For over 30 years Stéphane Bourgoin was known in France as the leading authority on serial killers. During his tenure he interviewed 77 murderers, including Charles Manson. He trained at the FBI’s headquarters in Quantico, Virginia and wrote over 40 best-selling books about various violent deaths. He was a regular on French television shows and true crime documentaries. Bourgoin’s fascination with homicide was personal. His wife was murdered in 1976.

But in reality, Bourgoin was lying about practically everything. While he wasn’t a serial killer, Bourgoin was a serial liar. He never really spoke to Charles Manson and he didn’t interview more than 70 serial killers; more like 30. He also never trained with the FBI and his wife, Eileen, wasn’t murdered. She didn’t even exist. Eileen, it turns out, was Susan Bickrest, a woman Bourgoin had met before she was murdered in 1975 by a serial killer.

In National Geographic’s “ Killer Lies: Chasing a True Crime Con Man ” director Ben Selkow explores Bourgoin’s web of deception and how he managed to get away with it.

The three-part series is based on Lauren Collins’s 2022 New Yorker article “The Unraveling of an Expert on Serial Killers.” In addition to Bourgoin, the series chronicles the group of online investigators (the 4th Eye) responsible for Bourgoin’s downfall while also examining the explosive growth of the lucrative true crime industry. Featuring forensically reexamined archival footage and interviews with Collins, members of the 4th Eye and Bourgoin himself, the docuseries is an exploration of human nature and cultural psychology.

Variety spoke with Selkow about “Killer Lies: Chasing a True Crime Con Man,” which began airing Thursday on Nat Geo and streaming on Hulu on Friday.

Bourgoin said that he was attracted to serial killers due to his wife’s murder, but since that was all made up, what was it that drew him to homicide cases?

Selkow: It’s hard to say, but my armchair psychology take is that he grew up in an established, rigid, higher-class France post-World War II with parents who were intimately involved in the war in various capacities and who had enormous amounts of trauma of their own. Bourgoin was left to raise himself, and I think he found solace in the cinema and his imagination. Then he eventually gained attention for his books and that gave him some kind of self-worth as an expert in that space.

Bourgoin lied about interviewing Manson and having the remains of serial killer Gerard John Schaefer Jr. stashed away in his home. He got away with his lies for close to 40 years. Why did it take internet sleuths to figure out that he was lying? Where was the French media?

It’s a strange case where he built his own reputation without any challenge and never faced criticism. I've been told that when a crime happens, they bring in Stéphane to satisfy the public's morbid curiosity. Nobody questioned him because he had been on other shows and written numerous books, so he must be an expert, right? So, it's a failure in that sense, but I wouldn't solely blame the French media. I'd say it's a common problem. You see this type of thing happening in the United States too.

Did it take a lot of convincing to get Bourgoin to participate in this series?

My producer and I talked to him for 90 minutes, and he came around pretty quickly. I think it shows his desire for attention. It was also his attempt to set the record straight in the public eye, but having an American documentary crew at his house also served another purpose. So, we were very careful not to give a platform to someone who had told so many lies.

Was it a difficult interview, since Bourgoin is a pathological liar?

I knew how to challenge him or push him when he made a claim that I found dubious. Someone on the team would say, “Stéphane, I’ve heard that and I have evidence to the contrary. You are going to have to back that up with something else.” So we did not let him speak without scrutiny. But it was challenging because you know you are being manipulated. We make the point in the series that every time he interviewed a serial killer, he was being schooled in manipulation.

If you were to classify this docuseries, would you say it’s a true crime doc, a con doc, a sleuthing doc? Or is it all three?

It’s all three of those things and it has a cultural critique within it. It certainly plays with all the tropes of traditional true crime, that’s who this show is for, but it’s a con and a scam (doc) that, like in “Don’t F**k with Cats,” elevates the sleuths as heroes. Also, Bourgoin’s rise parallels this modern rise of true crime and crime fiction that began with the 1991 release of “Silence of the Lambs.” That was followed by different periods of growth in the genre. Bourgoin’s own fame and celebrity are riding along those waves as well, so, we had this super unique opportunity to chart the modern true crime movement.