03x01 - What's Up, Doc?

[bunniefuu]

Doc, how pleased are you
with [span style="style2"]{\an8}Tiger King's depiction of you?

This is not a documentary.

{\an8}Not a documentary.

It's fake. It's a silly fake show.

An incredible wild ride
of a fanticiful tale.

[John Reinke] Doc Antle hated [span style="style2"]Tiger King.

He thought he was
misrepresented in a bunch of lies.

[Doc] They hid the fact that this facility

is the Ritz-Carlton of keeping big cats.

No one's even close to the grandeur
and beauty of this facility.

[Joe Exotic] [span style="style2"]It's an illusion. He creates
[span style="style2"]an illusion for people to believe.

I haven't spoke to Doc since this came out
but he's not happy about it.

[Barbara Fisher]
Doc is a very skilled con artist.

He thinks that he's smarter
than the rest of the world

and he designs his environment
around him to confirm that.

[Barbara] He creates his own truth always.

{\an8}[motor whirring]

{\an8}[Barbara] He doesn't live in a world
where people challenge him.

He doesn't--
He's not used to that anymore.

The silly little girl Barbara Fisher,
that b*tch is on there talking, saying,

{\an8}"They forced me to get a boob job
after a month." Like, are you mad?

She was obsessed with having boobs.

Those boobs didn't live here,
she's living out there,

test driving them on every
Tom, d*ck, and Harry she can find.

[host laughs]

-That's why she's pregnant all the time.
-Oh, f*ck.

In terms of what he said about me,
it's pure misogyny, that's what it is.

[somber melodic music plays]

[Barbara] Since [span style="style2"]Tiger King, we had people
coming by the house, recognizing the dog.

Just the fact that everybody
probably could figure out where I lived

and that means Doc knew where I lived.

That was scary to me,
so we just went out into the [span style="style2"]deep country

and that's where we remain.

[Barbara] Doc has gotten away with this
for so long, he thinks he's bulletproof.

But after [span style="style2"]Tiger King, all these people
contacted me with their own stories.

I knew that if I came forward,
other people would too.

[dramatic music plays]

[Barbara] There is safety in numbers.

[Barbara] Maybe he doesn't think
that you'll look back into his past.

But what's going on with Doc
won't survive in sunlight.

[music crescendos]

[mysterious music plays]

[guide] Good morning!
It's nice and warm today, isn't it?

-[crowd] Yeah!
-[guide] Just a couple rules on it.

No cameras are going
to be allowed at all today.

This is your final warning.

If we see recording or taking pictures,
you will be asked to leave.

I'm Dr. Bhagavan Antle,
director here at Myrtle Beach Safari.

{\an8}Myrtle Beach Safari
is an incredible wildlife encounter

where you get to have
an up-close, interactive experience

with a variety
of incredible exotic animals

up-close, uncaged
and unbelievable interaction.

[insects chirping]

[crowd laughs]

A handful of people in the world
get to have an eagle living in your house.

Sitting on the glove
watching [span style="style2"]Game of Thrones.

That doesn't happen
a whole lot for a lot of people.

When I was 12 years old, I got a photo
taken in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.

I looked at my mom and said, "This is what
I want to do for the rest of my life."

And when senior year came around,
I called up Doc Antle and I said,

"Please let me come volunteer for you,"

and he said,
"Well, how soon can you move here?"

And it was like I'd gotten
the golden ticket for [span style="style2"]American Idol.

I'm like, "Ah! Okay."

[melodic music plays]

[Jewels] I worked for Doc Antle
for seven years.

My parents were actually really happy
that I was doing something

that I believed I wanted to do.

I don't think they realized
what I was really signing up for,

which is just 24/7 working
at a place that I can't really leave.

Barbara was the first person
to come and talk to me.

Me and Barb focused a lot
on training little cubs

to become walking adolescents.

We would go to this place
called Barefoot Landing every day,

and we would do photos
with tiger cubs and big cats.

[indistinct chatter]

[Shavit Perel] One summer, I went
to call a friend of mine in Myrtle Beach,

{\an8}and he offered me a job operating
a climbing wall in Barefoot Landing.

[Shavit] As the summer went on,
I started developing relationships

{\an8}with the people that worked
at Preservation Station.

It started with Barbara,
and then it was China.

Everybody looked like Crocodile Dundee.

And everybody was tan
and blond and had a knife

and it was really impressive.

And then eventually Doc would show up.

He just blew me away.

By the time we reached the end of summer,
he said, "How about you come work for me?"

I said, "I'm in."

I stayed at the barn
where the elephant was living.

So I would go to sleep with Bubbles
and I would wake up with Bubbles.

Who the heck am I
to be lucky enough to be in this position?

And then they would give me those clothes,
and I got my knife.

Now I'm looking
like Crocodile Dundee, right?

I'm the cool guy.

{\an8}And it got to the point,
like, I'm living a dream.

But everything completely turned on
its head once Julie came into the picture.

I'm talking to Doc and he goes,

"I just want to let you know,
there's a couple of new girls."

"I don't want you getting involved."

Somebody told me,
"Hey, Doc rated you a nine."

Part of me was like, "Oh, yeah,"
and then part of me is like, "What?"

[Magenta Brooks]
Women and men at Doc's compound

were treated very differently.

He definitely showed off his giant bed
a few more times than was necessary

to do with an employee.

I had always wondered
if I had misread things,

and then seeing[span style="style2"] Tiger King

and hearing Barbara talk,
it was so cathartic.

It was just this amazing confirmation
that I didn't make this up,

and other people saw it too. [sighs]

[Magenta] I am a polyamory
relationship coach

and I've been noticing that people keep
talking about Doc as being polyamorous.

Polyamory requires
respect that flows both ways.

It requires autonomy.

And Doc is not encouraging his partners

to create healthy relationships
outside of him.

-It's a harem, it's not polyamory.
-[cryptic music plays]

[Doc] I have my three beloved partners
who've been with me for 20 years each.

My son, my three daughters.

[birds chirping]

And that group of people,

along with the peripheral characters
around them,

love doing this
and plan on to continue to do it.

So if I move
to the Himalayan Mountains today,

those guys should be able to step up
and run some facsimile of it.

[Magenta] He's got this very
highly overinflated sense of self.

He sees himself as kind of a guru.

And so, having followers
or having animals that are

subservient to him

kind of bolsters that narrative.

[Barbara] After we all changed our names,
he gave a bunch of us different chains.

The medallion signified to all of us

this union of us all being one family.

It's a symbol for the integral yoga
that Swami Satchidananda purported.

He was the guru that opened Woodstock.

A picture of the big bearded guy going,
"Let's start."

That's Swami Satchidananda.

[Doc] Tons of famous people
are longtime devotees.

[crowd murmurs]

{\an8}[Barbara] He met Swamiji Satchidananda
in Yogaville.

{\an8}[eerie music plays]

{\an8}[Barbara] All these people devoted
to Swamiji

{\an8}and listening to everything he says,

and basing every aspect
of their life around him.

[Barbara] If there's somebody
he idolized, it's Swamiji.

The way he talks about him,
it's beyond hero worship.

[man] How did you go
from Yogaville to being a--

[Doc] Once you add Yogaville,

you're dropping in
this incredibly complicated,

cult-ridden, strange entity, like, "What?"

[female voice] [span style="style2"]The Reverend
[span style="style2"]Sri Swami Satchidananda

experienced the spiritual oneness
of all creation

and dreamed of creating a shrine
where that oneness could be seen and felt.

[gently melodic music plays]

Swami Satchidananda
used to always laughingly say

that the yoga institutes were asylums
and we were all the inmates.

And people would go,
"Ha-ha-ha. That's so funny, Swamiji."

But it was true.

-We were having crisis times.
-[tense music plays]

People were choosing between yoga
and Scientology, and I thought,

"I wasn't raised by wolves.
I am going to go with yoga."

[Satchidananda]
Everywhere there seems to be the cry.

We hear people shouting
in the name of peace,

but they want to fight for peace.

Most of the people at Yogaville
are loving, caring individuals,

who want to better themselves spiritually
and want to better the world.

[melodic music plays]

[female voice] Yogaville is
an intentional community

where people choose to live together

practicing yoga,
vegetarian diet, meditation.

There's probably
close to 250 permanent residents.

My parents met Swami Satchidananda
when I was five years old,

and I started meditating myself
when I was 11, by choice.

I was doing, I don't know,

four to six hours a day
of yoga and meditation, yeah.

We were a very peaceful,
loving, accepting…

[chuckles] …community.]

[crowd singing indistinctly]

Hari om, hari om, hari om.

[female voice] People believe
Swami Satchidananda is a god.

-A Jesus Christ. He can do no wrong.
-[gentle music plays]

They would drop to the ground
when he walked into the room

and bow to his feet.

Kiss his feet.

[Sachi] I watched [span style="style2"]Tiger King,
and I was like, "Damn."

"They don't even know
the story before that."

Doc Antle got ideas
from Swami Satchidananda.

He was attracted to the power
that he wielded over other people.

Bhagavan was
a very well-known character at Yogaville.

Swami Satchidananda loved him.
He was, you know, lots of flash.

He had Bubbles, the little baby elephant.

[applause]

He was like a celebrity there.

[female announcer] [span style="style2"]Bhagavan Antle
[span style="style2"]of Bhagavan's Celestial Magic.

[mystical music plays]

[crowd cheering]

[applause]

[Joan] He was the cute boy of the '80s.
He had long dark hair, a mustache.

He was a magic man.

["Magic" by Pilot plays]

♪ Oh, h*, h* it's magic, you know ♪

[cheers and applause]

♪ Never believe it's not so ♪

♪ It's magic, you know ♪

♪ Never believe it's not so… ♪

[Steven Diamond] The two of us had
an instant connection through magic.

I was about 15 or 16.

I had my own career at that time,
so I was doing fairs and festivals.

And I was very popular
all up and down the East Coast.

{\an8}Bhagavan saw me
as a great way to make some money.

[camera snaps]

[Steven] And so, right away we kind of
formed this little informal partnership.

A 50/50 plan was the deal.

[Steven] Come down, guys! Run!

["Theme from Superman"
by John Williams plays]

[Steven] He had this place called
The Buckingham Zoological Park.

Right outside of Yogaville.

You'd drive down this little country road
and you wouldn't know that it was there

unless you knew exactly how to find it.

You walked through the little gate
and you see this A-frame house.

It kind of looked
like something a hobbit might live in.

And immediately, as soon as you walked in,
you could see an elephant in the distance,

and you could see tigers back there,
you could see lions.

Good boy.

[Steven] In the beginning,
it was such a great place.

[soothing music plays]

What I liked about the Buckingham Zoo
was the community that Bhagavan had built.

[man] I met Bhagavan
right out of high school.

He would do local shows
around here for schools.

And then I worked with him
at the Renaissance Festival.

[David] I made my living
as a juggler for like 25 or 30 years.

[motor whirring]

[David] I'm sort of an entrepreneur.

I had a video business

and I used to videotape
his magic show that he would perform.

[hissing, popping]

[mystical music plays]

By the constant practice
of the control of the life force,

you will not only be able to control
the life force of your mind and body,

you will also be able to control
the life force of the universe, as well.

[David] Bhagavan supposedly
had psychic powers

because he had practiced yoga
and his pranayama and acquired

these superpowers.

He would walk on coals and he would
supposedly levitate things and whatnot.

[mysterious music plays]

Your body can become so fit

that you are immune to the outside world
coming in and influencing you.

[Steven] He would create this illusion

that if you listened to him
and you followed his ways,

you would be able
to do some of the same things.

[David] These people getting paid
almost nothing in promise of getting

these super powers from Bhagavan,
when he didn't really have them himself.

He was not a great magician.

{\an8}[Doc] This is the Two of Hearts.

{\an8}[David] Ninety-eight percent accuracy.

[muffled laughter]

It was horrible. [laughs]
I mean, it just-- It was horrible.

But people liked it because he was
the cool guy with the tigers.

[melodic synth music plays]

These things are nothing
in comparison to the accomplishments…

of the thoughts-- of the control
of the thoughts and emotions of the mind.

They are but a drop
in the ocean by comparison.

The guru gave Bhagavan
all of his teachings, the yoga teachings.

This philosophy and psychology
of how to approach the world.

[sitar music plays]

[Joy] I still love the yoga teachings,

but the experience in retrospect

taught me so much about how

to be aware of a cult-type approach,

of wanting to attract people
for the purpose of power or greed,

and giving…

the feeling that you're going to receive
something that isn't possible to get.

[eerie music plays]

[Joy] He had complete control.

We had to wear a certain type of clothing,
we had to eat a certain type of food.

I mean, you give everything.

You give not just your material
possessions, but your whole belief system.

One day, you'll be surprised
how obedient your mind is.

One will have a body of all health
and vitality, free from disease.

It will make the mind calm,
clear, and dynamic.

[Joy] Bhagavan learned how to use
the teachings in a manipulative way.

[Steven] To be part of the zoo,

you give up your entire life,
you give up your name,

you give up your world,
you give up your family, your friends.

The tigers become the first priority
to the exclusion of everything else.

And he's always been that way,
and it's just a way of getting free labor.

[guide] Being in the presence
of a big cat

can be a life-transforming event.

When Doc started building his facility,

he wanted to embody,
like, a Yogaville type of environment,

where he's, kind of,
the leader of the group

and everyone's working
for a greater cause, working with animals,

and also incorporating yoga.

[melodic music plays]

[male interviewer] Do you practice yoga?

Cult, cult, cult alarm, um… [chuckles]

Myself, I have practiced yoga
throughout my life, I've practiced…

Myself, I've practiced martial arts
from the time I was very young.

I've practiced throughout my life.

I always tell my staff
that they should go and practice yoga

so they get a steadiness of mind and body.

[pensive music plays]

[Shavit] It makes so much sense
to use those characteristics of the guru

to basically create a culture
where you're like God.

[high-pitched growl]

[Doc] They come as teenagers
and decades later they're still here,

because there is a fulfillment
from spending time with wildlife.

[growling]

There's a song,

"I'm on a vacation
because I love my occupation."

"If you don't love what you're doing,
change your station."

It's perfect. It's a perfect song.

[insects chirping]

Bhagavan definitely had the desire
to create his own following,

and he did and he was very good at it.

[birds chirping]

[Steven] I met Joe
a couple times at his zoo.

and I was shocked at what I was seeing,

because in every way
it was a poor man's version,

it was a copy of what Bhagavan had built.

This is what we are going to create.

Press play.

[dramatic instrumental music plays]

[Joe] I want you to look
at the landscaping here.

One man does this entire park
because he takes pride in it.

The staff take pride in what they do.

Joe tried to make his park
look exactly like Doc Antle's.

Everything was about Doc Antle.

{\an8}We will buy safari-looking clothes

so you feel
like you work in a jungle atmosphere.

It's very simple, you get up
in the morning, you get dressed,

you come to work
with a shiny, sparkly attitude.

[Joe] Until you can get
some self-discipline,

we can never do this.

I have my own following and people.
It's called the Temple of the Beast.

[Joe] We're a nondenominational church
here at the G.W. Zoo, and I'm Pastor Joe.

And if you would like
to get married with tigers,

we can decorate and do it all

just for you.

We are here today in the sanctuary
of the Church of the Beast

where the sky is our ceiling
and the grass is our floor.

[gentle music plays]

[Jewels] People like Joe Exotic
and Doc Antle love dressing in costumes.

That's their thing,
that's what they love to do is boast,

"I'm Tiger King with all these,
you know, beautiful women around me

that all have big boobs
and all dressed in leather."

I can't believe I was actually okay
with wearing those costumes.

I think the one thing that I said
absolutely not is not putting on tights.

[dramatic instrumental music plays]

[Barbara] I've been deep into
Bhagavan's closet before,

and you can find
the most insane pieces of clothing.

This is the Renaissance Fair outfit.
I was proud of my chain mail halter top.

[male voice] [span style="style2"]King Richard's Faire!
[span style="style2"]Weekends, September 4 through October 24.

[Steven] Renaissance Fairs
are this gathering

of thousands of people that come

and all the performers
and everybody that works at the fair,

they're all dressed up
in these medieval type costumes.

And there's usually a swordsmith there,
and there will be jugglers,

and there will be any type of performer

that might have lived
back in medieval times.

Whenever we went to Renaissance Fairs,
Bhagavan was kind of on the prowl,

searching for girls.

There's no greater
pick-up line in the world than,

"Do you want to pet my tiger?"

[Magenta] That's how I met him.

I was traveling from state to state
doing Renaissance Fairs

and I was walking
my ferret through the forest area

and ran smack into a guy walking a lion.

Right now, he is gaining
almost a pound every single day.

I said, "Do you ever hire people?"

And a week later I was hauling
elephant poop. I had moved in.

[Magenta] He can talk a good game.

When he would talk about
the requirements of the job,

like how many hours we had to put in,
how dedicated we had to be,

it really was framed in a very, you know,

"These animals come first
and it's going to be hard work

and it's going to be difficult,

and you've got
to be strong to manage this."

And that appealed to me greatly.

[music crescendos]

[Joy] Bhagavan knew
how to work people beautifully,

because he got his beginnings
of learning from Swami Satchidananda.

[mystic music plays]

[Joy] In order to be a Swami
you take vows of celibacy,

obedience, selfless service, and poverty.

He was Swami Satchidananda
and he had taken those vows,

but they didn't apply to him anymore
because now he was enlightened.

Yoga expects one to reform himself.

[Joy] During the years that I was there,
the guru had sexualized the relationship

with many of the disciples.

[Satchidananda speaks inaudibly]

[Joy] With any kind of sexual abuse,

they bring you in, and they make you feel
like you're going to be…

[pensive music plays]

…friends with this powerful person.

So, what they would want gets changed.

No, they wouldn't want
an old man with a long beard

to be fondling them
and having intercourse with him.

Jerking him off.

[interviewer] How many women
was he involved with?

Oh, I don't know. I bet
there are some that never came forth.

Um…

But I would say at least a dozen.

[dramatic instrumental music plays]

[Joy] They believed
that this made them special somehow,

that this close intimate
relationship gave them

a certain connection to God.

And Bhagavan was emulating the guru.

[Joy] Women were very attracted
to Bhagavan.

[Sumati] His first wife
was "Brahmi" Betsy.

There was, you know, only "Brahmi"
for a little while on her own.

[Joan] "Brahmi" was a beautiful woman.

[Glen] She was beautiful.
Slender, long dark hair.

[David] They seemed like
a happy married couple, in a sense.

And Bhagavan used to use them
as an example about how happy they were

and what a wonderful couple they were,
which is sort of interesting.

I think it was not her lifestyle.

You know, Bhagavan being
interested in multiple women.

[somber music plays]

[man] I have to believe
that's part of why my sister is

where she's at now in her life.

I mean, it has to be.

She never dealt with it.

And she's just been
destroying her life, slowly but surely.

[Glen] She's had a problem
with drinking for a long time.

She almost died a few years ago.

It's a shame because she's--

[sighs] I'm getting emotional.

[Betsy] I'll probably never get over it.
My mother always likes to bring that up.

She goes, "He was the love of your life."
I'm like, "Yeah, he was."

[laughs]

Nobody's ever gonna change that.

[insects chirping]

[mysterious music plays]

[Betsy] Me and Kevin,
that was his name back then,

I met him in high school.

And before we started dating,
my boyfriend lived next door to him.

So I used to go to Kevin's house
to spend time with my boyfriend,

'cause Kevin's mother didn't care.

She was like, "Cool Mom."

[laughs]

{\an8}But, he broke up with me
so that he could be with Kevin's mother.

[interviewer]
Didn't people think it was strange

that she started having sex
with your teenage boyfriend?

Only the people that knew about it,
which was only us.

She felt bad because she said,
"Well, I know you're upset about this."

"Why don't you try dating Kevin?"

Meaning her son. And I did.

[Betsy] Of course I fell in love.

I wanted to be with him all the time.

[somber music plays]

[Betsy] He was very confident
and really beautiful.

[Glen] My sister used to bring him
to the house.

{\an8}I don't think my dad
liked him a lot in the beginning.

{\an8}I know Kevin dropped out of high school,
maybe that was part of it.

But he had long hair. [laughs]

That was--
My dad didn't really like that.

[Betsy] Oh, he was a rebel.

He always wanted to be in trouble.

[Betsy laughs, sighs]

He actually sought out trouble. [chuckles]

[Betsy] After we got married,
we changed our names

because we went
to this one-month retreat at Yogaville

to become certified yoga instructors.

And Swami Satchidananda
gave us a new name.

I went from Betsy to Brahmi.

And he went from Kevin Antle
to Sri Mahatmayavi Bhagavan Antle.

Pretty big change.

[mysterious music plays]

[Sumati] Bhagavan Antle in 1982
was very good-looking.

He was very charming.

He had a lot of bling, you know,
he drove a DeLorean and a Porsche.

[Sumati] I first met him
in the Lotus Lake,

which is a lake
around the Lotus Temple in Yogaville.

I remember it very clearly

because he hit on several
of the teenage girls that day in the lake.

and I talked to them about it
and asked them like,

"Did he touch your butt or boobs?"

"I mean, did that happen to you guys too,
or was it just me?"

[interviewer] How old was he?

He was 22, yeah, and I was 14.

[cryptic music plays]

[Sumati] That's not legal
in the state of Virginia.

He spent a long time,
he spent, like, six months

sending me poetry,
getting me flowers, just really wooing me.

[Sachi] I remember having
some outings with Bhagavan,

you know, to the movies,
or, you know, out to dinner.

He had all the toys.
I remember playing with a lot of toys.

They had a Jacuzzi.
We'd play with the baby animals a lot.

When you were over there,
you were in his world.

[Sachi] I minimized everything
that went on,

but now that I look at it as an adult,

I was kind of passed on…

to a person who worked with Bhagavan.

I felt a pressure…

to have a sexual relationship
with this person,

and he was 30 years old.

I was 15.

[somber instrumental music plays]

[Sachi] At the time, I thought
it was my choice and I played the role.

I didn't have the tools
to make those kind of choices.

It was part of the culture,
I think, that Bhagavan cultivated.

There was a lot of photo shoots.

[Sachi] There were some
inappropriate photos, definitely.

And we were underage.

Naked photos.

[Sumati] He did a nude photo sh**t of me
and a boa constrictor.

And luckily his wife "Brahmi"
found those pictures and burned them.

Otherwise, there could be nude photos
of me floating around who knows where.

[Sachi] He preyed after young women

and it was important to him
that they were virgins.

My 15th birthday
was the first time that we slept together,

but before we slept together,
we had a spiritual wedding ceremony

in his meditation room
upstairs at his house.

And he put a wedding band on me,

and I was supposed to be his wife,
and he was supposed to be my husband,

even though he was already married.

{\an8}He told me she was totally polyamorous
and totally into an open marriage,

and this was all copacetic,
and that was not the case.

The worst part is that
the other women that lived around there,

they actually thought that I condoned it.

They were like,
"Oh, I thought you were okay with it."

I was like,
"Are you kidding me? Of course not."

You have to remember
I was always the last person to know.

[Sumati] He took me on a honeymoon
down to the Virgin Islands

with "Brahmi" Betsy, his first wife,

which was really awkward for me

because "Brahmi" and I
weren't talking about

the fact that I was
in a relationship with him.

[Betsy] I didn't know
it was Sumati's honeymoon.

I was spending all of my time snorkeling.

Apparently he was
spending all day screwing women.

But I didn't know that.

[somber music plays]

He would just reassure me
that she was okay with it.

[Betsy chuckles] One of his many lies.

But she was really young

and I can imagine that
she would've believed him, of course.

[Sumati] He did one of those power
and control maneuvers

where he isolated me.

I moved out of my parents' house at 15
and moved on to the Yogaville property.

[Betsy] You know, he was pretty careful
about picking teenage girls

whose parents
didn't pay attention to them.

Sumati lived in a tent
right behind my house.

He would come and visit me
in my tent in Yogaville sometimes.

[Betsy] He was only interested in me
as long as I looked like I was 12.

Until the age of 30, I weighed 100 pounds.

I had no curves, just nothing.

That's what he liked, he liked women
who looked like they were still teenagers.

[somber music plays]

[Magenta] You needed to be very,
very thin.

I was eating Doc's very restricted diet,
so I was eating around 800 calories a day.

A very nutrient-light food.

[Doc] You cannot make someone
into an animal trainer.

It takes a certain degree
of mental and physical toughness.

One needs to be light on their feet,

one needs to have
a physicality of timing and understanding.

[Magenta] I was starving.

I was blacking out when I stood up.

I almost got k*lled because you're
working with wild animals and you…

My blood pressure was so low,
I'd stand up and start to black out.

One of the volunteers saved me.

She had been taken out for her birthday,
and she comes back to me the next day,

and she says,
"You don't know what's happening to you."

"You're being brainwashed."

"This is what cults do when they're
taking over people's psyches."

And she says,
"You've been doing this for so long,

you don't even know
how off your brain is right now."

[cryptic instrumental music plays]

[Magenta] So, she says, "You have to eat."

And she ended up chasing me around
the parking lot with a Fig Newton bar,

screaming,
"It's fat-free, for f*ck's sake!"

And I refused to eat it because
a Fig Newton bar was just too much,

but I started eating carrots

and I started thinking straight.

My brain started working a little better,
and I went to Doc

and I was like,
"I want to stay for the next year."

I was going
to finish up my two-year thing.

But I decided I didn't want the boob job.

I decided that wasn't who I wanted to be.

And he said, "If you're gonna look
like a fat a*s, you don't need the t*ts."

I mean, I was still skeletal,
I was still concave,

and I thought,
"Oh, I'm never going to win this game."

"And I'm starting to believe him."

[Magenta] I felt like if I stayed,
I was going to be subsumed.

[insects and birds chirping]

[Doc] In the '80s when we started out,

Swami Satchidananda had a new idea
that was really fresh,

that what you act like, what you think,
what you eat, shapes your health.

You are what you eat.
Please remember that.

Most of our physical problems
are caused by our food that we eat.

Swami led you to believe that he was…

now an enlightened being
and a perfect instrument of God.

[pensive music plays]

[Joy] Bhagavan saw the guru as someone
that could get away with everything.

I was very close to the person
who took care of Swami Satchidananda

and she would confide in me,
she would tell me that he would hit her.

If you want
to punish somebody who hurts you…

do something beautiful to that person.

She accepted it so easily and lovingly.

It was totally crazy,
but now I think of it that way,

but at the time, I just put on
my rosy-colored glasses, I guess.

[giggling]

[indistinct chatter]

Stop. Oh no!
Flippity-floppity. You big old guy.

[Steven] Bhagavan didn't like it

when someone,
in any kind of way, challenged him

and that was a problem between me and him.

If I did it in front of a group of people,
there would be hell to pay.

You got to not love me.

[Steven] And I learned very quickly
not to go there.

[woman] In order to get them…

-We're trying to not let you film.
-[cameraman] Sorry. Okay.

If you come here going, "That's not fair.
You didn't listen. I know the way,"

we have no tolerance
or time for anyone like that.

Look how calm…

[Barbara] He had a bad temper for sure.

You do not want to have something
you're attached to in front of Bhagavan

because he will t*rture you with that.

-[eerie music plays]
-I loved this one capuchin monkey.

From the time that I saw her,
I just was obsessed with her.

Bhagavan knew I loved her. He liked
that I was taking good care of her.

But he did also like to t*rture me
with the fact that I was so attached.

In one instance in particular,
he took her and put her in a freezer.

I mean, she's a little tiny baby

and he took her
and put her in the freezer and closed it

and just stared at me, waiting for me
to stop being upset…

[chuckles] …about that

That's what he was telling me.
"I'm teaching you not to be so attached."

"I need you to just
think about how you're feeling

with the monkey in the freezer
and calm yourself down."

[grim music plays]

[Sachi] He was capable of doing harm
more than your average person.

He could go
from very charming to very angry.

[interviewer] Did you ever see him
lose his temper in a way that was scary?

Yes.

With me, one time.

[sighs] Can we stop for a second?

Yeah. I just need a drink and…

There were four times in four years
where I thought he was going to k*ll me.

He was so incredibly violent to me
that I thought, "That's it."

"He got me. This is going to be the time."

[somber music plays]

The first couple times was,
I was going to leave him,

it was soon in the relationship.

I wanted to leave. I didn't want
to be in the relationship anymore.

[voice breaks] And he would beat me
or be violent with me.

And it scared me into staying with him.

Choked me to the point where I passed out,

and one time,
he even bragged to his girlfriends

that he broke
two of my ribs to shut me up.

And it's true, he did.

[Betsy] He didn't like to hit
because it'd leave a scar,

so he used to strangle me
because it didn't leave a mark.

[grim instrumental music plays]

He got so mad at me when I got pregnant.
He said it was my fault.

When I started giving birth,

somebody tracked him down, and of course
he was with his girlfriend at the time,

and so then,
while I'm still in labor, he calls.

"Is it okay if I just don't show up?"
And I was like, "No!"

So what he did was he actually came
and he laid on the bed next to me

and slept while I was having a baby.

[Betsy] Luckily, you're in so much pain
that you don't think about it too much,

but yeah, it was sad, but…

That whole thing about
what doesn't k*ll you makes you stronger?

Well, guess what.

There's not a whole lot of things
that will happen to me worse than that.

So…

[Betsy] As soon as the baby was born,
he was gone.

He was back
on the road with his girlfriend.

[insects chirping]

[Sumati] I remember I was shocked
when "Brahmi" got pregnant.

[birds chirping]

[Sumati] He told me
he wasn't even sleeping with her.

[somber sitar music plays]

[Betsy] He used to tell Sumati,

"I can do some kind of voodoo magic on you
and you'll never get pregnant."

She believed he could put a spell on her
and she wouldn't get pregnant.

But my daughter had just been born
and she was already showing.

[Sumati] Right before
the Lotus Temple opened,

I told Bhagavan
that I was pregnant with Tilakam.

First he said it wasn't his child… [sighs]

…and then he said
I needed to get an ab*rtion,

and he tried to guilt trip me into one.

[Doc] [span style="style2"]Tilakam's mom
[span style="style2"]was a crazy teenager

that, you know, I just happened to have
been hanging out with a little too long,

and she got pregnant.

I drug her a*s

to the Downtown Marriott in Washington DC,
and didn't follow through

on the birth control
the way we were supposed to do it

and, lo and behold, baby!

[Sumati] I called Swami Satchidananda
and I finally confessed to him

I'd been in a relationship with Bhagavan
for four years and I was pregnant.

[somber music plays]

He basically said,
"You're going to be a great mother."

He said, "If Bhagavan will marry you,
he can stay in Yogaville."

"If he continues with the women
like he is now, he's gonna have to leave."

There was a family meeting
that was called to deal with this

devastating news.

And in the family meeting, they…

were trying to blame the girls

for their… wanton behavior.

[Joan] My husband and I said, "Excuse me."

"This is a man who was promoted
by our teacher as this great Yogi,

and you're saying
the girls should not have trusted him?"

"That doesn't seem reasonable.
It seems to me the bad guy is the adult."

[tense music plays]

[Sachi] There was a culture
of pointing the finger at women.

We were [span style="style2"]seducing men,
that somehow it was our fault.

All of a sudden, the community decided

that every student, and parent,
and teacher involved in the school

should sign a pledge.

Basically saying that they won't date.

[Sachi] And also there's something about
not questioning Swami Satchidananda.

We felt like we were being punished.

We needed to just cover up, shut up.

Get permission to do… anything.

People of the opposite sex would not
be in the same room together alone.

And if a parent, a child, or a teacher
was unwilling to sign the pledge,

they couldn't attend
or teach at the school.

I didn't want to sign it.

When I spoke out, the community

asked me to leave.

[Sachi] Swami Satchidananda
told me directly.

He was like, "You're a rotten apple."

"You're going to make the other shiny,
bright apples rotten, too."

[Sachi] Being excommunicated
and shunned was painful.

My whole world was Yogaville.
I didn't know anything else.

Yogaville failed our kids

by not taking a stand.

By the time I got pregnant,

he was already in a relationship
with another 14-year-old.

Once you've married a 14-year-old…
[scoffs]

…what could possibly…

hold you back?

[cryptic music plays]

[Radha Hirsch] Never in a million years

did I ever think I would be sharing
this story publicly. [laughs]

When I hear myself,
I'm like, "Wow, it is pretty crazy."

I was 14 and he was 25.

My mom was wanting me to realize
how inappropriate the situation was.

And I remember him saying,

"Don't worry, we're going to deal with it.
It's all going to work out."

"Don't worry. We're going to be together."

Bhagavan and I were talking on the phone

and he wanted me to give him
very specifically my route to school.

We went over it and over it,
and he came and pulled up next to me

in a disguise of some sort.

He looked bizarre, like all the hair
up in a hat and like, crazy funky glasses.

And I jump in the car,
I dumped my book bags in a dumpster

and we flew off.

In my mind, I ran away, yes,
but I still, kind of, wasn't thinking

that it was really an abduction.

[sirens wailing]

[music crescendos]

[closing theme music playing]