Take a Wild Ride With These 20 Scam Documentaries

Netflix's "Fyre: The Greatest Party That Never Happened" gives a behind-the-scenes look at the Fyre Festival, an event coordinated by rapper Ja Rule and Fyre Media founder Billy McFarland. While guests paid up to $12,000 per ticket, the event was a disorganized fiasco, far from the once-in-a-lifetime experience it was marketed to be. Ja Rule and McFarland faced lawsuits by investors and attendees, and McFarland is currently in prison for charges of wire fraud and falsifying investment documents. While the Fyre Festival is well in the past now, McFarland has continued to leave an imprint on pop culture today — he's even a character on Netflix's "Inventing Anna," which portrays him getting stiffed by Anna Delvey.

Hulu's "Fyre Fraud" takes on the same Fyre Festival scandal, all while branding itself as a true-crime comedy. This bewildering doc observes the infamous disaster through the lens of capitalism in the digital age as we hear from whistleblowers, victims, insiders, and even McFarland himself. Netflix's take focuses more on the festival's impact on local laborers in the Bahamas, whereas Hulu's is more about the so-called "experience economy" on Instagram. If you're looking for a comprehensive overview of everything that went down during the Fyre Festival scandal, this doc is definitely worth watching before or after the Netflix original.

Elizabeth Holmes, the subject of HBO's "The Inventor," might be one of the most dangerous scammers of our era. Leading the company Theranos, she branded herself as a dropout biotech genius and claimed that she had a machine that could run comprehensive tests on small amounts of blood. But as we know now, her machine didn't work, so Theranos ended up defrauding investors and giving patients inaccurate results. Of course, "The Inventor" is only one of the many projects focused on Holmes's scam. Those curious to dive more into the Theranos story might find it worth checking out John Carreyrou's "Bad Blood" and Hulu's "The Dropout."

In the mood for a bookish scam? JT LeRoy was the writer who never existed at all! The celebrated literary figure, known for being a recluse, was actually Savannah Knoop, a gender-nonconforming artist who put on a disguise to portray LeRoy, the pen name of their sister-in-law. Up until 2005, Knoop played the fictional persona in literary circles, impressing the likes of Winona Ryder and Debbie Harry. "Author: The JT Leroy Story" features Knoop and the real author, Laura Albert, who didn't want to write as herself. Curious about more JT LeRoy content? Kristen Stewart and Laura Dern joined forces in "JT Leroy," a 2018 biopic about Knoop's life.

Imagine the terrors of the true-crime genre but on a political and global scale. Consisting of two seasons, Netflix's "Dirty Money" follows high-profile corruption cases (think money laundering, toxic chemicals, and more) to highlight how corporate greed has impacted the world. The topics run the gamut from the HSBC drug cartel scandal, to shady deals involving former President Donald Trump (as well as his son-in-law Jared Kushner). Other than focusing on companies and individuals who swindle on a large scale, "Dirty Money" also features in-depth analysis from seasoned investigative journalists and testimonies by those who have suffered the dire consequences of systemic greed.

There's no shortage of food series, but "Sour Grapes" is definitely a delicious one-of-a-kind experience that blends the culinary and true-crime worlds. The scammer documentary follows how Indonesian wine savant and collector Rudy Kurniawan told people that he had exclusive aged wine, but he actually sold fake fancy wine for millions of dollars. Kurniawan was a master counterfeiter, finding his way into the wine auction market and forming connections with the wealthy elite (including Bill Koch). Running his schemes from the early 2000s until his capture in 2012, he essentially collected empty bottles, filled them with cheaper wine, and created fake labels.

Tania Head claimed to be a survivor of the 9/11 attacks, even becoming president of the World Trade Center Survivors' Network. Reporters from The New York Times figured out in 2007 that her story was entirely fabricated — in fact, she wasn't in New York City at the time of the attack, but rather in Barcelona. "The Woman Who Wasn't There" uses interviews with Head from before and after the reveal of her scam to paint a picture of her story. Besides her fake account of escaping the South Tower, Head's other false claims included being engaged to a 9/11 victim, working for Merrill Lynch, and degrees from Harvard and Stanford.

As a magician and escape artist, the late James Randi knew a thing or two about sleight of hand and deception. In "An Honest Liar," we see how he became devoted to exposing fraudulent faith healers, psychics, and other con artists. Randi notably introduced skepticism to tricks that fooled the media and the public. The documentary includes footage from fellow skeptics such as Penn & Teller, Bill Nye, and Adam Savage. In addition to showing the professional aspect of Randi's life, "An Honest Liar" also looks into Randi's long-term relationship with his partner, Deyvi Peña, an artist who himself had been caught living under a false identity.

The true story behind the documentary "The Imposter" almost sounds stranger than fiction. In 1997, French con man Frédéric Bourdin pretended to be Nicholas Barclay, a child who went missing four years earlier at age 13. Despite being much older than the missing boy and having darker features, Bourdin scammed the Barclay family into believing that he was their long-lost son who had escaped from a child-prostitution ring. After being imprisoned for passport fraud and perjury, he pretended to be lost children several more times.

While looking into illegal doping in sports, filmmaker and amateur cyclist Bryan Fogel got in touch with Grigory Rodchenkov, the director of Russia's national antidoping laboratory. Over the course of their correspondence, Fogel found out that Russia had a state-sponsored Olympic doping program. While he initially began the investigation on a small scale, Fogel witnessed this massive global sports conspiracy grow in size and eventually became a whistleblower for the entire scandal. Rodchenkov testified that his team switched out steroid-tainted urine samples for clean ones, then he went into witness protection. After reviewing evidence that Rodchenkov shared, the International Olympic Committee went on to ban Russia from the 2018 Winter Olympics.

Uh, yes, we'd like a Big Mac with a side of scam. For over a decade, Jerry Jacobson, aka Uncle Jerry, sold winning pieces for major prizes (think cars, vacations, and cash) in the McDonald's Monopoly game throughout the '90s. While he was entrusted with pieces for the grand prizes, he built a network of conspirators with family and friends to rake in millions for himself. When an anonymous tip reached the FBI in 2001, Jerry's schemes finally came to light. Two decades after the height of the scam, HBO explored the story of how he cheated the system for his personal gains.

Netflix's "The Puppet Master" unpacks the crimes of British con man Robert Hendy-Freegard, who lied about his identity to steal money from his unfortunate victims. Hendy-Freegard would form relationships with women, telling them that he worked for MI5. He had a pattern of isolating these women from their loved ones in order to take money from them and force them into poor living conditions. Some victims were even reluctant to work with the police because he told them that authorities were other MI5 agents or double agents. Although Hendy-Freegard was caught and convicted of kidnapping, theft, and deception, he was eventually released after an appeal.

Netflix's "Bad Vegan" centers on the bizarre case of Sarma Melngailis, a respected raw-vegan-restaurant owner whose con-man husband promised to immortalize her and her dog. Throughout his courtship with her, Anthony Strangis proceeded to drive Melngailis's restaurant, Pure Food and Wine, into the ground. According to Melngailis, Strangis encouraged her to steal $1 million from her business and forced her to send him money to prove her commitment to him. Because of this scheme, her staff members did not receive any payments before they inevitably lost their jobs. Like Bonnie and Clyde, the married pair fled from the authorities, only to be caught soon after.

Gerry Cotten, the CEO of the Canadian cryptocurrency exchange QuadrigaCX, unexpectedly died when cryptocurrency prices crashed in 2018. Without Cotten, there were no passwords to retrieve the bitcoins — this meant that $190 million of customers' holdings were more or less locked inside an online black hole. Soon, conspiracy theories of Cotten faking his death started floating around. While diving into Cotten's mysterious passing, Netflix's "Trust No One" considers some of these theories as it follows a group of crypto investors who suspect Cotten may have stolen from them. The documentary also looks into Cotten's history of shady past dealings and gambling to create a more complicated picture of the tech leader.

Not entirely convinced if the "WeCrashed" Apple TV+ miniseries is worth your time? Check out Hulu's WeWork documentary to get the short-and-sweet breakdown of WeWork founder Adam Neumann's rise and fall. Banking on his charisma, Neumann brought in billions of dollars in venture capital from investors to sell his concept of a revamped office-space experience. The idea of transforming real estate through tech was thought to be the next Silicon Valley unicorn. However, WeWork didn't have a solid business model and spent its money lavishly, which resulted in losing billions. The company's failed IPO in 2019 eventually forced Neumann to step down as CEO.

If you enjoyed Hulu's "Fyre Fraud," it might be worth looking into "LuLaRich," which comes from the very same creators. The Amazon docuseries follows the dubious business plan of the billion-dollar clothing company LuLaRoe, which is more or less synonymous with the stretchy, colorful clothing that it sells. The doc details the rise of this fashion empire, whose owners eventually became accused of using a pyramid scheme to con thousands of women into promoting its brand. Although those at the top of the company grew rich, many low-ranking representatives were overwrought by debt and poor-quality products. In fact, things got so dire that some women were allegedly encouraged to sell breast milk to foot startup costs.

It's no secret that the rich have unfair advantages, but the 2019 college admissions scandal was particularly engrossing as it implicated celebrities such as Felicity Huffman and Lori Loughlin. It was revealed that wealthy families secured spots for their children at elite universities through bribery. Netflix's "Operation Varsity Blues" focuses on Rick Singer's central role in operating the bribing schemes. Essentially, parents sent money to Singer's sham nonprofit organization, and Singer bribed test administrators and university coaches to vouch for unqualified students. In the 2021 documentary, Matthew Modine portrays Singer in dramatized reenactments.

"The Tinder Swindler" follows the bizarre true story of an Israeli man named Shimon Hayut, who posed as fictional diamond magnate Simon Leviev on Tinder. Hayut would take women on ritzy dates on private jets and give them lavish gifts to build relationships with them. Eventually, he'd tell them that he was being targeted by his enemies. Hayut would then get women to send him money by saying that his credit cards and bank accounts weren't working due to breaches in security. With this insidious dating scheme, Hayut allegedly gained $10 million in total. Talk about a bad date gone really wrong.

If fine-art scamming is just your speed, "Art and Craft" is for you. The PBS documentary follows the life of Mark Landis, an American painter who's best known for gifting famous works to American art museums for three decades. But here's the twist: Landis forged his donations. The documentary reveals Landis's remarkable knowledge of art history and abundance of technical skills, which undoubtedly helped him as he replicated the works of everyone from René Magritte to Charles M. Schulz. Ultimately, no feasible legal case could be made against Landis, who didn't reap any financial gains from his prolific forging. According to NPR, he would donate pieces to museums for free, even going as far as using aliases to approach curators.

Here's another fine-art scam that's much more high stakes than Mark Landis's mischievous tricks on museums. In Netflix's "Made You Look: A True Story About Fake Art," we get an insider look of the largest art-forgery scandal in the United States. New York City's prestigious Knoedler Gallery had sold around $80 million worth of fake art allegedly by Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko, and Robert Motherwell. The gallery's former director, Ann Freedman, had been convinced by a dealer named Glafira Rosales that she was getting authentic paintings. It turned out that the esteemed pieces were actually counterfeits manufactured by Rosales, her boyfriend, and Pei-Shen Qian, a 75-year-old artist and math teacher.