This programme is about the cult of celebrity; it’s about the loss of values we have now … The rich and the successful rule. Matthew Collings, Hello Culture: Celebrity, 2001
David Bowie: He’s our modern version of Byron’s act, where celebrity is something weightless and taken on and taken off again. ibid.
Success is a value we admire apparently more than any other. ibid.
Warhol is a 1960s figure, artist, a celebrity icon … He de-personalised the faces of the famous. ibid.
Between us we should be able to do something. When Louis Met s1e1: Jimmy, BBC 2000
We can talk about anything. You can find out how tricky I am. ibid.
I can get anything. There’s nothing I can’t get. And there’s nothing I can’t do. ibid.
I’m not a grass. ibid.
That’s forty million pounds more than I’ve ever raised.’ ibid. Louis
And I’ll let those dirty slags do what they want to her. ibid. Jimmy re nightclub duty 1950s
Not even for a week, no. ibid. Jim, re having girlfriend
In a little village near Henley in Oxfordshire on the banks of the Thames lives Britain’s most famous magician Paul Daniels with his wife and former assistant Debbie McGee. Now in the 60s and 40s respectively the couple are entering a new phase in their lives that has allowed me to spend some time getting to know them. When Louis Met s1e2: Paul and Debbie, BBC 2001
‘A permanent source of regret to me that the one thing I’ve never been involved with is a sex scandal.’ When Louis Met s1e3: The Hamiltons, BBC 2001
‘Former Conservative MP Neil Hamilton and his wife Christine have been arrested by police in connection with allegations of a serious sexual assault.’ ibid. BBC news 10th August 2001
I was in a confusing block of flats in Battersea in London to meet Neil and Christine Hamilton. At this point in history Neil was best known for being a disgraced ex-Tory minister, disgraced for allegedly taking bribes in return for favours. ibid.
I found it hard to believe any of the allegations. ibid.
I was on my way to meet Anne Widdecomb. She was the shadow Tory Home Secretary at that time with a reputation for ultra-Conservative views and an unusual private life. I wanted to find out if the real Anne Widdecomb matched her hardline image. When Louis Met s2e1: Anne Widdecomb, BBC 2002
‘I don’t let anybody go upstairs.’ ibid.
‘Oxford days. Well there you go. I was young and glamorous, wasn’t I?’ ibid.
I was in the seaside town of Hove to meet ex-world-champion boxer and modern day daddy Chris Eubank. When Louis Met s2e2: Chris Eubank
‘I’m just an all right person.’ ibid. Chris
As a child I was always a fan of the ventriloquist and his famous creations Orville the duck and Cuddles the monkey. When Louis Met s2e3: Keith Harris & Orville
I was in London’s New Bond Street to meet PR guru and king of kiss and tell Max Clifford. When Louis Met s2e4: Max Clifford
It took him about ten weeks to get my measure. When Louis Met s2e5: Living With Louis, Jimmy Savile
I have an instant reaction to people. ibid. Savile
He looks a bit winsome and dough-like. ibid. Christine Hamilton
He can be annoying sometimes. ibid. Keith Harris
I flip in a bad mood. ibid. Paul Daniels
He’s not a normal human being. ibid. Christine Hamilton
I’ve always been odd. ibid. Savile
I’ve always been fascinated by the pop star Michael Jackson. Over the last few years I’ve made several approaches to see if he’d be interested in collaborating on a documentary. I never heard back. But in the summer of 2002 I decided to make a start without him. Louis Theroux: Louis, Martin & Michael, BBC 2003
Martin Bashir, the ITV journalist, had been seen going to a meeting with Michael. ibid.
The next day Michael’s baby-dangling was big news. ibid.
I don’t know another religion that use their celebrities as much as Scientology does. Scientology and the Aftermath Leah Remini s1e8: Ask Me Anything, A&E 2017
On the shores of the Ionian Sea is an island called Skorpios. This island and everything on it once belonged to a very rich man. Aristotle Socrates Onassis was born probably in 1906 and not in Greece but in Turkey. His father was a tobacco trader. Reputations s1e3: Aristotle Onasis: The Golden Greek, BBC 1994
Onassis created his own brand of cigarette. ibid.
Before long he was getting a handsome return on his [shipping] capital. ibid.
Onassis said, ‘I approach every woman as a potential mistress.’ ibid.
Onassis had bought up much of Monte Carlo. ibid.
Commercial whaling was an indispensable source of hard cash for the Onassis empire. This terrible damage to whale stocks did not concern Onassis. ibid.
‘You knew that here was a star, an unusual type of star.’ Reputations s2e4: A J P Taylor: An Unusual Kind of Star
A J P Taylor was the most famous historian of his generation. Brilliant and prolific he was unique in being just as happy writing for the popular press as for the Oxford University press … Television made him a star. ibid.
The BBC grew nervous of this loose cannon. ibid.
ITV: Taylor’s lectures never changed: he addressed the camera directly without rehearsal, notes, photographs or any editing whatsoever. And still people watched. ibid.
A man of the left with a lifetime’s commitment to giving history back to the ordinary people. ibid.
‘I’m a straight narrative historian.’ ibid. Taylor
Did Hitler Cause the War? ibid. BBC 1961 debate with Hugh Trevor-Roper, re Taylor’s book The Origins of the Second World War
‘When you look back at his life you see nothing but contradiction.’ Reputations s4e5: John Wayne: The Unquiet American, Oliver Stone
It was Ford who rescued Wayne from the B-Movie treadmill. ibid.
‘He drank like a fish.’ ibid. Harry Jackson, friend
Wayne would always be deeply insecure about his failure to serve. ibid.
‘He loved women.’ ibid. Harry Jackson
Wayne threw him and his film [The Alamo] into the Republican cause. ibid.
Wayne’s right-wing opinions were becoming increasingly extreme. He defended the taking of Indian land and attacked the civil rights movement. ibid.
In a 60-year career that began with hand-cranked cameras and silent movie stars and ended with wide-screen technicolour and method actors Hitchcock would taste both success and failure. Reputations s6e4: Hitch: Alfred the Great
The Hitchcocks were devout Catholics. ibid.
By the end of the 1930s he was ready for the biggest move of his career: Hollywood. ibid.
Under Capricorn … died at the box office and Transatlantic died with it driven into bankruptcy. ibid.
Fresh from the triumph of Psycho, nothing seems impossible. Reputations s6e5: Hitch: Alfred the Auteur
The successes of the past would prove elusive, and the man who valued order above all else would court chaos in his emotional life … The storm clouds were gathering. ibid.
Rear Window [1954] managed to be both experimental and crowd-pleasing. ibid.
Vertigo received a mauling. ibid.
Marnie bombed at the box office. His next film, Torn Curtain, his 50th feature, fared even worse. ibid.
1987: A hearse is escorted by police helicopter from Los Angeles toward the desert town of Palm Springs. Inside is the body of a man who w as once the highest grossing entertainer in America. The body has been seized by the authorities: against the wishes of his family they are going to conduct an autopsy. What they find will finally destroy his public image and expose the carefully constructed lie that has sustained his career; it is the body of Liberace. Reputations s7e2: Liberace: Too Much of a Good Thing is Wonderful, BBC 2000
Hiding his sexuality became his lifelong battle. ibid.
In 1954 The Liberace Show could be found on 179 channels across the USA … Now he was performing with the top stars of the day. ibid.