Who Should Play Who in the Inevitable Biopic on the FTX Fraud?
Sam Bankman-Fried
The CEO and star of the show is the biggest role. Bankman-Fried was recently sentenced to 25 years for defrauding customers of $10 billion. It’s a substantial role with youth, glamour, excess, and darkness. Every fuzzy peached face in Hollywood will want it.
Timothee Chalamet should be the one to play the thirsty CEO who gets in way over his head. I know what you’re thinking: “Chalamet is a twee fancy-boy who weighs 80 pounds. No one will buy it.” Have you seen the pictures of him on the set of the new Bob Dylan biopic? He looks rough and scuzzy and really pulls off a tangled fro. He just needs to gain 50 lbs for the role and Helllooooo Oscar.
Caroline Ellison
The story’s love interest, business partner, and perhaps true mastermind and Judas, or maybe the one with a conscious when things spiraled.
The part has the potential to be the true heart and tension of the movie as the lovers achieve massive success and then decide to go bigger with crime, while their relationship falls apart.
This is perfect for Millie Bobby Brown to shed her child actor perception and tell the world she’s serious now, with a part that is full of stranger things as she tangles with the upside down right here in the real world.
Ryan Salame
This dude has the look of Rob Lowe who’s been sunburned 100 times too many. If the movie was being made in 1988 Lowe would have been the perfect choice to play FTX’s co-CEO who cut a deal for a lighter sentence.
Paul Mescal has been a new force in smaller acclaimed projects and has already racked up a long list of awards including an Oscar nomination in 2023. He could bring the right amount of star power and cool-serious-guy-actor cred to the project.
Gary Wang
Most of the players in this story look like they smell bad but not Wang. Instead of looking like a haggard dude who partied too hard the night before he looks showered, awake, and professional. Perhaps that’s why he is one of the few people in the inner circle who Ellison says actually knew about what was going on.
A comedic observer is often a necessary part of these movies. Someone who stands outside of the insanity of what’s happening and participates without the emotion of the other players. Bowen Yang could be the perfect partner who lacks scruples and can often solve a problem that seems like it will cause the entire house of cards to tumble. That is until it tumbles.
There are several other roles to fill out that can still bring the heat to the big-time FTX movie but the real question is, who will direct this fraud?
