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Im one of the people who somehow missed this whole story when it was unfolding.
As I understand it, you guys werent necessarily familiar with the story either.
I remember Mac and I looking at each other thinking, Theres no way he has this right.
Theres no way this really happened.
We know about Waco, we know about Jonestown.
How is it possible this kind of slipped under the radar?
So how did you even begin?
Did you start by sifting through all that footage?
Reading old articles?CW:The first order of business was to digitize all this footage.
My wife produced and then Mac and I directed and the three of us dove into the archive.
Were a really small team; we dont have a big post staff.
Some of it was just Super 8 footage that was almost like home-video footage.
Thats really interesting.CW:A lot of this archive news footage was raw news footage.
So its almost like an archival verite doc.
As a documentary filmmaker and as a human being, we were immediately attracted to her story.
Shes this very strong, fierce woman who doesnt take shit from anyone.
She speaks her mind openly and plainly and we knew right away that we have to talk to her.
Exactly how much time did you spent with Sheela?
We ended up spending five days with her, and we interviewed her for about four hours a day.
We ended up with around 18 to 20 hours of interview footage with her.
Obviously when we were going there for the first time, its an intimidating experience.
She was immediately charming, she was immediately funny, and we got to know her.
It was a really interesting five days we spent interviewing her.
And Sheelas probably at the top of that list, and she should be.
Shes someone that at times is reliable, and at times is very unreliable.
But obviously, the Rajneeshees were doing things that were not right.
So you’ve got the option to understand why people were skeptical of them.
It almost changes on a daily basis still, even working on this four years later.
Also, though, I dont think that she came to America with these intentions to poison 750 people.
Im not very spiritual or religious.
Before this I had sort of a knee-jerk, dismissive reaction to cults.
Theyre brainwashed and Who joins these things?
These were consenting adults that joined this movement to better their lives.
It starts to become a game inside the commune of Who loves Bhagwan the most?
Whos most devoted to Bhagwan?
And that can lead to some very scary consequences.
MW:I think about it often: What is the difference between a commune and a cult?
A lot of cult stories show the internal process of how things turn into cults.
The federal officials were shocked they couldnt get these sannyasins to flip on the guru.
Thats not to say that there arent people in modern day who feel that way.
Shanti Bhadra told us something very interesting thats in this series.
She believes she allowed for this to happen, that it didnt happen to her involuntarily.
He still very much considers himself devoted to the teachings of Osho, of his guru.
Sheelas somewhere in the middle.
Theres definitely truth to that.
Its a little bit like the Al Capone story.
They couldnt find any evidence that linked him to the poisoning.
The government couldnt find any evidence that linked them to these political assassination attempts.
Thats ultimately what they got him on.
They knew that wherever he is, these people will follow him.
CW:To this day no one knows how involved the guru was in the criminal activity.
Was he aware of it?
This section really captured what this experiment meant to the sannyasins just in their daily life.
Maybe we can find a way on the directors cut or extra releases to get it out there.
Because I do think it is an interesting insight into what their daily life was like.
MW:There were 2,500 sannyasins out there and the vast majority of them were not decision-makers.
But, like, Chap said, we just couldnt really find a place for it.
Weve really been getting positive feedback from both sides of this issue.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
