Hm, I am the fairy man.
The human spirit is my business. Their madness, their passion, the wonderful and monstrous ways they burn out their brief candle.
I regret to tell you that very many American lives in love.
Was heard to shouts from the car.
He's dead. Whether he rebird to president or four hours, people must get up and go.
If I am here in the in between to collect their spirits and carry them to what comes next.
This road is not on any map.
It spanned the thresholds between their most forbidden desires and their greatest fear.
All I ask for.
In payment is a tale and accounting of their lives and the great temporary that is the land of the living.
These are their stories.
This is the passage.
Jonestown, Guyana, November eighteenth, nineteen seventy eight.
Death has a scent.
It's not the spoil of decomposing flesh that comes later. First death smells like scorched earth and the salt air and the steam rising off the tarmac at the Port Katuma airstrip after a tropical storm. You can smell it here, mingling with the swede and musky scent of orchids. Hmmm, yeah, you can hear death too under the buzz of busy pollinators. I have been very busy here, tendant to the lost souls after their massacre, hundreds of lost souls, all crying
out together. The people's temple was here after being chased from its country of origin, a grand experiment gone horribly awry. Such is the case with cults of men. The temple buildings still stand, the people do not. What made them human was their need to belong, to be a part of something that transcended themselves across human history. This is a requirement for survival. Rights of passage prepare the human
spirit for their place in the universe. These are painful, humiliating, and violent, as the old persona is literally destroyed to make way for the new. In these waning days of the twentieth century, there's no such rights of passage. Ceremonies no longer hold transformative power. So in this time, Americans have begun to ask themselves to what do I belong? It is a question born of separation. It is a
question that incites madness. America, after all, is a nation of immigrants, people displaced from their past and continually searching for their renewed sense of belonging. Yeah, a country, a political party, a circus, or in this case a church.
To What do I belong?
They ask?
Their religions are failing them, their rituals replaced only by a great drive to consume. But consumption cannot say the soul, and so they continue the search evermore frantic, many falling for the schemes of the likes of the man we meet today, Jim Jones, another American opportunist who saw the great question being asked, who sends the great hunger for meaning at the hollow core of American life? And who sought to fill it.
With himself.
Thousands of followers flocked to him, as mirised by his displays of mind reading and faith healing, and finding great meaning in his words, a new something to belong to. They followed that something to hear, to the salt air and the orchids of Guyana, to Jonestown. Despite his humanitarian preachings, he controlled his followers by humiliation and beatings, and blackmailing
and brainwashing. Here he had total autonomy, and moments ago, in a violent fit of peak, Jim destroyed what he built, as well as all those who helped him build it, including the innocent children who arrived here through no choice of their own.
Yeah.
Here he sits at the front gate, his grady intinted sunglasses bent and broken from his own bullet, somehow oblivious to the stench of death and the wailing of almost one thousand lost souls.
I'll be damned. Never thought my old ass would grace the seed of a Cadillac again. I can't thank you enough for the ride out of this damned place. You wouldn't believe the last few days. Can't leave well enough alone, those greedy American bastards. Everything we stood for, our whole Rainbow family, the whole damn thing went right out the window, quick as you please, And all it took was a note. Ever seen a city burn because of a scrap of paper? Sounds biblical, don't it.
It's time to go.
Hmm, that's killing me. Marty might be onto something about laying off the pills. She called for the car. I'm sure it's a good woman, despite her flaws.
She did not call you.
You did?
Oh? Hell I did? I did? Didn't I?
Ye?
Well? Of course, I mean, no one else would would think to call the car. The girls had too much on their plates. None only think about it. Of course, I called loyal. My family's so damn loyal, But dumbest posts half of them. No mind. The Good Book says to love them all the same. Everyone has their uses in the end, you know. And what we've all accomplished, all of us, our commitment, our ambition, our truth, it is gonna change everything. The whole world will see soon
enough what we had to do. That we wouldn't just lay down and let the enemy steal our lives from us, break us down. They thought they had us, but we showed them. This day is gonna be legendary. I am gonna be a legendary. They didn't think we had the courage. I tell you, brother, a revolution don't come cheap. But when you are dealing with the very salvation of everything you hold in your heart, money's no object at all, no object at all. We built a town out of nothing,
you know, in the middle of a jungle. That's damn hard work, real brutal stuff. Took a lot of hands and a lot of capital. There ain't no way around it. This day and age. You got to buy your freedom from the chains of the system. And we did it. Twice. There's preachers all over America thinking about being shepherd, telling the children to love God and put their faith in something intangible and a million miles away. But I put
in the work. I gave them truth and glory across that whole ugly nation, from sea to shining sea, spreading my good word worth more than a goddamn Bible. I'll tell you you think you could turn on the air conditioning. Friend, the jungle seems to have joined us in the cab. I'll be honest with you, my brother. A lot of folks didn't like what I had to say. But the good ones, the clever ones, they saw I had the right idea, and they spread the word like dandelions on
the wind. I called, and they followed. Together. We built from this soil a paradise on earth. It was better than Eden. A father loves his family and sees the value in them, even if they stray from time to time. They just got to know enough to be led to the promised land. They find their station in life and do as they're told, and then it's all golden. They're worth something, and then you have them for life, good little soldiers, primed up and ready to march as soon
as you give them the word, I'm here. And you should have seen them, how they all stood there that first night seems like forever ago. We were all there in the church, sipping wine from our first harvest drapes, a real treat them, thinking they did such a good job for their father. We talked a lot about confrontation in those days, about Russia, about Cuba, all the places we could go to to be free, about war, America always chomping at the bit for war. But I assure
them all we were safe. Dad would keep them safe, and we would stay united against every enemy, united in love and revolution. All smiles and nods and amens. Then I told him they were drinking cyanide in their warm That's how you know. That's how you separate the wheat from the chaff. You can't have a real revolution without conviction. You can't know you've got real soldiers on the front lines, or cowards afraid to die for what they believe in, until you put them to the test. They can sing
praises all day long, but I had to know. I had to know who I could trust, who really was a good soldier, ready for the revolution, ready to lay down their life for the cause. We did it over and over. White Night Communions, that's what we started calling them. That first night there was all this screaming and yelling and running, but not from everyone, wheat from the chaff. Indeed, some of my flock they strong armed the others and sitting down and shutting the hell up, anything for the cause.
And when the panic died down and the faithful were waiting for me, I told them it was just fine. It's fine, no poison at all. It's just a test of faith, a show of devotion. And I'll have you know, some of those little scavengers, we're goddamn embarrassed about the drama. Ugh, drama, Why yes, drama, No need for all that fussing. We are revolutionaries. We are brave, better than the blind, frightened dogs out there in that seth pit, believing the lie
that is the American dream. We take a drink and maybe we're martyrs, or maybe we're just tasting a little of the good stuff. God's reward for hard work and tending good soil, a reward either way for real faith, christ level faith, Say, brother, was that silver ice bucket there a minute ago in this bottle smells off artificial grape bitter omens.
Yeah, I'll go ahead, Jim, drink M.
I don't need a sip of that, my friend. I'm here now. I played my part. I guided my flock home like I promised. No, No, you don't need to say it. I can tell guided them to slaughter. That's what you're thinking. It's stifling back here, brother, have mercy and hit the AC. I never would have had to do what I had to do if it weren't for
that damn senator. If Leo Ryan would have stayed in californ if he'd kept those goddamn wolves from coming back to break apart our family, we'd be singing around campfires and feeding hungry people. We'd be playing with their babies,
harvesting vegetables, and healing our elders. I didn't know we had so many traders in our midst turncoats, sneaky little rats, not content with everything I've given a whole new world, and they still had to write their lives down and beg and bleat at that damn government goon and their slack jaw family members. Journalists with their cameras and their recorders, finding all the worst and building a narrative. They wanted a spectacle. They wanted it. They wanted to end it all.
Don't you see. I couldn't let them take everything from us. I couldn't let them destroy our family, rip up the people's temple in every thing we stood for. The family knew it. My soldiers knew it. Lord. I didn't force some, didn't tell them what to do, but they knew. They followed those little liars back to the airstrip and they gunned them down like the pigs. They were just ready for them. What did you say, slaughter? No I wasn't there. Oh no, I wasn't there. I didn't need to be.
It had to be done to save us, but it wasn't. It wasn't enough to save us. If you want, you want me to be honest, I always knew it would come to pass, And god damn it, I've just been so tired of this life, of this responsibility. Hm he kin too hot, ah, the too damn hot in here for all this, my goddamn head. I'm in agony back here, friend, this ain't the Middle Ages? You know? Are we going the right way? You need to understand something I knew the minute Leo Ryan's brains blew out of his skull,
we'd all be dead one way or the other. Look dead at the hands of the United States of America, you see, they'd bomb us. Have you heard of fred Hampton, Martin Luther, King Tulsa, the trail of tears. America hasn't ever given a second thought to killing, just like Rome of old feeble old men in Washington want nothing more than to murder the poor, to take our sons, feed them to the war machines. They were going to steal the babies, blast us into oblivion. Label us terrorists, but
we aren't terrorists. We're the ones being terrorized, broken down by the evils of capitalism. We alone stood up against Goliath, and at the end of the day, damn it, it wasn't enough. It had to be done. People play games, friend, What can I do about liars? I beg them to just please leave us, But no, there was no other way out from my brothers and sisters. No, no, they made damn sure that we did not let our lives be taken, laid them down gladly and protest to every
damn thing we fought against in this world. One last white night, the final test of the love and loyalty, of our ability to do great things together. It was just too damn late for Russia, Do late for Cuba, do late for anything but our defiance. Dou late for anything except revolutionary suicide, to keep our babies out of the monster's jaws, to die free and with our hearts full, not shot down by the state like common criminals. God, where are you taking me? I should be rewarded for
my love, for my commitment, my conviction. I am not a coward. I am a father stronger than those bureaucrats and those ugh I who loves so so deeply. My God understands what I have done. My God will welcome me. Those people came to me for love, for acceptance, and I alone took them in. I provided them with love. I accepted them when this evil, horrible world showed them only hatred and judgment. I loved them. And now my God will take me in because my God loves me.
Are you lost? This is it right? What road are we on? No? It's too much, it would not smell. The sweetness is sickening. We did have to get a little more forcible with some of our brethren than I would have wanted. Didn't have to be like that. Brother, Please understand, I wanted us all to go easy, peaceful, to accept the future, our revolution together painless. Only it was it was not the first time that first night, and some some people tried to run.
I couldn't have that.
I have them making everything a damn mess, babies crying, women screaming. No, no, he was all wrong, not my playing at all. But I couldn't keep on with it anymore. No, no, to Leah Ryan, I couldn't take any more of that chaos, knowing all hell would be loose soon enough. So yes, yes, some of them we had to. We had to remove. They were running from the truth and it was too late for them. For all of us. We go together. They've always known that, and I just got no step of the left for the runners.
None.
After all I had to do to fix every damn thing for them. Brother, I feel like on the suffocate. My head is pounding, gomas are burning, my mouth is enohing.
Drink.
I told you I had quite.
Enough to drink.
You haven't had a drop.
Oh no, yeah, you're gonna try and slip away.
Oh well, the rest.
Rot for your lie.
No, you always saw what you wanted to see. You weren't walking away from here. What good is revolution without it's martyr?
Hell, I was gonna go my own way. I'm a good father. God damn it. I didn't need no damn gun in my face.
Oh not me.
Everything we are we are because of me, and you think. Ah, I was gonna drink. I was gonna join my beautiful rainbow family. It seemed to me that death was a million times more preferable than another day in that life. I told him too. Oh, I laid my life down, So we haven't. I laid my life down.
Who try to convince a liar at the very end?
You'll be quiet, if you'll just be quiet. I was going to lay my life down.
You're holding the bottle o drink from it.
I would have run if I could have. I was so damn tired of it all. Oh, all the z canery, all the pageantry, days without sleep, none of it ever mattered at all. I was so tired. Ah, let's just tell one of the burden of their lives on me anymore. God damned, that's it, isn't it?
Drink Jim, So.
What you're all waiting for. Is that what you're all waiting for? Oh ah ha ha oh oh oh yeah, I see.
It seems uh this is your stuff.
Well hm oh God, damn y'all drink to that. Mhm h m hm.
Oh oh look.
Yeah ooh yeah yeah.
It gets me right here every time. And all it took for Jim Jones to see what he really was was the great mirror of his own death. A coward's death, yeah, not the one he hadn't meet it out so bravely while still in control of the final thrashings of the People's Temple. A silver tongue, sharp and meticulous, gone on the hell his portal, a bottle that he would not drink from in life, a little grape flavored aid, a little cyanide, and one last prayer to send them on his passage.
The Passage stars Dan Fogler as the Ferryman. This episode features Scott Poythras as Jim Jones.
Written by E. M.
Westover with additional writing by Dan Bush and Nicholas Dakowski. Our executive producers are Nicholas Dakoski, Matthew Frederick, and Alexander Williams. First Assistant director, Script supervisor and production coordinator Sarah Klein. Music by Ben love It, additional music by Alexander Rodriguez. Casting by Sunday Bowling, Kennedy and Meg Mormon. Editing and sound designed by Dan Bush, Dialogue editing and sound mixing by Jan Campos. Additional sound editing by Racket Sound. Our
supervising producer is Josh Thane. Created by Dan Bush and Nicholas Dakowski. Produced by Dan Bush. The Passage is a production of iHeartRadio and Cycopia Pictures.
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