Louis Theroux heads to Las Vegas, the fastest growing city in America, to take a look at the pastime that made it famous and meet the gamblers, the high rollers and the casino men who keep this town in the middle of the desert green with money.

The Las Vegas Hilton is Louis's home over the course of one very memorable long weekend. Once the biggest hotel in the world, it is old school Vegas with a face-lift; this is the casino where Elvis played over eight hundred sold-out shows.

We meet Richard Wilk, the Hilton's smooth-talking 'super host' who prides himself on his ability to say yes to his clients. Louis hangs out with Richard's high-rolling 'whales'. Whales like Allan, who flies in from Canada to party in a 25,000 dollar suite, ready to blow 200,000 dollars or more over the weekend.

Louis makes his way past the dancing girls and flashing lights to find Martha, a glamorous septuagenarian who spends at least 1,000 dollars a day on the slots. She hasn't missed a day in ten years and has lost 4 million dollars.

And there's John and Tim, Vegas regulars who take Louis under their wing as he nervously gambles his own money on one long night on the black jack table. They walk away at 5am - but are they winners?

On the streets of Lagos, it is not the police who wield power but gangs of fight-hardened young men known as Area Boys. Louis spends time with several outfits, joining them as they patrol their turf, clash with local rivals and keep the peace in a brutal and haphazard fashion. The main income for the Area Boys is an arbitrary and unofficial form of taxation, extracted from local businesses and commercial drivers. Louis gets to know the rich and glamorous Area Boy leader MC, a former street youth himself, who has now become a friend of the most powerful men in the city. Taken under MC's wing, Louis experiences the top levels of the Area Boys' world from the inside, complete with a tour of MC's grand residence and extensive shoe collection, and ending in a chaotic mini-riot with gunshots, blood and mayhem.

On the side of the law, Louis rides with KAI, the government's Kick Against Indiscipline paramilitary task force, as they storm different city districts. With bulldozers and arrest warrants, KAI use their own strong-arm tactics, and are in their way as feared as the Area Boys.

In Law and Disorder in Lagos, Louis wrestles with life in a world in which the forces of law and the forces of disorder are not always readily distinguishable and nothing is quite what it seems.

Louis Theroux joins the Philadelphia Police Department patrolling the most dangerous part of one of the most violent cities in America.

With gun carrying drug dealers on every corner, it is now normal for the centre of Philadelphia to stage 30 or 40 homicides a month. Embedded within the Philly rapid response teams, Louis feels a palpable sense of adrenalin mixed with frustration as police and the drug dealing 'corner boys' take each other on night after night. Here is a community desperate for protection but unwilling to talk to the law enforcers for fear of street retribution.

Louis senses a society trying to contain a lawlessness born out of poverty and disaffection. There's mistrust on all sides, although over time Louis sees a complex picture evolve - there are cops and robbers, guns and violence, but also an understanding between both sides. They are all part of 'The Game' which plays itself out night after night between the community and the cops given the task of policing it.

Louis Theroux travels to Johannesburg, where the residents find themselves increasingly besieged by crime. Despairing of the capability of the police and the courts to protect them, many have turned to an industry of private security, offering protection for a price. Are the sometimes brutal methods of these private police really a solution or just another part of the problem?

The first stop for Louis is a meeting with William Mayangoni, the local co-ordinator for a security firm known as Mapogo. Based on the outskirts of Diepsloot, one of the squatter camps that ring Johannesburg, William investigates thefts for his mainly white clients. When he catches a suspect, he gives them 'medicine': the alleged offender is beaten with a leather whip known as a sjambok.

Although his clients seem to support what they see as 'an African solution to an African problem', William's methods alienate the people of Diepsloot. Finally, their patience snaps dramatically, and William has to call out the real police in order to protect himself from the vicious threat of the mob.

In the centre of Johannesburg, a security company called Bad Boyz work in an area called Hillbrow, notorious for its high crime rate. Louis meets company director Hendrik De Klerk who explains that much of their activity involves reclaiming and securing buildings that have been taken over, or hijacked, by criminal gangs who illegally take rent from tenants. Louis watches dramatic evictions unfold, in which the police and security companies are not afraid to use force to kick out the protesting residents.

Louis Theroux spends time in New York among the subculture of off-Broadway performers in his latest foray into the weirder fringes of American society. Only a small proportion of actors make a decent living and Louis soon finds himself struggling to get work alongside the thousands of out-of-work actors. To improve his chances he joins a talent grooming agency, puts together a portfolio and has acting and voice coaching lessons. But as he discovers, an actor's lot is not an easy one. (1999)

In his final challenge, Louis Theroux investigates the most extreme American wrestling organisations. He hangs out with the WCW wrestlers of Monday Night Nitro and considers joining the Independent Wrestling Federation, who use barbed wire to spice up their shows. (1999)

In light of the unmasking of Jimmy Savile as a predatory sex offender, and 15 years on from the BBC documentary When Louis Met Jimmy, Louis Theroux sets out to understand how a man who was at the centre of British entertainment and charitable fundraising for decades was able to get away with a long litany of crimes.

In this reflective 75-minute film, Louis talks to some of Savile's victims and to people who worked closely with him, and re-examines moments from the original film as well as footage that has never aired before on television.

A typically offbeat look at the festive season from Louis Theroux as he unites four of the characters he met during his Weird Weekends series for a Christmas gathering in New York.

The diverse individuals - united only by their singlemindedness - are Mike Oehler, who spent 28 years living in a hole in Idaho but craves success as a folk singer, preacher Randy James, who is planning to save New York from the devil, JJ Michaels, set to feature in a porn shoot, and the Reverend Robert Short, bearing an important message from a distant galaxy.

Louis examines how the greatest source of love in our lives – our families – can often be the cause of our deepest pain.

In his trilogy of documentaries centred around the Westboro Baptist Church, Louis explores the price the family was paying for its devotion to the distorted vision of its patriarch, Pastor Fred Phelps. With Pastor Phelps now dead, the family has been torn apart – some of its members are still utterly devoted, whilst others have left, forbidden from ever contacting their families again.

Louis also reflects on how physical and mental health or forces beyond our own control can threaten to derail our family lives. He catches up with contributors from Trans Kids and A Different Brain to see how life has changed since he saw them last.

Louis Theroux explores the weirder fringes of American society. Theroux tries his persuasive selling skills on the Home Shopping Network in Florida, a television channel devoted to non-stop, around-the-clock selling. He enters a world of inventors, pitchmen and visionaries, all obsessed with making their product the next big thing. (1999)

Louis Theroux continues his exploration of the fringes of American society. He visits Southern California, home to a group of people known as swingers. There he meets Gary and Margaret Lee who host parties at their home but only for swinger couples, so Louis goes searching for a date. (1999)

Louis Theroux travels to New York, the epicentre of the radical black nationalist movement, to meet proponents of black nationalism. American black nationalist groups have been branded anti-Semitic, homophobic, misogynist and even racist by the mainstream press. As he follows their work, he tries to separate myth from reality and wonders whether he will be welcomed. (1999)

Stuck at home like most of the country, documentary-maker, Louis Theroux, used the lockdown to track down a number of high-profile people he’d been longing to talk to – a fascinating mix of the celebrated, the controversial and the mysterious. The result was 'Grounded With Louis Theroux', a podcast series for BBC Sounds and Radio 4 that featured ten conversations carried out remotely over the internet.

In this iPlayer exclusive, we finally get to see some of these encounters using the original video feeds. Featuring, Miriam Margolyes, Helena Bonham-Carter, Lenny Henry, Chris O'Dowd and many more, we revisit highlights from the first series of intimate and revealing chats.

Louis travels to Limpopo Province to stay in a hunting lodge. Hunting in South Africa has become easier than ever before - in fact, it is a blossoming tourist industry. The cost of a trophy animal ranges from as little as $250 for a baboon to as much as $70,000 for a rhino. The animals are bred to purpose on private game farms. In fact, lion breeder Piet insists that hunting, by putting an economic value to the animal, has allowed populations of exotic species to flourish.

Louis explores how America has managed to take our darkest desires, commodify them and turn them into a saleable product.

From his memorable Weird Weekends episodes on porn and rap to films about Las Vegas and the US opioid crisis, this episode explores a very human tendency to jump to the dark side when seeking out pleasure – whether through indulgence, risk-taking or the joy of doing something seen as ‘bad’ or 'wrong’.

Louis re-connects with porn-star JJ, who over 20 years ago was just making his way in the adult industry but has since turned his back on that world in favour of a new life in eastern Europe.

And Louis catches up once more with Katilia from Heroin Town, whom he last saw hopelessly addicted to drugs, with little sign of turning her life around.

Louis reflects on the criminal justice system in the USA, which has more prisoners than any other country in the world.

In documentaries such as Behind Bars and Miami Mega Jail, Louis spent time with hundreds of incarcerated men, discovering a world with its own rules and codes and a system that seemed to be broken. In A Place for Paedophiles, Louis came face to face with those responsible for serious sex crimes against children who were being locked up indefinitely, even after their sentences had been completed.

Louis also revisits his documentaries in Philadelphia and Milwaukee, where tensions between the African-American community and the police were already at boiling point, years before the recent killing of George Floyd.

Documentary filmmaker Louis Theroux discusses his new film My Scientology Movie, Jimmy Savile, and his particular documentary-making style.

To celebrate National Poetry Day, PJ Harvey, Daljit Nagra and Holly McNish will each be introducing and reading a new poem each for Front Row.

Sara Lloyd from the Welsh-language National Theatre Wales, Theatr Genedlaethol Cymru, and Thomas Cloarec from Breton company Teatr Piba discuss their collaboration on a new play. Merch yr Eog (The Salmon's Daughter) is performed in Welsh, Breton, French and Creole and translated for the audience through a smartphone app.

Presenter Samira Ahmed

Producer Marilyn Rust.

Following up on his 2007 documentary, The Most Hated Family in America, Louis Theroux returns to Topeka, Kansas, for a week-long visit with the Westboro Baptist Church.

He again joins the Phelps family on their controversial pickets where they try to antagonise communities with offensive slogans and anti-gay placards. But four years on from Louis's last visit, there are signs of disarray in the Phelps clan. A series of defections of family members has shaken up the church.