The Phelps family was the subject of the 2007 TV program "The Most Hated Family in America", presented on the BBC by Louis Theroux. Four years after his original documentary, Theroux produced a follow-up program "America's Most Hated Family in Crisis", which was prompted by news of family members leaving the church. Phelps' son Nate has broken ranks with the family and in an interview with Peter W. Klein on the Canadian program "The Standard", he characterized his father as abusive and warned the Phelps family could turn violent. Writing in response to Phelps' death in 2014, Theroux described Phelps as "an angry bigot who thrived on conflict", and expressed the view that his death would not lead to any "huge changes" in the church, as he saw it as operating with the dynamics of a large family rather than a cult. Theroux returned for a third documentary in 2019, titled "Surviving America's Most Hated Family".