When Amazon Met LouisAn interview with Louis Theroux Amazon.co.uk: Do you find yourself worrying about people you met on your Weird Weekends after the interview? Louis Theroux:   Yes, I do because the
people I meet on Weird Weekends are people on the edge and I don't think it is
coincidental that some of them have come to sticky ends. I get e-mails from
Mike Cain (from Survivalists) he's still around, I'm always thinking he's going
to be in some kind of shoot out with the local sheriff because he hasn't paid
any taxes in about five years. I get e-mails about him and it's interesting to
hear what he thinks of September 11, because if you view the federal government
as your arch enemy, what are you going to make of something where a terrorist
attack by Osama Bin Laden is clearly responsible? He sent me an e-mail saying
that as far as he's concerned it was the US government that did it, which
sounds like complete mania to me.
Amazon.co.uk: What about the other people featured in the Survivalist episode? Theroux: It's interesting because Mike Oehler--the guy that lives in the underground home when we did that story about four years ago--literally said that he thought that civilisation is going to collapse and the likely scenario was a war of the Islamic nations against the Christian nations--he actually predicted it. He was also very disappointed that the millennium bug didn't cause havoc. Amazon.co.uk: Which interview do you think was the hardest? Theroux: There's different kinds of hard. Hard in so far as physically unpleasant would have probably been the wrestling one, although that's not on the collection. When I was training there was a certain point when I wanted to stop. The sarge, who had a neck as big as his head, wouldn't let me stop because he thought I was disrespecting the sport and he trained me until I threw up. But there are other senses of "hard", there was a sense in which the porn was hard to do because it's hard to know what sort of pose to strike, it's very hard to interview a woman who's bare-chested. But there are other senses of "hard", there was a sense in which the porn was hard to do because it's hard to know what sort of pose to strike, its very hard to interview a woman who's bare-chested Amazon.co.uk: Are you disturbed that the Porn episode is one of the viewers favourites? Theroux:  It's one of my
favourites as well and that's why it got on the collection. It was one of the
hardest in a way because in a lot of the Weekends we do the protagonists are in
some way idealists--people who have a philosophy of life, however wrong-headed
it may be, they believe it to the hilt and they will share it with you. You can
see that they take pleasure or virtue in it or they take self-sacrifice in
living by their credo whether it's being a survivalist or a ufologist or
whatever it is; with the porn people they're not idealists really. They are
more animated by a sort of dysfunction. They are just sort of confused and
lonely people really. It can make them a bit depressing to be around and I
found of all the stories I did that was definitely one of the more depressing
ones to do. Which is funny because it doesn't come across like that I hope, it
comes across as reasonably warm but it has got its dark touches.
Amazon.co.uk: You looked really worried in the Porn episode when you went to get your Polaroid back... Theroux: I don't know. It was like everyone that saw that Polaroid, it was like it seemed to have a weird hold over them. It was like... I don't want to talk myself up or sound conceited but that Polaroid always gets a reaction, you know, and so I think anyone who has held the Polaroid has been reluctant to give it away afterwards. But I am happy to say I have all the Polaroid cos there's not just one, there's three and they are all in a safety deposit box in a Swiss bank in Geneva. Amazon.co.uk: You might have to be careful with the freeze frame function on the DVD... Theroux: Well, it's all blurred isn't it so it should be OK--can't get too fruity you know my mother might be watching... Amazon.co.uk: There are moments when you are talking with specific people that are certainly a bit disturbing... Theroux:  Yes, when you make a
human connection as well and you're like, well now I know this person--why are
you doing this? Actually, as you know JJ has now gone out of porn and he's
married and he's working in computers in Missouri.
Then you go back to the question: which was the hardest and there's also the scariest and the scariest was probably the one in the rap show at the end when I was talking to this kid who is also a rapper, Mellow T, and he starts firing this gun almost willy-nilly. I don't think he was going to shoot any of us deliberately, me or the crew or the director, but I just thought maybe by accident he was going to shoot himself or one of us, and that made me very, very nervous. Amazon.co.uk: So have you written any more rap since that episode? Theroux: Do you know I've not written any rap. I think I owe it to the people, to the rap fans out there. Rap used to be a much more comical medium, you think back to the Sugar Hill gang or Curtis Blow and it's good-time music really, I'm not knocking gangsta rap because I like gangsta rap as well. I'm very pleased that Afroman got to number one because I'm not saying he was influenced by me... but I feel he's definitely calling on the same muse. It's sort of an instructive example of what you shouldn't do. Amazon.co.uk: Have you got any nearer to meeting aliens since the UFO episode because you didn't seem to have much luck. Theroux: That's a tough question because I don't really believe in aliens. I thought well if I go into this show that could work quite well because I could go into this as a sceptic and therefore if I meet something then that would have more credibility and as it happens I didn't really meet anything. I think the closest I got to meeting an alien was seeing Robert Short channeling Vorton from the planet Koldas and I've only seen him do that once and that was when he was visiting my flat in New York when we were doing a Christmas special, a documentary about some of the people I've met on my travels. Amazon.co.uk: At the other end, what about Ford Templar I hear he's not dealing with aliens any more? Theroux:  Yes, there's a big
difference between those two. Reverend Short channels his aliens--friendly
omniscient space aliens who can see the future while Ford Templar doesn't like
aliens, he kills them because he regards them as malevolent and dangerous.
Actually Ford Templar, when I spoke to him recently said "oh they've pretty
much given up the fight". So he's dealing with vampires now. Actually, when the
shows went out in America I had an e-mail from Ford Templar saying how much he
had enjoyed all the episodes which I was surprised by.
Amazon.co.uk: The Jimmy Saville interview seemed like hard work, he's not keen on house guests and yet he let you live in his house while filming. Theroux: Yes, I suppose that was the hardest interview in a way because every time you say anything he's like "no, no, no, no. I was born in Leeds" and you were trying to ask a question and he'd be like--"No, no, no, you weren't listening, I was born in Leeds!". That's what he's like, he's very bolshy and you might think he was picking on me or something but I was up there recently with Will the director and he was exactly the same. He will say something like "Oo I do like the colour blue" and then later you'll say "Jimmy, you like the colour blue!" and he'll go, "No! no I don't, no I didn't"--its just his perverseness coming across. Amazon.co.uk: Why did you choose Jimmy? Theroux: He's such a unique person you know, there's no one in the world like Jimmy Saville. He's a living work of art Jimmy Saville is, he's an ongoing piece of performance art which has been going for 50 years. He's very fully formed, with all Savillisms intact-- "now then, now then". He's been going for 42 years and no sign of stopping and all that time no one's really seen under the surface. I think we got closer than anyone. He's still an enigma. Amazon.co.uk: Is it true that he greeted you clad in some very tiny shorts? Theroux: When we were doing the DVD commentary, we arrived at the flat, we came up in the lift and the lift opens into his flat and he was standing there and all and he was wearing was a pair of shorts and I said "those are very small shorts!" and he said "no they're not". Amazon.co.uk: Why did the scene in Broadmoor get cut? Theroux: Because Jimmy had broken his leg at that point and so he was hobbling around rather and it being Broadmoor our sphere of activity was somewhat circumscribed. We couldn't really shoot anything. We could only walk around the central courtyard. We rode in his rolls Royce which had gold hub caps and it was so comfortable I sat in the back seat and I fell asleep during the interview!. Don't tell him, he didn't notice and luckily Will the director sort of nudged me and woke me up. Amazon.co.uk: Well, you always seem very relaxed as an interviewer, are you as natural as you look though, is it really "you"? Theroux: You have to be natural, but you have to think about what that means. Am I being really natural now, not really because I'm being interviewed, but it's pretty natural for an interview. You've got to be natural but you're also there to do a job. If I turned up and didn't ask any questions, which would be me at my most natural, I think I would be out of a job. Sometimes you ask a weird question and you don't know what you're going to get. Sometimes I ask the obvious question or a slightly stupid question or sometimes I'm a bit hung over but I do have a sequence of questions. If I turned up and didn't ask any questions, which would be me at my most natural, I think I would be out of a job. Amazon.co.uk: So are the random questions sometimes the best? Theroux: Well you never know really and that's one of the benefits of shooting as much as we do. You can't be Mr Jolly interviewer constantly for 12 hours a day. Not only would it fry my brain but it would completely alienate the person I'm with because at some point you've just got to be a human being haven't you? Amazon.co.uk: Do you think being with Jimmy such a long time was the way to break him out of that "persona"? Theroux: Yes. It's the same as the one we're doing with Chris Eubank and he's the same way. Its only by day 5, day 6 that you feel like your starting to get a bit closer to the truth. Do you feel me? Amazon.co.uk: Has it been harder as you've become well known to do episodes with ordinary people and is that why you've switched to doing more personality-based ones? Theroux: Not really, it's more that we ran out of subjects. I don't think I'm terribly well known in America and to be honest with you we've done three series and in the second we did one on Broadway and a couple of people had seen weird weekends in Britain and they still went ahead and did it. In fact if they had seen the show they were just as likely to go on. But the reason to switching to personalities was just because I did the Jimmy Saville one as something to break from the routine and I liked doing it so I thought I would do some more like that really. Theroux: I think I want to be the interviewer and ask myself a question now. Amazon.co.uk: Go ahead Theroux: "Why do I think people should buy this DVD?" Shall I answer now? Amazon.co.uk: Take it away... Theroux: 
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