Louis Theroux has disclosed that he smoked cannabis nightly for many years, prompting astonishment during a recent podcast interview.
The documentarian, recognised for his composed and earnest on-screen presence, appeared on Katherine Ryan’s podcast What’s My Age Again? and discussed his past vices.
“I was like one or two cigarettes at parties and a nightly spliff through my late teens and 20s,” he said (via Metro), before addressing the studio’s reaction. “There was a reaction in the room to that. Did that surprise the kids?”
Theroux explained that he typically smoked one spliff each night to aid sleep, though occasionally more. He also discussed alcohol, confessing that he “even enjoy[s] the hangovers” because of the sensation of feeling progressively better throughout the day.
Theroux built his reputation at the BBC through multiple documentary series. After rising to fame with Louis Theroux’s Weird Weekends, which explored American subcultures, he profiled figures such as Jimmy Savile before tackling subjects including Scientology, American Neo-Nazis, and Israeli ultra-Zionists.
In March of this year, he released his first Netflix documentary, Louis Theroux: Inside the Manosphere, examining the rise of hyper-masculine content creators. NME’s five-star review concluded: “[Theroux has] certainly shown the lads up as scared, insecure little boys offering easy answers in a complex world that has left them feeling adrift. If the manosphere really does have to be a battleground, Louis Theroux just owned its loudest voices.”
