people look like dicks, we take it seriously, often times we will trim things, if it feels like it’s unnecessarily intrusive,” he said.
As for bringing a difference to the crowded podcast market, he said that with his interviews, he’s sometimes pushed out of his comfort zone a bit, and rolls with aspects of life or culture, that might not seem like the most perfect fit for him.
“I do try to explore worlds and interview people that are not like me,” he added.
Launched today, The Louis Theroux Podcast is available on Spotify now.