What amazed me was how bizarre every version of this story is...
Louis Theroux’s new docu-series The Bambers: Murder At The Farm is a real-life whodunnit, as discovers
He’s interviewed some of the most notorious – and sometimes controversial – public figures on the planet, but there’s seemingly no end to Louis Theroux’s selfdeprecating ways.
A character who often feels better suited to life behind the camera as a result, his recent transition to the role of producer seems like something of a no-brainer.
“I would love to be able to be involved in programmes that my face doesn’t have to appear in,” says Louis earnestly.
“I’ve always loved TV and making TV, but I’ve always almost felt as though the price of me doing it is that I’m on camera.”
Founding independent production company Mindhouse Productions in 2019 alongside fellow producers Arron Fellows and Louis’ wife Nancy Strang, the new endeavour acted as a conduit for the film-maker’s grander aspirations.
“I feel like a grown-up TV maker now,” he says. “I suppose when it is working – and this is going to sound hopelessly insecure, but if I find I’ve made a suggestion and it’s made the project slightly better, I actually think: ‘Oh, well, maybe I do have something to offer’.
“I know this is an insight into my own pathology, but I always worry that people tolerate my creative input because I’m on camera and they just sort of happen to humour me. When actually, being off camera, it’s a more pure kind of involvement because, really, I’m just another member of the team.”
The Bambers: Murder At The Farm is one of the first projects to emerge from Mindhouse Productions. A grisly four-part documentary that delves into the case of the White House Farm murders.
After local police were called to a secluded Essex farmhouse on August 7, 1985, officers arrived to find the bodies of five people – young mother Sheila Caffell, her twin sons, and both of Sheila’s parents – all of whom had been shot.
An incident that initially appeared to be a murdersuicide carried out by Sheila following a documented period of mental instability, new evidence later emerged that would point detectives towards Sheila’s brother, Jeremy Bamber.
“What really amazed me was how bizarre almost every version of the story is, and yet one of them, quite evidently, must be true,” says Louis, who executive-produced the project.
“Sheila did have a history of serious mental illness and had expressed confused ideations about possibly doing physical harm to people. And at the same time, to believe that she did it, you’d have to believe that in her psychosis she did an almost executioner-style job – every one of the bullets, there were 20-something shots, hit its target.”
Following his conviction for all five murders, Bamber was sentenced to life in a maximum security prison.
Bamber continues to claim he is innocent, and has spent 35 years fighting to overturn the verdict from his cell.
Now, with Louis and his team gaining access to neverbefore-heard tapes, the story has been brought to life using first-hand testimony and evidential footage.
“There are these two camps: the people who believe passionately that he (Bamber) did it, and the people who believe passionately that he didn’t do it,” says Louis.
The Bambers: Murder At The Farm is on Sky Crime and Now TV, Sunday at 9pm