Elizabeth Holmes, the convicted Theranos founder, contacted A24 about a documentary project one month before she began serving her eleven-year fraud sentence in 2023, according to a new film reviewed by TechCrunch. Holmes and her husband, hotel heir Billy Evans, proposed that the studio send a crew to record her final weeks of freedom as an attempt to clear her name publicly. The resulting project pairs Holmes with comedian Nathan Fielder, whose work often blurs the boundary between fact and fiction, and director Lance Oppenheim.
Fielder asks Holmes whether it is strange that he made a television show about a business scam while she got in trouble for one. Holmes replies that she never made that connection and considers the two situations different. The exchange reflects the film's central question: Holmes was convicted, but whether she genuinely believes her own claims of innocence remains unresolved. She tells Fielder that the world believes an untrue reality about her and that she committed no crime.
The film also documents Holmes's reaction to media coverage. After The New York Times published a profile of Holmes that drew criticism for letting her present herself as an innocent mother, Holmes and Evans were angry about the article. Holmes told the Times reporter she was not offended by Amanda Seyfried's portrayal of her in Hulu's miniseries The Dropout because the actress was playing a character Holmes created. She and Evans later said the quote was taken out of context and that Holmes actually said the character was one the actress created. Fielder repeatedly asked Evans for evidence of the misquote and never received it.
After Holmes entered prison, Fielder reviewed his footage and brought in Seyfried, who plays Holmes in The Dropout, to help him interpret Holmes's behavior. He shows Seyfried a clip in which Holmes tries to watch The Dropout with him and turns away in tears during a scene involving her ex-boyfriend and former Theranos partner Sunny Balwani, who is also imprisoned. Evans has also built an AI avatar of Holmes displayed on a large vertical screen that he brings to the dinner table with him and his children.
The documentary presents a series of overlapping personas. Seyfried works to understand Holmes's story, while Evans behaves in ways that may push viewers toward sympathy for Holmes. With Holmes in prison, Fielder is barred from bringing recording devices to visits, so he reconstructs their conversations from memory into a script that he and Seyfried practice reading aloud.
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