Director of doc on Sarah Lawrence cult says warning signs are 'very hard to detect': 'You don't join a cult'

When Larry Ray was convicted of having physically, even sexually, and psychologically abusing his daughter's college roommates, the story was almost too much to believe: He had moved into her dorm and brainwashed her roommates to the point they cut off communication with their families, paid him thousands of dollars and even attempted suicide.

Everyone wondered: How could this happen? Who would fall for such a thing?

The new Hulu docuseries Stolen Youth: Inside the Cult at Sarah Lawrence shows us. We watch as Ray became whatever the people around him needed: a mentor, a father figure, a boyfriend.

Director Zach Heinzerling, whose 2013 documentary Cutie and the Boxer was nominated for an Oscar, says he was drawn to the story precisely because he found it so relatable. He's about the same age as the victims, and he attended a small, liberal arts college.

"I feel like the real purpose of making this documentary was to say, you know, to the general public that this could be you too, that you don't join a cult," he tells Yahoo Entertainment. "A cult is a series of controlling relationships led by an abusive manipulator."

Just last month, Ray was sentenced to 60 years in prison for inflicting what the U.S. attorney described as "brutal and lifelong harm on innocent victims."

It all began in 2010, with a group of friends living together, and Ray, the father of one of the women, began crashing on the couch. He was soon regaling the students with stories of having worked in the military and the CIA, where he said he had befriended former New York Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik and others with powerful titles. Ray had the photos to prove it. Soon he was doing the dishes and cooking dinner. Next he became a sort of counselor, and began running a pseudo mental bootcamp out of their residence, that he said would help the young adults. Before long, Ray was controlling the lives of these students who were at such a vulnerable place in their lives and just figuring out who they were; he told one woman she had undiagnosed schizophrenia, and a man that he was gay. He called the mother of a female student and said that the daughter had been molested when she was younger, so she would no longer be speaking with the mother. The students did physical labor for Ray, and they weren't allowed to eat without his permission. He also convinced some of the students that they owed him large sums of money — they had destroyed some of his property, he told them — and had them ask their parents for it or raise it by prostituting themselves. He convinced them they were working with powerful forces to kill him by poisoning. More than one of them attempted suicide. The madness only ended when Ray was exposed.

"I think that the people who feel like they're not susceptible to cults are probably more susceptible because of it," Heinzerling says. "As you see in the doc, these are bright, successful young people from all different backgrounds. Sure, they had issues with their parents and other common things like anxiety or depression, that any 18, 19-year-old would have… If you look at what happened, it's a series of much lesser, less surprising forms of manipulation, like love bombing or gaslighting or any kind of coercive behavior. It is impossible to say that you would never be interested in someone who was presenting themselves as a friend, someone who's giving you advice, someone helping you."

Ray was able to slip into whatever role was needed.

"These are highly relatable issues that people have and, you know, Larry as a chameleon, is able to sort of shapeshift himself and become a kind of answer to whatever question someone was asking. I think there are tons and tons of versions of Larry out there," Heinzerling says. "I think it's much more normal, these kind of relationships where there’s a power dynamic imbalance, and where someone is taking advantage of someone else. I think that’s very everyday, and that's how it starts. They don’t always get to the point of extremities, like in the case with Larry, but versions of this story are playing out all over the place. And it's very hard to detect, because the person is presenting in a very, very real way as a positive person, and that's why I think… the saying you don’t join a cult is super important, because you don't know that your relationship is going to end up being abusive. And it is really hard to see warning signs."

Heinzerling spent about two years working on Stolen Youth, and much of it was dedicated to just listening to his subjects, several of the students affected and multiple parents who, at least for a while there, lost their children. It was important to him to have the participating survivors be the ones who told the story so that it wasn't presented in a one-dimensional way. He notes that some documentary participants find telling their stories to be cathartic.

The director also wanted to note that Ray's case is connected to something bigger.

"I think it's important to relate the story to the broader conversation about cult-like personalities. I think when you see the documentary, it's a very specific story to a very specific group of individuals, but I think the behaviors that Larry exhibits are not unlike a lot of other toxic, masculine personalities that have captured the spirits of a lot of people," he says, "and I think something very appealing about this kind of very self-assured, directive, wisdom-giving, you know, kind if omniscient leader type, and I think that attraction is more widespread than we'd like to think."

As shown in Stolen Youth, the former students who participated in the documentary are all in some form of recovery and away from their abuser.

One of them, Isabella Pollok, who worked as Ray's top lieutenant, pleaded guilty in September of having conspired to launder money in his schemes. She's scheduled to be sentenced Feb. 22, though she's already told the court that she was one of Ray's victims, too.

As for his daughter, Talia, no charges have been brought against her.

In another interview, Heinzerling explained that she had declined to participate in his series.

"It's not really much more to that right now," he told Variety. "I imagine she's probably going through a lot. I can't speak for her, but I [can] imagine having Larry as your father presents its own challenges. I hope that she has support through all this as well."

Stolen Youth: Inside the Cult at Sarah Lawrence is available now on Hulu.