Nathan Fielder turns Holmes’s PR into the story
Oct 20, 2026Tuesday, October 20, 2026Summary from 4 contributing podcasts.
- Nathan Fielder’s film puts Elizabeth Holmes’s pre-prison image-making under an intimate, deliberately awkward lens.
- Critics disagree over whether the cameras reveal a person or give her another stage.
The three-hour documentary about Elizabeth Holmes is less a courtroom replay than a contest over who gets to shape her story. Fielder and co-director Lance Oppenheim filmed Holmes at home with her partner, Billy Evans, and their children in the weeks before she began her prison sentence for defrauding Theranos investors.
Evans told David Friedberg on All-In that the couple wanted viewers to see Holmes’s private life beyond familiar caricatures. He acknowledged the risk: the trailer, he said, could reinforce the negative image they hoped to complicate. Holmes, meanwhile, still insists she never lied.
That claim meets a sharp rebuttal from investigative reporter John Carreyrou on Hard Fork. He called Holmes’s denial and her suggestion that others pushed her into public view brazenly false, pointing to her earlier efforts to court the press. Caitlin Roper, a former Wired editor, said Holmes’s shift from dark founder outfits to relaxed beachwear also looked like careful image-making.
The Daily’s Alyssa Wilkinson and Jason Zinneman see Fielder’s filmmaking as part of the argument. They say his long pauses, repeated questions and focus on ordinary domestic moments press Holmes to explain herself; visible artifice and awkwardness also remind viewers that documentaries shape what they show. The result, in their reading, isn’t a clean verdict on Holmes but a tense encounter between two people managing how they appear.
The argument reaches beyond one founder. On Hard Fork, Aaron Griffith said Silicon Valley investors treated Holmes as an exception even as founders commonly exaggerate to win support and buy time. Roper pointed to Elon Musk’s promises that had not materialized on schedule, arguing that the line between accepted hype and fraud can be difficult to locate. The film’s discomfort comes partly from asking viewers to look at both Holmes’s choices and the culture that rewarded the performance, until it didn’t.
Source Intelligence
- Deep dive into what was said in the episodes
Anthropic Gives Away 5% of Its Shares, Clone’s Muscle Robot, ElevenLabs Steals Podcaster's Voice • Oct 20
- Jason called Nathan Fielder’s Theranos documentary the greatest documentary he had seen, praising its layered treatment of Elizabeth Holmes, her husband Billy Evans, Silicon Valley’s fake-it-till-you-make-it culture, and responsibility for fraud. Holmes had been convicted and was filmed 30 days before incarceration; Jason said the film runs three hours.
Also discussed on this episode: (14)
Agents (1)
- Jason and Lon Harris said Plaud records meetings on a phone or pin and turns audio into formats such as meeting notes, lesson plans, and interview Q&A. Jason said the show now uses Plaud to produce more comprehensive show notes than its former three-hour manual process.
Startups (4)
- Anthropic proposed putting 5% of its stock into a fund for public-benefit projects, subject to shareholder approval; its board could add 2% for each 50% increase in company value above an undisclosed baseline. Jason argued direct share distributions would give ordinary Americans a stake in AI’s gains, while Lon Harris questioned letting Anthropic leaders decide how the fund is spent.
- Jason said founders seeking a premium domain should use a broker to conceal their identity and avoid bidding against their own public valuation. He cited GoDaddy’s $99.99 broker service and estimated clone.com could cost hundreds of thousands to millions; the hosts also joked that domain ownership disputes after an owner’s death could inspire a romantic comedy.
- The hosts promoted startup services including Northwest Registered Agent’s free identity tools, Vanta’s compliance software, Rippling AI’s cross-system business dashboards, and GoDaddy’s domain and security services. Vanta said it serves more than 16,000 companies; the sponsors offered a 10% Plaud discount and $1,000 off Vanta.
- Jason and Lon Harris said their Substack publishes tactical startup advice and uses Claude to develop infographic concepts, which Jason argued would be too slow and costly to produce with a human illustrator for every post. The team is hiring business writers across experience levels and plans to compare advice from people with opposing views.
Society (2)
- Jason argued that giving children company shares could build financial literacy and make people more supportive of AI by sharing its upside. He cited Michael and Susan Dell’s contribution to the Invest America effort, praised the Trump administration’s role, and urged the Trump family to donate half its net-worth increase during the term.
- In a brief Texas firearms discussion, Lon Harris cited bus ads warning people not to leave loaded guns in cars because thieves can steal them. Jason supported carrying a gun, saying the world was chaotic, while Lon said he was not armed.
Robotics (4)
- Clone Robotics CEO Rad Krishnan said the company uses hydraulic artificial muscles instead of the electric motors and tendon-pulley systems common in humanoid robots. Pressurized fluid contracts a rubber tube inside a braided sleeve, producing linear motion; Krishnan said this approach could cost a fraction of motor-actuated designs while preserving human-sized strength and movement.
- Krishnan said he began pursuing androids as a lifelong goal, built a one-megawatt plasma thruster at 13, and met his Polish co-founder on Facebook in 2020. He moved to Poland in 2021 to start Clone Robotics, after deciding that hydraulic muscle technology and newer deep-learning methods made the project viable.
- Krishnan said Clone plans to deploy human-level torsos in enterprise settings before complete androids, with assembly-line and manufacturing work as early uses. He expects complete home robots in two to three years, described 2027 as a possible first deployment year, and cited $25,000 as a potential affordable price while also envisioning luxury models.
- Krishnan said Clone is betting that open models and human-generated data will supply much of the robot’s intelligence, while the company focuses first on proprietary hardware. He expects models to turn over quickly and plans to adapt open-weight checkpoints with robot data, simulation, motion capture, and reinforcement learning.
Models (2)
- Odyssey showed a simulated fruit-fly brain flying through worlds generated by its Odyssey 3 model, prompting discussion of whether a sufficiently realistic simulation could be indistinguishable from reality to its inhabitants. The hosts connected the demo to simulation theory and games such as Grand Theft Auto and Free Guy.
- Jason said ElevenLabs’ Archer voice was based on podcaster Chris Williamson’s distinctive accent, despite ElevenLabs saying a different voice actor supplied it. The company removed Archer without admitting wrongdoing; Jason argued the resemblance could confuse listeners and urged ElevenLabs to compensate Williamson or license his voice.
Safety (1)
- Jason called the chance of losing control of AI minuscule, estimating it at one in a billion, and argued that software would remain controllable. Lon Harris said the show should hear multiple sides, while Jason replied that AI-safety advocates already receive extensive media coverage; the hosts also debated religion and the ethics of creating simulated minds.
Elizabeth Holmes and Nathan Fielder Keep Us Guessing • Oct 18
- The three-hour documentary You Can See Everything, co-directed by Nathan Fielder and Lance Oppenheim, generated massive cultural hype before release. Alyssa Wilkinson and Jason Zinneman argue the film successfully redefines non-fiction cinema through its intimate access to Elizabeth Holmes.
- Elizabeth Holmes built Theranos into a $10 billion company before investigative reporter John Carreyrou exposed its technology as fraudulent. In 2022, a federal court sentenced Holmes to 11 years in prison for defrauding investors.
- Elizabeth Holmes invited Nathan Fielder into her home after watching a Nathan For You episode about a gas station offering $1.75 per gallon fuel. Fielder forced customers to hike a mountain to claim a $13 rebate, using deception to forge genuine emotional connections.
- Jason Zinneman argues that Elizabeth Holmes strategically uses her children and partner Billy Evans as emotional armor during filming. Fielder counters her attempt to humanize her public image by subjecting her to persistent, uncomfortable questioning.
- Alyssa Wilkinson connects Nathan Fielder's personal documentary style to Ross McElwee's 40-year-old film Sherman's March, which abandoned its historical subject to focus on director self-analysis. Fielder expands on McElwee's approach by reflecting real-world subjects back through his own personal anxieties.
- Jason Zinneman compares Nathan Fielder's documentary strategy to illusionists Penn and Teller exposing their own tricks to audiences. By showing viewers the precise machinery of cinematic manipulation, Fielder earns back authenticity from a naturally skeptical public.
Also discussed on this episode: (2)
Comedy (2)
- Nathan Fielder developed his distinct editing style and interest in reality television while producing segments for Canadian Idol and writing for comedy shows. He later translated those reality television mechanics into his 2013 series Nathan For You.
- In his 2022 series The Rehearsal, Nathan Fielder constructed full-scale architectural replicas to allow participants to practice stressful social encounters. Jason Zinneman argues that Fielder uses these extreme contrivances to directly confront the ethics and potential cruelty of his own work.
Hard Fork
Casey Newton
Why No One Can Look Away From Elizabeth Holmes • Oct 16
- Nathan Fielder and Lance Oppenheim’s documentary You Can See Everything follows Elizabeth Holmes, partner Billy Evans, and their children at home shortly before Holmes began her prison sentence.
- Caitlin Roper interviewed Holmes for Wired in 2013 and found no way to verify Theranos’s science: she could not inspect the lab or speak with its lead scientists. Roper’s own test results closely matched a conventional panel, but she later questioned where and how the sample was tested.
- John Carreyrou grew suspicious after reading Ken Auletta’s New Yorker profile, which described bold blood-testing claims without peer-reviewed studies and noted Theranos’s secrecy. A pathologist’s skepticism strengthened Carreyrou’s doubts, and Holmes repeatedly declined his requests for an interview.
- Aaron Griffith covered Holmes’s trial in San Jose and recalled reporters socializing with her family. Billy Evans’s father introduced himself to journalists as a criminal-justice observer, then appeared with the family when Holmes arrived at trial.
- Carreyrou describes Holmes as charming when she wants to be, but also feisty, combative, ruthless, and dishonest. He says the documentary mostly shows her pleasant side, with brief flashes of resistance when Fielder presses her about responsibility.
- Roper and Griffith see Holmes’s founder persona as shaped partly by Silicon Valley’s appetite for charismatic leaders and the tech press’s search for prominent women. Roper viewed Holmes’s dark outfits and controlled presentation as a way to project authority in male-dominated investor rooms.
- The documentary’s intimate scenes do not settle whether Holmes believes her own story. Carreyrou calls her claims that she never lied and was pushed into the spotlight brazenly false; Roper says Holmes’s blame-shifting avoids responsibility even as the film invites sympathy for her separation from her children.
- Carreyrou argues Holmes’s story remains compelling because it combines the psychology of deceit with potential risks to patients. Roper adds that women who deceive attract a different kind of public condemnation than men, while Griffith says Holmes’s own choices keep her in the news.
- Carreyrou sees a repeating pattern in Holmes’s relationships with Sunny Balwani and Billy Evans: romantic partners also became business partners, and he describes both men as harmful influences. Roper points to Holmes’s grand, performative language about love; Griffith says the affection between Holmes and Evans still appears genuine.
- Griffith argues Holmes followed Silicon Valley’s “fake it till you make it” playbook until exaggeration became deception and fraud. He and Roper say the boundary can be difficult to identify, and Roper notes that observers could question why Holmes went to prison while Elon Musk did not.
- Carreyrou mocks the idea of Theranos 2.0 by pointing out that Holmes’s original account already presented the technology as fully functional. He questions why the company would need another prototype or lasers if the first version worked as Holmes described.
Also discussed on this episode: (5)
Big Tech (2)
- The FBI arrested OpenAI employee Abdul Rahman Al-Fazan over an alleged recording device hidden in an office. OpenAI said its models helped identify the device and the employee; Casey Newton noted that investigators had not yet explained what information the device was meant to capture.
- Apple’s Home View is an always-on home screen for messages, calendars, Siri, and household tasks. Casey Newton questioned whether families need another screen, while Aaron Griffith said household technology can help families manage complicated schedules and reduce mental load.
Startups (1)
- Character.AI filed for bankruptcy and plans to sell some assets to Disney after its founders and a portion of its staff joined Google through a talent deal. The company had roughly 12 million active users, faced lawsuits over chatbot-related harms, and cited computing and talent costs.
Agents (1)
- Casey Newton wants a simple way to consolidate school and camp messages rather than add another device or rely on an AI agent. Griffith noted that Anthropic advertised for an assistant to handle tasks such as scheduling, duties that AI agents are also meant to perform.
Health (1)
- A Palantir CTO claimed some AI researchers have taken up smoking to signal confidence that AI will soon cure cancer. Casey Newton and Aaron Griffith treated the rationale as a strikingly literal form of optimism about future medical breakthroughs.
Elizabeth Holmes' Husband Billy Evans: The Trial, Prison & Nathan Fielder's Documentary • Oct 15
- Billy Evans met Elizabeth Holmes at a San Francisco Fleet Week party on October 7, 2017, without initially recognizing her; they stayed friends for six months before dating, and Holmes was indicted three weeks into their relationship.
- Evans says Holmes followed the judge’s direction to litigate the case in court rather than the press, remaining silent through the appeals process, which ended last April. He calls that decision a major mistake because he believes her strongest asset was telling her story.
- Evans rejects portrayals of Holmes’s turtlenecks, deep voice, and fundraising as proof of manipulation, arguing that similar ambition in a male founder would be praised and that the framing of her appearance is sexist.
- Evans says Holmes believed in her innocence and was surprised by each escalation in the case; he describes her as deeply committed to her mission and says she spent extensive time reviewing records with lawyers before trial.
- Evans says Theranos ran 12.5 million patient tests over 18 months, while prosecutors presented four patient cases; Holmes was acquitted on patient-fraud counts but convicted of defrauding three investors and conspiracy.
- Evans argues that the patient cases did not establish fraud, noting that diagnostic tests vary in accuracy and that some tests can be considered good at 70% or 90% accuracy. He says Theranos’s Walgreens revenue shortfall followed Walgreens stopping a contract covering about 800 stores after press coverage.
- Holmes received a 135-month sentence and was ordered to pay $435 million in restitution, according to Evans. He says the loss calculation included 10 investors, including people he says were never proven to have been defrauded, and that a later guideline change reduced her sentence by one year.
- Evans says the First Step Act lets Holmes earn 16 days off her sentence for every 30 days of qualifying programming. He expects her to move to a halfway house in the second quarter of next year, though he describes the Bureau of Prisons calculation as complicated.
- Evans says Holmes has spent 1,205 days at Bryan Federal Prison Camp in College Station, Texas, where 800 women are held. He says 70% of money sent for her commissary is deducted toward restitution, making routine purchases difficult.
- Evans says Holmes’s imprisonment has left him raising their two children while building a business, and the children visit her on Saturdays. He says the family answers their questions truthfully, adjusting explanations to their ages.
- Evans says the documentary, made with Nathan Fielder and Lance, was intended to show Holmes’s personal life and let viewers form their own opinions, rather than revisit the case. He had not seen the finished film at the interview and worried its trailer could reinforce negative portrayals.
- Evans says Holmes’s parents raised her around public service, with family conversations focused on alleviating pain and suffering. He says that upbringing helps explain her commitment to making diagnostics cheaper and more accessible.
- Evans says the couple spent eight months traveling across the country in an off-road RV to escape constant attention in San Francisco. He describes strangers photographing them in restaurants and press coverage judging ordinary outings as evidence of Holmes’s character.
- Evans says 130 million Americans have a family member who will be incarcerated and that, at Holmes’s facility, roughly 30 of 800 women receive visitors on a typical weekend. He says seeing children say goodbye to incarcerated mothers gave him new respect for parents raising families alone.
Also discussed on this episode: (2)
Autonomous Vehicles (1)
- Evans says he worked at Luminar building lidar for autonomous vehicles before starting Hamanthus. The company uses Raman spectroscopy to read chemical structures in biological samples and aims to make the equipment cheaper and produce data for AI analysis.
Biology (1)
- Evans says Raman spectroscopy is already used in research labs, but current devices cost millions of dollars, can be many feet long, and are difficult to operate. Hamanthus aims to make smaller, cheaper sensors that collect biological data for machine learning.