John Safran is a writer and filmmaker, who thrusts himself into the centre of true stories that tackle faith, race, extremism and love. John rushes to the messiest parts of the story, the intersections that everyone avoids and the people that no one wants to talk to – he is fascinated by people on the fringe and how they found themselves there.

His latest book, Squat, was released in 2024 and finds John in pursuit of Kanye to find out more about his beef with the Jews, but when he hits LA he decides to lay low in Kanye’s abandoned mansion writing the book and getting closer to the illusive Ye.

His debut book Murder in Mississippi (Penguin Random House, 2013) found him ‘befriending’ the Black killer of a white supremacist, whom John had by chance met eleven months before his murder while filming Race Relations. It won the Ned Kelly Award for Best True Crime.

His follow-up book Depends What You Mean By Extremist (Penguin Random House, 2017) pre-empted the ‘reboot’ of the far-right, with John hanging with then-unknown local extremists and a local ISIS supporter who, while the book was being written, tried to flee overseas to fight for the terrorist group and was subsequently imprisoned.

Before he was an author John was a filmmaker immersing himself in the divine and the profane, through shows like John Safran vs God, Race Relations, Race Around The World and Music Jamboree, including:

• Being covered in chicken’s blood by witch doctors in Mozambique in an effort to remove a curse placed on the Australian soccer team.
• Trying to join the Ku Klux Klan, arguing to the Orange County Grand Dragon, that even though he’s Jewish, his skin is whiter than Hitler’s.
• Nailed to a crucifix in the Philippines, along with local Catholics, in an annual Easter ceremony.
• Visiting voodoo priests in the Ivory Coast to place a curse on his ex-girlfriend.
• Drinking peyote in an Arizona desert, under the guidance of local indigenous people, hoping and failing to have mystical visions.
• Trying and failing (whipped actually) to be inducted in a Buddhist temple in Japan.
• Going back to his orthodox Jewish school to dance Footloose in protest for them never having a school dance with its sister school.
• Convincing an imam in the UK to place a fatwa on an Australian talk show host for bumping his as a guest on his talk show.
• Spending three days being exorcised by an American evangelical Christian, who believed all sorts of devils had entered him through all the religious rituals he’d taken part in.
• Making a Golem to protect a falafel shop.

John is currently working on a new documentary series for Australian television and is about to commence a speaking tour talking about Squat.