Robert Downey Junior. and his wife Susan Downey are jumping on the podcast train and are ready to produce a new investigative cult podcast series titled The place of the sun on the Synanon cult.
The podcast tells the story of the former California-based drug rehab facility and experimental community that “has morphed into a dangerous and violent cult, led by its Messianic founder Charles E. Diedrich.” The series will be narrated by Sari Crawforddaughter of former Synanon leader Bill Crawford.
The place of the sun will tell the story of Synanon from the inside out and “from the people who lived through it, tracing its rise and exploring its decade-long reign over the counterculture of the 1960s and 1970s through the memories of members, survivors and chroniclers. devotees “.
Synanon was called “the miracle on the beach” in Santa Monica, California in the 1960s. “It started as an experimental drug rehab facility that made a radical claim: It could cure your heroin addiction. The man responsible for this miracle? Charles E. Dederich, aka” Chuck. ” Diedrich would have made an even bolder statement: Synanon could cure any of your problems. All you had to do was move. What started in a beach house in Santa Monica soon spread to San Francisco and Oakland, then into complexes. across the state of California and then into the country, with thousands of people and millions of dollars in assets. But Diedrich would be the same man who would destroy it all, along with the lives of many of his followers and, in the late 1970s, Synanon had been called a violent sect. “
The Downeys said in a statement, “Even though we knew Synanon, it was only when we heard the deeply personal stories that we could truly appreciate his epic rise and fall. We felt this was a strangely relevant and twisted admonition that needed to be told about the incredible lengths people will go to looking for answers and the more dangerous ones others will provide. “
Chris Corcoran, founding partner of Cadence 13, added: “This is a story that immediately attracted us and that we wanted to tell. It is an honor to be able to tell incredible stories like this with such an exceptional team of Susan, Robert, Emily and Josh in collaboration with our brilliant creative team at C13Orginals. “
This wild-sounding series is produced by Team Downey and Wink Pictures for Audacy-owned Cadence13. The eight-part series will launch on August 10. Listen to a trailer below.
by Joey Paur
Source: Geek Tyrant
