Louis’s Coming To Oz: Here’s 10 Legendary Louis Theroux Docos You Must See

Australia all let us rejoice, because the one and only Louis Theroux is (finally) coming to our fair land.

His Q&A style speaking tour Louis Theroux Live On Stage will see him in conversation with Julia Zemiro, and will tour at Hamer Hall in Melbourne, the State Theatre in Sydney, as well as shows in Perth, Adelaide and Brisbane.

Over the course of the show, Theroux will reflect on his years of film-making and his many documentaries, including his popular Weird Weekends series.

Theroux’s aptitude for empathy and understanding when faced with the worst of the human existence, is what makes him stand apart from those that have come before him. A contemporary pioneer in immersive journalism, Theroux dives deep into his subjects; often becoming a subject himself.

Choosing a favourite Louis doco, is akin to picking your favourite pet. They’re all so damn good! But the following stand ever-so slightly above the rest.

10 Of Louis Theroux’s Most Legendary Docos

1. The Most Hated Family in America

The Westboro Baptist Church, known for their ‘God Hates Fags’ signs and the picketing of funerals are a particular brand of evil. The family – including young children – regularly picket military funerals, holding up signs stating obscenities such as ‘Thank God for Dead Soldiers’ and ‘Fag Marines’. Led by Fred ‘Gramps’ Phelps, Theroux spent time with the church and wrestled with their religious ideas promoting homophobia. The documentary was so affecting, that it led to a follow-up by Theroux America’s Most Hated Family in Crisis.

2. Transgender Kids

Theroux drops in at the Child and Adolescent Gender Center at UCSF Hospital in San Francisco, where a group of pioneering medical professionals are helping children to begin the process of changing genders at ever-younger ages. Louis meets children as young as 3 years old, showing signs of rejecting the gender they were assigned to at birth and beginning the process of transitioning. It’s an emotional and controversial issue, handled gently and emphatically by Theroux- as usual.

3. African Hunting Holiday

Theroux visits privately owned gaming reserves in South Africa- where rich Americans with no souls pay to hunt, kill and mount on the wall beautiful wild animals, including lions, zebras and elephants. Louis accompanies hunters and considers trying to kill an animal himself – which he cannot complete in the end. The episode calls into question the artificial quality of  ‘the hunt’, considering the animals are caged in areas the holiday goers are hunting. While released back in 2008, the program is far too relevant today, in the shadows of the international outrage received by the senseless murder of Cecil the lion.

4. Weird Weekends: South Africa

Theroux heads to South Africa where he meets Afrikaner a.k.a Boer separatists –  a whites-only community – who refuse to accept the end of apartheid in SA and dream of building separate cultural enclaves. Theroux visits white supremacist leader and generally awful human being Eugène Terre’Blanche, who proposes the ugly reasons he believes the Afrikan culture is being denigrated by black Africa.

5. Louis, Martin & Michael

A documentary essentially about a documentary, Theroux originally sets out to interview Michael Jackson but Martin Bashir is given the rights to the documentary instead- a documentary that ended up presenting a biased and rather damning representation of Jackson. Louis goes through the complicated process of trying to speak to people close to Jackson. He finally gets lucky with a couple of bizarre interviews with Jackson’s personal magician, Majestik Magnificent and Joseph Jackson. Weird and wonderful episode- classic Theroux.

Image via Tumblr

6. Weird Weekends: Gangsta Rap

Into the ‘Dirty South’ to learn more about the Gangsta Rap industry, Theroux gets his rap-game on and signs up with ForeFront Entertainment studio where he meets the rapper Q-T-Pie. He travels to Mississippi where he meets former pimp Mellow T and his hood and its corner boys. Watch it just for Theroux’s rap battle on Wild Wayne’s radio show, who invites him to drop a beat on his morning program. It’s so bad but fucking hilarious.

7. Louis and the Nazis

Meeting with neo-Nazis, Theroux travels to California to spend time with white supremacist Tom Metzger, the founder of the White Aryan Resistance (WAR)- a group said to have been involved in the murder of the 28-year-old Ethiopian student Mulugeta Seraw. Theroux even gets to know white nationalist pop group Prussian Blue, consisting of eleven-year-old twins Lynx and Lamb Gaede. In a pivotal scene, Theroux is quizzed by neo-Nazi ‘Skip’ whether he is Jewish, a question which Theroux refuses to answer that he in fact is not.

8. Black Nationalism

Theroux meets black nationalist groups in Harlem, among them Khalid Abdul Muhammad, Reverend Al Sharpton and members of the Israelite School of Universal Practical Knowledge. Theroux follows Sharpton on a march protesting against the shooting of a young man by the police- he died with 41 bullet wounds. Again, a telling subject that is especially pertinent today.

9. Extreme Love: Dementia

Theroux travels to ‘the capital of dementia care’ Phoenix, Arizona, spending time at a residential institution, and with loved ones at home. This is Theroux at his best, attempting to understand the struggle of living within a limited mental capacity; in terms of remembering life, love and oneself. It’s tragic and really pulls at the heart strings.

Image via BBC.

10. Weird Weekends: Porn

Theroux takes a turn behind the lens, in a look behind-the-scenes of the porn industry, the set, its actors and the challenges faced in the digital age. Theroux is even invited to audition himself, and learns about “wood problems” and “inconclusives”. It’s cringey-perfection but is hard to look away.