Netflix and Hulu's feud over their dueling Fyre Fest documentaries is getting uglier
Aux Features NetflixHulu pulled a helluva power move yesterday by dropping its new documentary about 2017's ill-fated Fyre Festival mere days before Netflix was primed to release Fyre, its own deep dive into the event. This was more than just a marketing stunt, though—Hulu’s Fyre Fraud, it appears, sought to preempt the Netflix project because it directly calls Fyre out for counting social media agency Jerry Media among its producers. Jerry Media—run by Elliot Tebele (a.k.a. meme god FuckJerry)—also had a hand in staging another event: Fyre Festival. Weird, huh?
The team behind Netflix’ Fyre has bigger problems with Fyre Fraud, though. In an interview with The Ringer, Fyre director Chris Smith revealed that the team behind Hulu’s project paid $250,000 to Fyre Festival founder (and convicted con man) Billy McFarland for an interview. “We were aware of [the Hulu production] because we were supposed to film Billy McFarland for an interview,” he said. “He told us that they were offering $250,000 for an interview. He asked us if we would pay him $125,000. And after spending time with so many people who had such a negative impact on their lives from their experience on Fyre, it felt particularly wrong to us for him to be benefiting. It was a difficult decision but we had to walk away for that reason. So then he came back and asked if we would do it for $100,000 in cash. And we still said this wasn’t something that was going to work for us.”
Fyre Fraud co-director Jenner Furst disputed McFarland’s $250,000 price tag (“It was less than that,” he said), but maintained that Netflix’s partnership with Jerry Media puts their film in “a bigger ethically compromised position, and that’s going and partnering with folks who marketed the Fyre Festival and were well aware that this was not going to happen as planned.”
Furst added that his documentary includes “a whistle-blower from inside [Jerry Media] who says that he knew months before that this wasn’t going to be what it was sold as.” He continued, “It’s a little bit of a head-scratcher to say that we have an ethical quandary when it seems like people who got the rest of the world knee deep in shit are making large licensing fees and getting prestige when this thing comes out on Friday. To me, I think it’s a little bit of the pot calling the kettle black.”
While ethical questions plague both projects, they remain equally fascinating and unique looks at what’s undoubtedly the Woodstock ‘99 of this generation. Fyre Fraud, in particular, does an admirable job of using Fyre’s innate schadenfreude as a portal into larger, more pressing themes about social media’s role in the evolution of the grift.
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Fyre Fraud co-director Jenner Furst disputed McFarland’s $250,000 price tag (“It was less than that,” he said)So…$249,999.99?
And a hard-boiled egg.
Well, hold on just a second, now. Combined, that comes out to MORE than $250,000. The maths just don’t add up!
You don’t know what the egg was boiled in . . . .
Urine?
We don’t know what it was boiled in.We don’t know what it was boiled on.We don’t know where it was boiled when.I just want it gone.
Are you saying this McFarland guy may not be great with numbers?
[HONK]—two hard-boiled eggs.
Orange whip?
*honk honk*
probably less than $125, since that what he was begging Netflix for. I’d bet $100K and he just lied to the Netflix producers because that is exactly what he does.
300 plus gas money and a sandwich
Heck, you can interview me for $10,000.
I’m available for the cost of a decent lunch.
Trump will buy you 100 Big Macs.
I said a decent lunch, thank you very much.
But they’ll be cold too?
Well, when you’re ready, you can sashay off the cricket field and partake in some Spam sliders and Jolt Cola over by the dumpster.
I’ll have you know that sashaying is a critical skill for a good cricketer.
I don’t care what you learned at Eton.
How dare you besmirch the King’s school! Blackguard!
Them’s fighting words…if we were 18th-century dandies.
Yes, right. Of course. Neither of us are 18th century dandies. Exactly right, chum.
I require that the burgers be served nyotaimori style on a naked Donald Trump.
Why do you do this to me?
Well, that’s about 14 layers of gross. I don’t think I want to interview you.
You, sir, are disgusting.
You have weird eating habits.
Eww.
Hell, for 250k I’ll go commit some crimes right now and you can interview me from jail. I mean, obviously nothing that’ll get me life but I think I could take a little stint in the slammer if I knew there was a quarter-mil waiting on the outside.
I’ll talk for free!
Hell I’ll gife you my take for free “Rich White Millenials have way to much money and way to little sense.”
you can interview me for a single shoe
Shit, you could just tell me you enjoyed talking to me. I’m so very lonely.
Ugh, isn’t this why some states of Son of Sam laws? So you can’t profit from crimes you committed? Is fraud somehow exempt, or was it just in a state without them? Suuuuuuch bullshit
You might have to be convicted or jail for those.
They said he’s been convicted though so I guess not
But if it was before conviction? I really don’t know the intricacies of that all.
Frankly me neither, I was just parroting what the article said re: conviction
FYI, Billy was convicted and is serving a 6 year jail sentence.
Ugh, isn’t this why some states of Son of Sam laws? Sorry, I’m not a lawyer.
I’m just a caveman. Your world confuses and frightens me.
Me neither. Luckily, my dog passed the bar and he assures me that this whole thing is on the up and up.
Upvoted for Son of Sam reference
Depends on the state and the definition of “profiting.” In some states, the victims have to actually complain. If the money is being given directly to whatever fund is paying the victims, that would also make it okay. Because it was NY, it’s probably the former — they are a state where the victim has to be notified and complain.
The answer to your question is out there. Why do you expect others to do your research for you?
He was convicted of federal crimes, and I don’t think he is subject to the federal Son of Sam law, 18 USC §3681.
The Supreme Court smooshed the Son of Sam laws. Then some other stuff happened.
I would have paid more than 250k to watch Billy McFarland squirm. Haven’t seen the Netflix doc, but if the Fuck Jerry dudes are that heavily involved in it without taking accountability for their part in promoting this event, I’m team Hulu.
“I would have paid more than 250k to watch Billy McFarland squirm.”You assume he has any shame. Plus, when he gets out of jail in a few years, he’s now got 250k in pocket money.
I doubt it. He owes a lot of people money. If anything, Netflix should have paid him as a favor to all the people he ripped off.
This. Sure Billy we’ll pay you 250k. Would you like us to make that check out to “every Bahamian defrauded by Billy”?
at what’s undoubtedly the Woodstock ‘99 of this generation. Fyre FraudSpeaking as someone who survived Woodstock ‘99, I can do naught but laugh at this comparison. There are no tropical beaches in upstate New York.
Hey now, at least Woodstock 99 had, you know, actual bands playing.
This is a bummer, because I was more interested in the Netflix one just because I really like Chris Smith’s films.Who am I kidding? I was going to watch both of them. But now I feel like there’s going to be a third documentary that brings up this unexpected documentary feud’s part in the story.
I guess I’d feel some sort of moral quandary if I wasn’t already subscribed to both services. As it stands though, I’ll probably watch both anyway.
I actually don’t think paying a subject is as problematic as people are making it out to be. Errol Morris does it. Documentaries are in a weird spot that way, filmmakers aren’t bound to traditional journalistic rules, and if it’s a movie that’s going to play in theaters and make money then why not include a piece for the guy everyone is paying to see? The Jerry Media thing, where the people involved with the festival are actually making the movie, is far more egregious and problematic.
You would say that, John Hulu.
Yeah the Netflix doc sounds like a PR company trying to control a narrative where they were not st least partially to blame over this, when clearly they were
Sounds like? Well, maybe you should watch it BEFORE contributing your 2 cents.
Do you work for them or something? I will watch it when it comes out on Friday.
It happens in publishing all the time, criminals get paid to tell their story to a ghost writer.
Look, skip all the hoo-ha and he said, she said and get to showing me rich people suffering already.
why watch either when there’s that internet historian video
There’s also the matter of avoiding something like what happened with Errol Morris and Randall Adams.McFarland’s been paid, he can now fuck off.
I mean…are people that stupid?! YES
I can wait to see the three documentaries about all the drama about these two documentaries. I watched the Hulu one and I did laugh when the guy formerly from Jerry Media was like “Fuck those guys”. I’d like to have seen comments from the acts playing, especially Blink-182, why they waited till the last minute to say they were not coming when it sounds like it looked like a clusterfuck from day one. Billy Mcdouchebag is a terrible human being but their were a lot of terrible people around him profiting from this bullshit who should not be ignored.
He paid them to say they were coming. He never paid them to perform, bands have to pay bills too, and so many backed out before any news broke, sociopaths have to rob to make some cash and take no blame, and then distanced themselves from this event.
That may be the case but if Bands took money to say they were coming with no intention of coming then they could at least have informed their fans farther ahead then the day of. Seems sorta shitty to me.
If you watch the documentary (either one), it seems like none of the bands were paid before the festival.I’m sure Blink had every intention of playing. The way that the industry is set up, they probably didn’t realize how much of a clusterfuck it was until shortly before
I don’t know enough about the music industry but I would figure big name bands probably get paid a retainer ahead of time. Cancelling at the last minute just seems really shitty. Maybe it was a last minute, “Oh fuck, this is bad” but it seems like if they were being dicked around for months that could have let their fans know. Who knows.
At least from the band’s perspective, this probably just looked like another date on a calendar. On paper it made sense that there would be enough moneyed idiots to make a festival like this sell.
Two streaming services having some beef to see who can make the sociopath look worst. I have to say that I have seen the Hulu doc and I now want to see the Netflix version to see what they have to offer
Worse
Proposed name for movie about the conflict between these two movies: Fyre Fight
Would you say that Hulu fell down, down, down into The Ringer, Fyre for offering McFarland cash……………. Johnny Cash……….. for his interview.
No.
Nobody says that.
Maybe the plan all along was to stage a disastrous music festival and profit off the ensuing documentaries. 😀
He’s not profiting. That money is going indirectly to the people he defrauded.
K’ai get just ONE AV Club article that doesn’t use the phrase “schadenfreude?”
Even the documentaries about this festivals are a clusterfuck.
So the Hulu guys think a marketing agency should be held responsible for marketing something they were paid to market?