WeCrashed is an American biographical comedy-drama television miniseries created by Drew Crevello and Lee Eisenberg that premiered on Apple TV+ on March 18, 2022. Based on the podcast WeCrashed: The Rise and Fall of WeWork by Wondery, it stars Jared Leto and Anne Hathaway as Adam Neumann and Rebekah Neumann, the married couple at the heart of WeWork, a coworking space company which claimed a valuation of $47 billion (in an internally produced prospectus) in 2019, before crashing as a result of financial revelations.
Cast and characters
Main
Recurring
Development
WeCrashed: The Rise and Fall of WeWork, a six-part
podcast, is the basis for the series.
[ RSS] WeCrashed: The Director’s Cut podcast is a remake of the podcast, with David Brown by
Wondery.
Production
After
Lee Eisenberg signed a multi-year overall deal with Apple, 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+ had put the series into development, with
Jared Leto in negotiations to star.
Damien Chazelle was initially supposed to direct and produce, but was sidetracked by his film
Babylon and dropped out.
He was replaced by
John Requa and
Glenn Ficarra.
Lee Eisenberg and
Drew Crevello 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; both will serve as executive producers.
In April 2021,
Kyle Marvin was cast in a lead role, portraying
Miguel McKelvey, another co-founder of WeWork.
In July 2021,
America Ferrera was added to the cast.
In August 2021, O. T. Fagbenle was added to the cast in recurring capacity.
In December 2021,
Theo Stockman was added to the cast in recurring role,
with Anthony Edwards noted as being cast in February 2022.
Episodes
Release
A portion of the series previewed at South by Southwest on March 12, 2022.
The series premiered on Apple TV+ on March 18, 2022.
Reception
On review aggregator website
Rotten Tomatoes, the series holds a 65% approval rating based on 48 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's knockout performance."
On
Metacritic, the series has a score of 65 out of 100, based on 21 critic reviews, indicating "generally favorable" reviews.
Naomi Fry in The New Yorker 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, and I say this as an Israeli."
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 co-founder
Julie Rice.
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 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
See also
External links
