PC: I was in a really bad seven-year relationship that I'd been trying to get out of. This master teacher is going to do whatever it takes to bring you to the ultimate, even if it means destroying you and himself. That film is about this master teacher, and he puts this guy through the wringer, and the guy is supposed to continue to do it and eventually he's vindicated because the guy's a genius. I'm your mama, you're nursing on me, I'm giving you all this love, you need me. It looks like we were serving him, but he was serving us. Everything he did was for our growth and a lesson for us. VC: I would say, too, "He's doing this for me." I saw him as perfect. So when you see his faults, you go, "OK, well, I can wrap my head around that. We were asking us to be loved unconditionally, so we also had to love unconditionally.
WA: Yeah, it was like I saw the man behind the curtain. WA: I don't know if I had the closest relationship with him, but I definitely think I was around him the longest out of anybody I know, with him for 18 years.ĭid that change your perception of all of that? Did you know about all that at the time and what was that like? In the film, Will, you mentioned that you had one of the closest relationships with him. He ended up getting everyone's power individually, one at a time. And he also had a relationship with each one of us individually. West that we were doing-surrendering to the guru, dropping your ego, taking your shoes off before you walk into a room and leave the world behind-we didn't think of it as giving our power, we thought of it as empowering. There's a wave of agreement, because we're all agreeing to do it. And there is this groupthink that goes on. I never thought, "I'm going to join a group and give my power to someone." But there is a social proof that happens. Vera Chieffo: I never saw it as giving my power to him. Also, a lot of us wanted somebody to give our power to, somebody to help guide us along. It was almost like a mosquito, how they just suck your blood until they pop.
The more people feed him, the monster gets bigger and bigger. And there are many people that we've seen, like Donald Trump for instance, who does this really well. Phillipe Coquet: Some people have such a need to take other people's energy that when it comes to them, it feeds them. Will Allen, along with former Buddhafield and cast members Vera Chieffo and Phillipe Coquet, sat down with Esquire to talk about the power of the cult's leader (known as The Teacher), why they joined Buddhafield, and life after living in a cult.ĮSQ: How do you think one man was able to have so much power? Holy Hell which premiered at Sundance and is executive produced by Jared Leto, arrives in theaters today. The charisma and kumbaya-ing turns into megalomania and gaslighting. The cult members accuse The Teacher (real name Jaime Gomez) of moral and criminal violations, the worst of which is widespread sexual abuse of the male cult members.
Gradually the film steers towards the sinister, and about a third of the way through, there's a tangible key change. Allen had spent half his life in the cult when he departed at the age of 44. But during that time he was allowed to film 22 years' worth of footage, which he combines with interviews with other cult members who defected late in their lives. Imagine lots of watered-down Eastern spirituality and group sing-a-longs.ĭirector Will Allen's documentary about the Buddhafield, Holy Hell, seems pretty tame in the beginning. Even the Buddhafield itself seems like your standard '80s Hollywood Hills hippie commune. As far as cult leaders go, the leader who runs the Buddhafield-sometimes known as Andreas or Michel, sometimes The Teacher-seems relatively benign at first, perhaps even laughable. A ballet dancer with a Ken doll's body, a penchant for wearing Speedos and mascara, and whose claim to fame was being an extra in Rosemary's Baby , he is miles away from the likes of Jim Jones and Charles Manson.