Louis Theroux

Journalist Louis Theroux looks back at 25 years of documentaries and explores how America has managed to take our darkest desires and commodify them.

The film-maker looks back on his documentaries about the criminal justice system in the US. Louis reflects on his reports on the prison system, which exposed a world with its own rules and codes and a system that seemed to be broken. He also revisits the documentaries he shot in Philadelphia and Milwaukee, where tensions between the African-American community and the police were already at boiling point years before the death of George Floyd.

A decade on, Louis revisits Joe Exotic - 'gay hillbilly', convicted felon and cult figure. He digs deep into Joe's background, meets Carole Baskin and asks what made the Tiger King.

Louis Theroux spends time with the growing community of Israeli religious-nationalist settlers. Their settlements are illegal under international law, and they have been protected by the army, the police and the Israeli government.

Since the Hamas-led attacks on 7 October 2023, in which 1,200 Israelis were killed, there has been an acceleration in the establishment of settlements, with settlers pursuing a campaign of violence against local Palestinian communities.

What was once a fringe movement has now won support at the highest levels of government, with their supporters holding key positions in the cabinet and able to influence not only the role the military plays but also the future of this conflict.

Louis Theroux embeds himself in the West Bank, meeting prominent settlers - including the ‘godmother' of the movement, Daniella Weiss - and travelling throughout the territory to understand the consequences of their activity. Louis also meets Palestinians whose lives have been impacted by settlers moving into their communities. As the world focuses on Gaza, where at least 50,000 Palestinians are estimated to have been killed by Israeli forces since 7 October, Louis discovers that the settlers are already making plans to move into that territory, too.