''WeCrashed'' is an American
drama
Drama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance: a play, opera, mime, ballet, etc., performed in a theatre, or on radio or television.Elam (1980, 98). Considered as a genre of poetry in general, the dramatic mode has been ...
streaming television
Streaming television is the digital distribution of television content, such as TV shows, as streaming media delivered over the Internet. Streaming television stands in contrast to dedicated terrestrial television delivered by over-the-air aer ...
miniseries that premiered on
Apple TV+
Apple TV is a digital media player and microconsole developed and marketed by Apple Inc. It is a small network appliance hardware that plays received media data such as video and audio to a television set or external display. Since its secon ...
on March 18, 2022. The series stars
Jared Leto
Jared Joseph Leto ( ; born December 26, 1971) is an American actor and musician. Known for his method acting in a variety of roles, he has received numerous accolades over a career spanning three decades, including an Academy Award and a Golde ...
and
Anne Hathaway
Anne Jacqueline Hathaway (born November 12, 1982) is an American actress. The recipient of List of awards and nominations received by Anne Hathaway, various accolades, including an Academy Award, a Golden Globe Award, and a Primetime Emmy Awar ...
as
Adam
Adam; el, Ἀδάμ, Adám; la, Adam is the name given in Genesis 1-5 to the first human. Beyond its use as the name of the first man, ''adam'' is also used in the Bible as a pronoun, individually as "a human" and in a collective sense as " ...
and
Rebekah Neumann
Rebekah Victoria Neumann (née Paltrow; born February 26, 1978) is an American businesswoman. Until September 22, 2019, she served as chief brand and impact officer at WeWork, a company founded by her husband, Adam Neumann, and oversaw its educat ...
, the real-life married couple at the heart of
WeWork
WeWork Inc. is a provider of coworking spaces, including physical and virtual shared spaces, headquartered in New York City. As of December 31, 2021, the company operated of space, including in the United States and Canada, in 756 locatio ...
, a coworking space company whose valuation reached $47 billion in 2019 before crashing as a result of financial revelations. The series is based on the podcast ''WeCrashed: The Rise and Fall of WeWork'' by
Wondery
Wondery is an American podcast network and publisher of numerous award-winning podcasts, including Dirty John, Dr. Death, and The Shrink Next Door. Wondery was founded in 2016 by entrepreneur and media executive Hernan Lopez. The company was lau ...
.
Cast and characters
Main
*
Jared Leto
Jared Joseph Leto ( ; born December 26, 1971) is an American actor and musician. Known for his method acting in a variety of roles, he has received numerous accolades over a career spanning three decades, including an Academy Award and a Golde ...
as
Adam Neumann
Adam Neumann ( he, אדם נוימן; born April 25, 1979) is an Israeli-American billionaire businessman and investor. In 2010, he co-founded WeWork with Miguel McKelvey, where he served as CEO from 2010 to 2019. In 2019, he co-founded a family ...
, co-founder of
WeWork
WeWork Inc. is a provider of coworking spaces, including physical and virtual shared spaces, headquartered in New York City. As of December 31, 2021, the company operated of space, including in the United States and Canada, in 756 locatio ...
*
Anne Hathaway
Anne Jacqueline Hathaway (born November 12, 1982) is an American actress. The recipient of List of awards and nominations received by Anne Hathaway, various accolades, including an Academy Award, a Golden Globe Award, and a Primetime Emmy Awar ...
as
Rebekah Neumann
Rebekah Victoria Neumann (née Paltrow; born February 26, 1978) is an American businesswoman. Until September 22, 2019, she served as chief brand and impact officer at WeWork, a company founded by her husband, Adam Neumann, and oversaw its educat ...
, Adam's wife
Recurring
* Kyle Marvin as
Miguel McKelvey
Miguel McKelvey (born 1974) is an American businessman, and the co-founder and former chief culture officer of WeWork.
Early life
McKelvey grew up in a "five-mother collective" in Eugene, Oregon. His family started and ran a weekly newspaper call ...
, co-founder of WeWork
*
Kelly AuCoin
Kelly AuCoin (born February 14, 1967) is an American actor who has appeared in film, television, and theater. He is best known as "Dollar" Bill Stern on '' Billions'' (Showtime), and Pastor Tim on ''The Americans'' ( FX). He has had recurring rol ...
as
Scott Galloway
Scott Robert Galloway (born 25 April 1995) is an Australian professional football (soccer) player who plays as a fullback for Melbourne City in the A-League.
Born in Perth, Galloway played youth football for the Australian Institute of Spor ...
*
Steven Boyer as Matthew
*
Cricket Brown
''The Unholy'' is a 2021 American supernatural horror film written, produced, and directed by Evan Spiliotopoulos (in his List of directorial debuts, directorial debut), based on the 1983 novel ''Shrine (novel), Shrine'' by James Herbert. Prod ...
as Chloe Morgan
*
Andrew Burnap
Andrew Burnap (born March 5, 1991) is an American actor. He was born and raised in South Kingstown, Rhode Island, and graduated from the University of Rhode Island. He starred in the 2019 Broadway production of '' The Inheritance'', for which he w ...
as Phil
*
Anthony Edwards as Bruce Dunlevie
*
O. T. Fagbenle as Cameron Lautner
*
America Ferrera
America Georgina Ferrera (; born April 18, 1984) is an American actress. Born in Los Angeles to Honduran parents, Ferrera developed an interest in acting at a young age, performing in several stage productions at her school. She made her featur ...
as Elishia Kennedy
*
Asmeret Ghebremichael
Asmeret Ghebremichael is an American actress and singer, known for her work in ''Submissions Only'', ''Legally Blonde'', and '' The Book of Mormon''.
Early life and education
Ghebremichael grew up in Churchill, Pennsylvania, with her parents an ...
as Renee
*
Peter Jacobson
Peter Jacobson (born March 24, 1965) is an American actor. He is best known for his portrayal of Dr. Chris Taub on the Fox medical drama series ''House''. He also starred on the USA Network science fiction drama ''Colony'' as former Proxy Snyde ...
as Bob Paltrow
*
Kim Eui-sung
Kim Eui-sung (; born December 17, 1965) is a South Korean actor. He is known for his roles in films ''The Day a Pig Fell into the Well'' (1996), ''Office'' (2015), '' The Exclusive: Beat the Devil's Tattoo'' (2015) and ''Train to Busan'' (2016); ...
as
Masayoshi Son
Masayoshi Son ( ja, 孫 正義, translit=Son Masayoshi, ko, 손정의, translit=Son Jeong-ui) (born 11 August 1957) is a Korean-Japanese billionaire technology entrepreneur, investor, financier and philanthropist. A 3rd generation "Zainichi Kore ...
*
Campbell Scott
Campbell Scott (born July 19, 1961) is an American actor, producer and director. His roles include Steve Dunne in '' Singles'', Mark Usher in ''House of Cards'', Joseph Tobin in ''Damages'', and Richard Parker in ''The Amazing Spider-Man'' and ...
as
Jamie Dimon
James Dimon (; born March 13, 1956) is an American billionaire businessman and banker who has been the chairman and chief executive officer of JPMorgan Chase – the largest of the big four American banks – since 2005. Dimon was previously on ...
*
Theo Stockman
Theo Stockman (born December 27, 1984) is an American actor and singer, known for his roles in Broadway musicals such as ''Hair'', '' American Idiot'', and ''American Psycho'', numerous roles on television including '' Inside Amy Schumer'', ''High ...
as Jacob
Development
''WeCrashed: The Rise and Fall of WeWork'', a six-part
podcast
A podcast is a program made available in digital format for download over the Internet. For example, an episodic series of digital audio or video files that a user can download to a personal device to listen to at a time of their choosing ...
, is the basis for the series. ''WeCrashed: The Director’s Cut'' podcast is a remake of the podcast, with
David Brown by
Wondery
Wondery is an American podcast network and publisher of numerous award-winning podcasts, including Dirty John, Dr. Death, and The Shrink Next Door. Wondery was founded in 2016 by entrepreneur and media executive Hernan Lopez. The company was lau ...
.
Production
After
Lee Eisenberg
Lee Eisenberg (born April 5, 1977) is an American film and television writer and producer. He usually works with Gene Stupnitsky, with whom he founded Quantity Entertainment.
Life and career
Eisenberg was born in Needham, Massachusetts. His fath ...
signed a multi-year overall deal with
Apple
An apple is an edible fruit produced by an apple tree (''Malus domestica''). Apple fruit tree, trees are agriculture, cultivated worldwide and are the most widely grown species in the genus ''Malus''. The tree originated in Central Asia, wh ...
, it was reported that a drama series based on the story of WeWork was in development in February 2020. It was announced in December 2020 that
Apple TV+
Apple TV is a digital media player and microconsole developed and marketed by Apple Inc. It is a small network appliance hardware that plays received media data such as video and audio to a television set or external display. Since its secon ...
had put the series into development, with
Jared Leto
Jared Joseph Leto ( ; born December 26, 1971) is an American actor and musician. Known for his method acting in a variety of roles, he has received numerous accolades over a career spanning three decades, including an Academy Award and a Golde ...
in negotiations to star.
Damien Chazelle
Damien Sayre Chazelle (; born January 19, 1985) is an American film director, screenwriter and producer. He is known for his films ''Whiplash'' (2014), ''La La Land'' (2016), and '' First Man'' (2018).
For ''Whiplash'', he was nominated for the ...
was initially supposed to direct and produce, but was sidetracked by his film
''Babylon'' and dropped out. He was replaced by
John Requa
John Requa (born January 1, 1967) is an American screenwriter (with Glenn Ficarra) of ''Cats & Dogs'', ''Bad Santa'' and the 2005 remake ''Bad News Bears''.
The DVD commentary for ''Bad News Bears'' revealed that Requa was to have had a bit role ...
and
Glenn Ficarra
Glenn Ficarra (born May 27, 1969) is an American filmmaker and actor. He frequently collaborated with John Requa.
Life and career
Ficarra met John Requa at Pratt Institute, where both were studying film. After college they went to work in anima ...
.
Lee Eisenberg
Lee Eisenberg (born April 5, 1977) is an American film and television writer and producer. He usually works with Gene Stupnitsky, with whom he founded Quantity Entertainment.
Life and career
Eisenberg was born in Needham, Massachusetts. His fath ...
and
Drew Crevello
Drew Crevello is a writer and former film studio executive known for his work with Fox and Warner Bros. studios.
As a vice president of film production at Fox, Crevello developed films such as ''Deadpool'' and '' X-Men: First Class''.
In 2019, ...
were set to create and write the series. The series was given an eight-episode series order the next month, with Leto confirmed to star alongside
Anne Hathaway
Anne Jacqueline Hathaway (born November 12, 1982) is an American actress. The recipient of List of awards and nominations received by Anne Hathaway, various accolades, including an Academy Award, a Golden Globe Award, and a Primetime Emmy Awar ...
; both will serve as executive producers. In April 2021, Kyle Marvin was cast in a lead role, portraying
Miguel McKelvey
Miguel McKelvey (born 1974) is an American businessman, and the co-founder and former chief culture officer of WeWork.
Early life
McKelvey grew up in a "five-mother collective" in Eugene, Oregon. His family started and ran a weekly newspaper call ...
, another co-founder of WeWork. In July 2021,
America Ferrera
America Georgina Ferrera (; born April 18, 1984) is an American actress. Born in Los Angeles to Honduran parents, Ferrera developed an interest in acting at a young age, performing in several stage productions at her school. She made her featur ...
was added to the cast. In August 2021,
O. T. Fagbenle was added to the cast in recurring capacity. In December 2021,
Theo Stockman
Theo Stockman (born December 27, 1984) is an American actor and singer, known for his roles in Broadway musicals such as ''Hair'', '' American Idiot'', and ''American Psycho'', numerous roles on television including '' Inside Amy Schumer'', ''High ...
was added to the cast in recurring role, with
Anthony Edwards noted as being cast in February 2022.
Filming
In May 2021, Hathaway was spotted filming for the series in
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
.
Episodes
Release
A portion of the series previewed at
South by Southwest
South by Southwest, abbreviated as SXSW and colloquially referred to as South By, is an annual conglomeration of parallel film, interactive media, and music festivals and Convention (meeting), conferences organized jointly that take place in m ...
on March 12, 2022.
The series premiered on Apple TV+ on March 18, 2022.
Reception
On
review aggregator
A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...
website
Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...
, the series holds a 70% approval rating based on 20 critic reviews, with an average rating of 6.8/10. The website's critics consensus reads, "The pacing can be frustrating, but ''WeCrashed'' still works thanks to its compelling central relationship and
Anne Hathaway
Anne Jacqueline Hathaway (born November 12, 1982) is an American actress. The recipient of List of awards and nominations received by Anne Hathaway, various accolades, including an Academy Award, a Golden Globe Award, and a Primetime Emmy Awar ...
's knockout performance." On
Metacritic
Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...
, the series has a score of 64 out of 100, based on 10 critic reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews".
Naomi Fry in ''
The New Yorker
''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...
'' called the show "genuinely funny", but complained that the business scenes, which become more frequent toward the end of the show, lack dramatic stakes. She did praise Leto's performance, saying "I don’t think I've ever seen a better impression of an Israeli's accent and mannerisms done by a non-Israeli". A number of reviewers criticized the series for not exploring the deeper issues raised by the WeWork story, such as "how thin the line in
Silicon Valley
Silicon Valley is a region in Northern California that serves as a global center for high technology and innovation. Located in the southern part of the San Francisco Bay Area, it corresponds roughly to the geographical areas San Mateo County ...
can be between visionary and fraudster", or how Neumann's success came in part because he managed "to tap into a specifically millennial sense of longing for meaning and community".
Historical accuracy
''WeCrashed'' contains a mix of real and fictional characters and events, although the fictional elements tend to have a basis in reality. For example, the character Elishia Kennedy is fictional but largely based on
SoulCycle
SoulCycle is a fitness company owned by Equinox Group which offers indoor cycling and spinning workout classes. It was founded in 2006, and has operations in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom. In early 2020, before the COVID-19 p ...
co-founder
Julie Rice
Julie Rice in an entrepreneur, investor and co-founder of SoulCycle, a New York City-based fitness company that offers indoor cycling (also known as " spinning") workout classes.
Personal life
Rice studied English and theater at Binghamton Uni ...
.
The episode "Summer Camp" involves Rebekah Neumann making an onstage comment at a 2014 "Summer Camp" event that antagonizes many of the female employees, leading to a session in which they vent their frustrations at her. In reality, she did make the comment, but at a 2018 Summer Camp, and there was no corresponding discussion session afterwards, although many of the sentiments expressed had been stated publicly or privately by female employees at various times.
''
Bloomberg News
Bloomberg News (originally Bloomberg Business News) is an international news agency headquartered in New York City and a division of Bloomberg L.P. Content produced by Bloomberg News is disseminated through Bloomberg Terminals, Bloomberg Televi ...
'' reporter Ellen Huet felt the show was inaccurate in portraying WeWork co-founder Miguel McKelvey as "a clueless punchline", when in reality "many former employees saw him as a key architect of the company culture".
Further reading
*
*
Further viewing
* ''
WeWork: Or the Making and Breaking of a $47 Billion Unicorn''
References
External links
*
{{Apple TV+
2020s American workplace drama television series
2020s American drama television miniseries
2022 American television series debuts
2022 American television series endings
Apple TV+ original programming
Television shows based on podcasts
WeWork
English-language television shows