What is it with Silicon Valley? Since The Social Network was premiered and redefined what a good biopic looks like, there have been a number of TV shows and movies about business sociopath entrepreneurs in the field of technologies. Numerous series such as “The Dropout”, “Inventing Anna”, “Super Pumped: The Battle for Uber”, “The Inventor: Out For Blood in Silicon Valley” were released just in the last ten years, some within this year only. Although the actual people involved can range from barely likable to absolutely detestable (like Inventing Anna), the narrative has remained relatively unchanged.
Almost every one of these shows or movies exemplify WeCrashed, AppleTV+’s new show which covers rise and fall of we work. A character’s triumphs are shown at first before he/she falls or reaches at least its lowest point. Then we go back to where all things started, following a protagonist who is more often than not an anti-hero obsessed with success.
Typically lasting around 10 years or even a decade, this character’s life and relationships are depicted (or relationships that he destroys) – remember Steve Wozniack in Jobs, Eduardo Savarin in The Social Network and whoever Anna Delvey ever knew if you had watched Inventing Anna too many times; any entrepreneur worth his salt would always have that ill-fated best friend.
So WeCrashed is no different. It features Kyle Marvey surprisingly warm and lovable playing Miguel McKelvey, Adam Neumann’s put-upon ‘friend’ and co-founder of WeWork. Neumann doesn’t exactly love his supposed best friend like many others portrayed here though Neumann doesn’t really care about him as much as those who really love do this thing; instead McKelvey represents merely an opportunity for him- everything must be seen through opportunities.
As usual, Leto plays Adam Neumann – all out. There is no compromising on any role for him, meaning he has acted Neumann completely here, and in the most realistic manner possible. But though Leto nailed it entirely, it still seems like a parody because of the fact that the actual Neumann was an eccentric guy who lived a life larger than his own. Perhaps this can be explained by the fact that Neumann himself is almost not human at all.
While McKelvey plays it straight, Neumann navigates risky moves which are occasionally successful only due to his unrestrained self-confidence (where ‘con’ is short form). The truth is that they don’t do this together – mainly McKelvey does all the heavy lifting early on while Neumann lies into business deals. In a funny montage, McKelvey builds a deck for their business model overnight while Neumann sleeps soundly beside him.
On the way, Neumann has an encounter with and falls in love with Rebekah Paltrow who is a rather strict assertive woman like Adam that has been living a lie about her true identity. Rebekah is portrayed by Anne Hathaway, a generally criticized actress who has been dazzling in movies such as Rachel Getting Married and Colossal but rarely gets credit for delivering a great Hathaway performance. She also goes all out with her part, changing her posture and general disposition in an atypical manner for an actor. Her voice deepens into something more velvety; her stride becomes straighter and cockier; she makes only very slight gestures.
Both Leto and Hathaway producing WeCrashed made absolute sense because there was just something juicy about these roles they had to bite into and they are just eating it up like it’s an all-you-can-eat buffet. At times this can be almost embarrassing in how joyfully committed they are to sometimes odd affectations or exaggerated personalities (as when Hathaway dons an intentionally bad Russian accent while Masha in Three Sisters). These people are so self-unaware that there is hardly any selves left in them.
That scene was far from being the only one sullied by awkward accents. Jared Leto faced serious criticism for his Italian accent on The House of Gucci as Roberto Bentivegna had not written it with him or even Italian accents in mind. People made fun of him sounding like Super Mario with such overdone Italian accent. He does that here as well– sporting a totally heavy Israeli accent (akin to Julia Garner’s bold bizarre one Inventing Anna); one might be tempted to say he is screaming ‘Look at me, I’m acting!’ through his performances here, much like he does elsewhere. Yet again comparing his mannerisms and tone to the actual Adam Neumann reveals that he might actually be morphing into the businessman himself. He is uncannily like him but (as with Hathaway) more Hollywood-handsome.
As WeWork slowly succeeded, they were a wonderful couple falling and recovering countless times. Both actors have great chemistry together and the characters form quite an unusual relationship that is rarely seen on screens in which their professional lives are mixed up with their personal ones no less than their personalities have done. Nonetheless, Leto and Hathaway were absolutely amazing-even too much so-and yet the show itself was just another formulaic derivative overall. However, not every news article or podcast needs to be turned into a movie or miniseries.
However, WeCrashed is visually impressive, as well as sounding it too. It has a glossiness to it with fast moving cameras in perfect light tones and everything is filmed beautifully even the ugliest things thanks to Xavier Grobet and Corey Walter who worked as cinematographers. Moreover, its music is great; the soundtrack cuts and especially Christopher Nicholas Bangs’ score. Yes, it sounds like a bouncier version of Atticus Ross and Trent Reznor’s Oscar-winning score for The Social Network (surprise), but it works entirely here. Digital ambiance plus synthy arpeggios make strong motifs while building suspense throughout.
Laid-back humor of The Office and Hello Ladies comes out in WeCrashed, a comedy not exactly. Pranksters aiming to deceive people with tricks are inherently funny. As an art form, Harry Frankfurt described it in his essay:
Adam Neumann was the best at false talk; he knew how to manipulate others and make them believe that his firm was worth $45 billion when its real value was around half a million dollars. His bullsh*t made him rich and also brought billions to WeWork. Despite its collapse and forcing him out as CEO in 2019, Neumann still has a net worth of $1.6 billion. According to Frankfurt, we live in an age where bullshit rules and the likes of Neumann from WeCrashed or Anna Delvey from Inventing Anna are its proponents.
“Ripped from the headlines” concept movies and shows like these have one major drawback; majority of people already know what happened in reality. So if people want more than just seeing actors reading news, they will have to do more interesting characterizations, writing or directing than we can see on this program. However, WeCrashed is quite good at telling a story previously popularised through news makers but by one podcast “WeCrashed: The Rise and Fall of WeWork,” Wondery.
However, this has been done well so many times already (and is being done). It’s a solid representation of capitalism’s sociopathy but can be mistaken for other series mentioned above easily enough. For some reason or another, filmmakers have become obsessed with this character—and given the success of Inventing Anna—audiences too may be feeling the same way about her as well? Are these frauds now idolized as American heroes? What does our cultural obsession with them mean? It’s almost like Patrick Bateman from American Psycho has become someone girls want to date — as if satire became embodied; his blood-letting also had balance, at least it was exciting and thought provoking.
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