That furniture doesn't look very comfortable.
as long as there are folks who make this kind of crazy money, there will always be the sycophants who are willing to cater to them. nature is free. go take a walk in a park.
So distracting to watch BILLIONS and see the same necklaces on everyone. Why does the designer feel the need for two or more skinny chains around each throat? Surely these different women would have different style. Irritating.
2
Truly looks like a show Kardashian fans would love. Fans of fake people with more money than brain cells. Just what the world needs.
2
Dislike these shows. Same old propaganda that the elite, need our sympathy as they wreak havoc in their and other peoples lives.
Disgusting.
1
The shows are both ridiculous. Succession is at least well written lurid fun. Billions is just ludicrous.
Is that Paul Rudd in the picture "The Dynasty reboot..."?
Favorite wealth porn scene is Chuck selling his Churchill's History of World War II with the inscription to Monty. Never give in.
It is programs like these which add to the fodder on which our values have and are being built. It is morally reprehensible for creative people to work on them. They themselves become collaborators who enable our failed, capitalist system to blind us to its superficiality and immorality and the dangers hiding behind it. They, the shows and their creators, lead our society to the corrupted values of our "bling, bling" world. The old story of the emperor's clothes and the emptiness of his life. The budgets for these shows could themselves provide for so much desperately needed good, to begin with the food for the hungry children of America.
1
Relative on mine lives on Fifth Ave across from the Metropolitan Museum of Art--Billions uses the lobby and the exterior for scenes--they pay the residents who own the building for the use of the location--nice work if you can get it--the residents are already pretty rich!
2
I have a relative who is very, very rich. Not a billionaire. From the outside, it looks hard, maybe even exhausting. If you can afford to do anything, you do too much. If you buy stuff, you have to do something with it. Like I said, it looks hard. Some of it would be fun, but too much is just too much.
2
Ah yes, the comfort of watching the inordinately wealthy and seeing that they're not happy. A nice sop to the blighters who have trouble paying childcare and worry how to cover the cost of insulin. The premise of ever soap opera ever is to show - as the unimprovable title of that old Mexican series had it - 'Los ricos tambien lloran' (The rich also weep).
Enough with the billionaires already - and not just on TV.
2
The Sky Lofts, 145 Hudson?
Ahhh, yes. You can envy the lifestyle of the ultra-rich and famous, but remember, the old cliche still applies . . . the grass always seems greener on their side of the fence.
“They’re of interest in the way that a zoo animal is of interest.”
Ah, no. We're the zoo animals in this power dynamic. I'm a fan of Aerosmith; guess which of theirs is my favorite song?
I wouldn't put a cat or a dog or a horse or a chicken in a place that doesn't have any fresh air and grass to run around in.
2
It’s just TV.
2
All of that furniture is cheap. Rich people have designers order the furniture custom from small furniture factories. Either that or they go to RH or BB Italia or whatever and spend 2x what the furniture is actually worth.
The point is that everything in those pictures is either mass produced, or ordered from retail furniture stores that specialize in copying designer furniture for what the stuff is actually worth.
Stardust. All I think of is stardust (wink to IAMX). In a few blinks of cosmic time, we will all be nothing but the ashes of a burnt out sun, reduced to oblivion and elements in the vacuum of space, with no record of anything that transpired while we consciously existed. No record what so ever will remain of our triumphs and daily struggles to make sense of our brief time as sentient (or semi-sentient) beings in this universe. None of it is of any lasting consequence, no matter what you have or achieve. But maybe the show is entertaining, if you want to waste your precious time on it...
5
Money is insulation from poverty, sickness and the drudgery of work. Money can buy one solitude and silence. Money is not the problem, it’s how one uses it.
5
"Billions" is a great show. The writing, the casting and performances, the cinematography. I never thought much about the apartments...the office spaces are pretty swank, though. And the costume designer Eric Daman should take a bow for getting Axe's look right.
3
@Third.coast
It’s all about the writing and acting for me too.
1
Snore. Let's get back to the 91% tax rate and fix our crumbling roads and ancient airports.
9
How about a show with a 'tax 'em all' politician leading riotous voters to the polls? I'd watch that.
3
They keep putting on these Bradley-Martin balls, and I think "Yes, and?"
I miss the Waltons
106
@Libby D
John Boy Axelrod doesn't have quite the same ring to it.
5
@Libby D Little House on the Prairie too... people with values, imagine!
7
@Libby D
I loved Ugly Betty myself and binge watched all of the seasons with my mom. We had so much fun!
1
Isn’t it a little ironic that you run this article on the same day NYT is explaining the cheating to get into college scam?
5
Everything is either money porn or royalty porn TV – depicting commoners eager to swear fealty to Geoffrey or some such personage. The result is the golden age of acquiescence; Americans programmed to embrace a peasant mentality.
1
You guys at the Times really know how to stir up class resentment. There's such visceral hatred for these shows though many commenters haven't watched/won't watch them. And yet you publish articles in other sections of the paper about the real-life counterparts to these fictional characters and their pricey real estate. Interesting.
3
Lifestyle schmifestyle, show us how they manage their taxes...
2
Shameless used to be my counter to the guilty pleasure that is Billions. That is until Frank Gallagher in person turned out to be as obnoxiously rich as anyone in Axe’s universe.
2
I watch both "Billions" and "Succession" and can honestly say I don't envy these characters one bit. Their lives seem miserable, stressful and empty. The things that make life enjoyable to me are completely absent from theirs: they have no real friends, their relationships with their family members are difficult at best and they have no time for culture, relaxation or simply fun. It's all just an empty competition in the name of greed and power.
I guess it takes a different kind of person to want to live like this. Good for them, I guess, but I wouldn't trade places, no thanks.
Both shows are excellent, by the way.
64
@Michel Forest I don't envy them particularly but admit that I do get a little flutter when I see an high-end sports car rumble by. I appreciate the value they add to society by their innovation and ambition. I just wish that they would enthusiastically pay their taxes! Like Obama said, these people didn't construct the system that allowed them to achieve their success. So pay your taxes!!!
5
@Michel Forest
It’s just a TV show, it’s not real. No one wants to spend their time watching Axelrod attend a lecture for an hour. Then again, it might depend on the lecture.
1
Interesting juxtaposition: Began today's news intake with Ed Caesar's stirring report on recovery of WWII aircraft carrier, the U.S.S. Wasp. The late Paul Allen, of Microsoft mega-wealth, was the underwriter for the mission. I turned next to this inside look at "wealth porn," a term new to me, as are these series. Granted, every story has its backstory, but I am left thinking, money for money's sake vs. money for mankind's sake.
32
I think Walking Dead and Games of Thrones are poverty porn. Breaking Bad sort of was. Most viewers can say they have more luxury than Walking Dead and better heating and electricity than Game of Thrones. I'm not being facetious. Walking Dead started just after the Recession started.
4
I guess modeling a billionaires life drama on Warren Buffet t - with his modest home and Cadillac would look like home made middle-class-porn shown of free-TV than colorful wealth-porn on pay - of course - TV.
Perhaps one modeled after Mr. Oracle (Ellison) himself on his own Hawaiian island and sailing yachts would be interesting wealth-porn - dirty indeed.
3
The glorification or appeal of the uber wealthy comes at a time when most people in society feel or experience a powerlessness. An inability to affect the world around them or significantly change their place in it. Perhaps that's the allure. Watching people with "screw you" (not sure what the comments moderator will consider inadmissible) money wealth who can materially get whatever they want whenever they want it.
Some years ago I toured the Rockefeller property in Tarrytown,NY. A beautiful property with many luxurious appointments as you might imagine. The grounds include a garden which overlooks the distant banks of NJ side of the Hudson River. We were told the Rockefeller family would enjoy their breakfast there. The tour guide told us a story that at one point there was construction project on that western bank of the river. The family didn't appreciate this violation of their view so they bought the land on which the project was being done.
Having that kind of wealth and therefore power has it's seductive quality to someone who lacks it.
4
No one deserves to be a billionaire. I don't care what you do with your money.
5
Why not do a show with wealthy teenagers whose parents get them into elite schools. Law and Order used to say “ripped from the headlines.” Everyone would watch it.
Who would of thought a parents love would use photoshop to get there academically challenged children into elite schools.
Wonder what the number of rich crooks will be in this scandal. It’s amazing that the levels of corruption has no depth for the Trumps and the other beautiful white elites in this country.
3
DESTROY the rich.
A wealth tax could do it.
2
Damian Lewis is one of the 1% as well
2
I cannot help but think of Steve Martin’s bit: “I love money. I love everything about it. I've bought some pretty good stuff. Got me a $300 pair of socks, got a fur sink. Let's see, bought an electric dog polisher, a gasoline-powered turtleneck sweater, and, of course ... I bought some dumb stuff, too.” The sad part is that when money is controlled by so very few, it loses value. This is incredibly easy to grasp. Give $10 to someone with a net worth of $100 or give $10 to someone with a net worth of $1,000,000. For one, it’s going to mean something very valuable (perhaps a pair of warm socks), for the other, it’s practically nothing.
5
The rich do good things. And the lesser also do good things. The lesser rescue animals and the money comes out of their pockets. The lesser volunteer to help other lesser attain jobs. The lesser are our educators. The lesser are nurses. The lesser prepare meals and deliver them. Thing is, the lesser may not have a hole in them which they need to fill with money, and never really fill it. The lesser just like “to do”. No television crew. No newspaper articles with photos. No entourage. No internet sites. The lesser just do. Different ethic sets.
4
These are companies trying to make a profit and employ people. Humans have always had a fascination with those in the upper crust. Long before even radio was around print media would publish salacious details about he rich and famous.
The focus on billionaires is simply dovetailing on the left's campaign that those with truly enormous wealth are all evil if they are not Democrats. In the mean time very real problems, like plastic pollution in the worlds oceans are pushed to the back burner.
1
I like the private plane part. The more money you make, the more lonely and isolated you become. The expensive toys are momentary distractions from the reality that you have no friends or people you can trust. People want what you got, baby. Ask Oprah and Donald. Joy to Oprah is a well-made cupcake. Happiness to Donald is a Big TV screen and a burger.
@Jocelyn H
Except, only Oprah is a real billionaire.
5
Rich people pay the bills.
The USA is such a strange place - We hear from our earliest years to strive to be successful ( code for make a lot of money), and if you do become fabulously wealthy people hate you, and the government wants to steal all of that money.
4
...a little slice of everything that's wrong with America today. What happened to, "I have what they don't have. I have ENOUGH."
2
For those who swoon over the super-rich giving some money to The Arts and other charities:
"No one ever considered Carnegie libraries steeped in the blood of the Homestead steelworkers, but they are. We do not remember that the Rockefeller Foundation is founded on the dead miners of the Colorado Fuel & Iron Company and a dozen other similar performances. We worship Mammon." - Senator Harry S Truman, 1937
Plus ça Change...
https://emcphd.wordpress.com
8
While the facts are not yet all in on the so-called "college admissions bribery" case, there is some juxtaposition between it and the sentence your reporter wrote stating: "The wealthy characters in these shows often choose money over family, community or moral integrity.
While the college admissions bribery case is so far just a matter of allegations, there seems to be some degree here of art reflecting life or of life reflecting art.
Having just read "The Times" story on the Gambino family assassination, it seems that all of our life in this criminal society and deadly culture comes down to wealth and power.
2
The glorification or appeal of the uber wealthy comes at a time when most people in society feel or experience a powerlessness. An inability to affect the world around them or significantly change their place in it. Perhaps that's the allure. Watching people with exorbitant money/wealth who can materially get whatever they want whenever they want it. Some years ago I toured the Rockefeller property in Tarrytown,NY. A beautiful property with many luxurious appointments as you might imagine. The grounds include a garden which overlooks the distant banks of NJ side of the Hudson River. We were told the Rockefeller family would enjoy their breakfast there. The tour guide told us a story that at one point there was construction project on that western bank of the river. The family didn't appreciate this violation of their view so they bought the land on which the project was being done. Having that kind of wealth and therefore power has it's seductive quality to someone who lacks it.
1
“Part of the fun of the way our audience experiences this wealth is by feeling how unimportant it is to these people.”
Even worse is the tragedy of how our nation's wealth, its human capital, resources, planet and well being are so unimportant to these people - especially to the current leader of our country that the trumplican fanatics aspire to - a “true pure wish fulfillment" for his base to be him.
Marine One and Air Force One are merely tax payer paid toys the trump is entitled to enjoy commuting to his properties, and the White House, called a dump by the trump.
Everything is unimportant, except for his wall - paid by others, of course, like most billionaires - to separate and show off his domain from the south.
Unimportant? To the point of unaccountability.
2
I guess I must be an anomaly here because the only reason I watch "Billions" and "Succession" is because of Damion Lewis, Paul Giamatti, and Brian Cox. They are brilliant actors, the chemistry between Damion and Paul is incredible and the writing and storylines are fantastic. I would watch these guys if they were in "The Beverly Hillbillies" or "The Waltons". I could care less about how the 1% of the 1% lives.
3
If there is one thing that irks me beyond belief it's a small private jet.
3
Trump is actually not really rich, but at least his digs would include a golden throne, but it has to be cleaned.
2
@Joren Maksho You mean gold plated throne.
1
@skanda
Ha! That turns one's skin green, like a cheap carnival ring.
3
In the 1990s, I saw Prince in concert at Constitution Hall in Washington D.C.
The tickets had been expensive. I was sitting in the 3rd row.
A man behind me shouted at Prince, complaining how expensive the tickets were. Prince responded that the concert was a benefit for a Children's Medical Charity he had established and all the money would go directly to the charity. (Information about the charity had been included in the advertising for the concert).
Prince then looked directly toward the man and said "I have enough money." I don't need any more money."
It's the only time I've ever heard a very rich person say they didn't need any more money.
Prince was an extraordinary person. I miss him all the time.
20
@fast/furious
Prince's estate has been valued at between $!00 - $300 million.
Prince was a Jehovah's Witness and we learned from some of his friends after he died that Prince used to go door to door in Minneapolis as a witness for his religion.
1
I have not seen these shows and I do not want to see them. What good would they do me?
What I would like to see are forms of entertainment that focus on actual people who are decent and happy, regardless of relative wealth. I'd really like to see how they got that way, what their ancestors valued, their place in the community, how they raise their kids, how they handle their various tools, etc. etc. That would actually be helpful to people like me.
My worry is that such salt-of-the-earth folks are becoming rare, a different kind of 1%. That's the impression I get from a lot of news coverage, anyway. But maybe the truth is that they are everywhere, which itself would be a wonderful thing to know, and a great news story.
5
@Chris
Both programs are actually quite good.
"Billions" is a hilarious escapist drama about powerful people battling each other in a dirty, corrupt NYC legal landscape of envy and frustration.
"Succession" - reportedly loosely based on Rupert Murdoch and his family, is beautifully acted and written, & is probably the best new tv show of 2018.
9
It had been years since I had thought of her, and then I remembered her smile and warmth. Her apartment was small and different, charming and appealing to an imaginative child.
Revisiting some old postcards, I retrieved her name, and a castle that belonged to her in Scotland. She would be past a century now, and looking on the web, she was the second richest woman in Great Britain at the time after the Queen.
Recently another friend of my mother's passed away at 105. On a visit to New York, years ago, my parent went to see her in her new townhouse, and I asked for her view of the above on her return.
The interior decorator had placed a large cage of love birds inside the entrance, causing a gunburst of fluttering wings and hearts when the butler opened the door. The style was British to be expected, and over a fireplace was her portrait by Dali. What my mother couldn't understand was why would one want a river view of a Pepsi-Cola sign.
Having looked at this City manor recently on the web, it is really a house in the country located in Manhattan, and one of a kind.
Many new buildings are rising in New York reminiscent of surrealistic beehives, and it would help to have an indicator from a fine architect to determine which ones will have a lasting impact and be cited as landmarks in the future.
Shows of this kind, which purport to shed a negative light on either excess wealth, or prostitution, violence, or war, or drugs, always surreptitiously glorify such things. They do this in a million sneaky ways, such as casting incredibly good-looking actors, failing to show what shootings and fistfights actually look like, music, evocative lighting and sets, story lines that make such things look adventurous, bold, daring and sexy. Sure, the bad guys are always bad, but when they look as good as they generally do, and when the good guys prevail without being too badly hurt, or dying in some atmospheric way, the bad things don’t carry much consequence.
This is because the “bad” things featured in such fare are what attract viewers, and hence advertisers. People watch the stuff to see the nasty, the brutal, the greedy, the narcissistic actions of the characters, and so such characters must be presented in an attractive, engaging, and alluring light.
All of Shakespeare’s villains are more engaging than their virtuous opponents, but somehow he did it without promoting the evils he was trying to show.
2
It’s kind of funny that there are people who don’t seem to recognize the philanthropy of our world’s billionaires as the symbolic posturing which it nearly always is.
It’s also kind of funny that there are people who struggle to feed their families, and view the amassing of material wealth as being some kind of existential jackpot.
Laughter really is the best medicine. Even when it’s gallows humor.
2
@ubique
Bowie died with a net worth over 100 million, and left most of it his children. No symbolic posturing for him. Wouldn't it have been kinder, if he left some to charity?
From his youth, Bowie was fixated on wealth and fame. He may have been a counter-culture icon, but I don't think he was ever much of a philanthropist. He seem to believe that amassing material wealth was some kind of existential jackpot.
4
Wealth is Power. Wealth is Agency. The scale of that is difficult for average Americans to apprehend. The financial elite can throw away amounts of wealth like a used tissue, that average people work their entire lives to fail to achieve. The financial elite vary in their essential characteristics pretty much like most people. But the power and agency of wealth is very distorting to mental health and perception of others. It is and would be for anyone.
On that level I have sympathy for the financial elite. They are human beings, good and bad. What I don't have sympathy for is a system that promotes and allows these radical distortions of wealth. With this overall abundance, if our society has any aspirations to morals or ethics, No one should physically want for a basically comfortable and secure life. A roof, essential financial security, health care.
11
Let's not forget these are tv/cable shows meant to entertain audiences. People will watch these shows for various reasons: to watch the trappings of exterior wealth, to see the main characters rise and fall, due to hubris, to watch for the costumes, the clothes, the relationships, but just keep in mind that audiences primarily watch to be entertained, to escape. Nothing wrong with that. Enjoy the show folks.
4
Billions is one of my favourite TV shows. I’m also happy for the suggestion of Succession so thank you NYT. I know that a show like Billions is fiction because Bobby Axelrod is a really sweet guy. He’s not sexist, bigoted or scornful of people who work for him. He doesn’t force people to bow down anxiety pay tribute. The term “the wealthy” is a generic fantasy descriptor for what people think it’s like to orbit that circle. Even so-called wealth consultants are selling a fantasy to insecure people in return for a big packet of cash. I find the idea of needing one quite laughable. I grew up in a family of talented and wealthy sociopaths: Children were neglected unless they agree to fetch money from a parent much like water from a village well. Siblings became enraged because one earned more millions or another one bought a hotel. Homes being literally split down the middle. I don’t see enough vulgar pettiness in this show to be say that it is a snapshot of reality. It’s wrong to assume that people become wealthy because they have all around competent personalities and characters. Sometimes people only have the capacity to acquire wealth. They don’t necessarily understand the concept of being decent.
10
The show is about a different kind of wealth- undeserved wealth. It does a remarkable job of portraying the nasty miserable people who pursue such a lifestyle. It is difficult to empathize with any of them and they do not seem to be happy at all. Pretty sure this was the directors intent. In contrast, I know some real life billionaires who made their fortunes building outstanding well-known family businesses. They are now in the process of running foundations that are giving their very deserved wealth away to make the world a better place for all (my cause is a fortunate recipient of their largesse). The most common comment I hear about each of these people is that "they don't look like a billionaire". You would not recognize them on the street- they are not ostentatious but they do have extremely nice houses some of which are full of amazing works of art (often collected before the artists were famous). The thing that makes these people most happy is giving their money away and making a difference in the lives of others.
3
@Tom
I'm glad you know nice and really charitable billionaires. My feeling (and I hope more and more people agree as time goes on) is that no one should be a billionaire. Why should one person or even a group of foundation trustees decide who benefits from their largess?
I long for marginal tax rates of 90%, with no loopholes. If these people then leave the US, good. I don't want to share my country with totally selfish people as we're all doing now.
1
Such is America's obsession with wealth and status. I don't watch TV much, but I'd like to watch a few shows with main characters being from struggling middle class family or people paying bills.
And no, I'm not talking about "Two Broke Girls" with their fantasy NYC apartment.
3
First, today, I read about Hudson Yards.
My first thought was, "I hope this doesn't spoil the loveliness of the High Line." Next, there would be 10% affordable housing in the condo billionaire building. Two entrances in this building: one for billionaires and another for subsidized housing people. What? Antiquated - nothing 21st Century about these two entrances. With a low level of curiosity, I looked at a billionaire designer's weird sculpture idea, a "stairway-to-nowhere," and, a shopping mall? Shopping malls are disappearing around the country? If there ever was a concrete description, encapsulating the new West Side locale, it’s: “stairway-to-nowhere.” Why couldn’t we have copied Singapore with its ultra-high-tech skyscraper, devoted solely to urban farming. That would have added excitement to a New York state of mind. Would have shown 21st Century leadership. There's nothing compelling about this billionaires' enclave.
As a life-long Manhattanite, who knows the city well and can afford to be comfortable here, I cannot think of one reason to drop in on Hudson Yards, because unlike most of this great city, it has no soul.
On my second cup of coffee, I read about the “Billionaire” series on HBO, looked at the interior and costume designs and thought, “Why would I want to watch this?” Another example of moral vacuity…… b o r I n g. I like excitement in the way I spend my time. This series in no way adds anything to my life.
4
Many years ago the band I was in had a gig playing for Ivan Boesky's son's high school graduation party. It was at his mansion in NY state. They had us use a game room as a dressing room, As we dropped our bags his wife looked at one of her servants and pointed at us and said "They don't leave this room" as if we weren't standing 3 feet away. That's how I will always think of the super rich. it wasn't too long after that that he went to prison.
17
I watched the first episode of Succession and thought I was done. There was no one for me to root for. Maybe it was the sheer nastiness of it that brought me back. I hung in because it made me feel better about my barely middle class life.
4
i watch this show and iv'e become a better painter.
my fav
2
The show I really want to see is how these people survive after the stock market collapses and all that money is gone.
4
@Joe
Oh that is a reality show- what happens is they conned the government into giving them a billion dollar personal tax break (based on a corporate and shareholder loss) then they laundered money for the Russian mob to buy inflated real estate in manhattan and used the proceeds to self-fund a political campaign to increase the value of their brand and to their great surprise they ended up controlling the entire country
2
@Joe
Billionaires don't get their money from the stock market.
Reminds me of my daughter playing the hip hop artists, Brother from Another:
"Old school car,
I spent for new brakes.
Rather be broke
Than rich with bad taste"
2
Generally, the media is funded by advertising and advertising is a driver of consumerism. The ability to attract wealthy consumers increases the value of a media property, So..promoting expensive goods and services and corresponding lifestyles on an actual or aspirational basis is a mission for media...just read the NYT.
3
There should be an episode about buying your kids admission into an Ivy League school.
22
Check out “The Sopranos”.
1
That as a future story line would be a good reason to keep Billions going a few more seasons as Axe’s sons grow ole enough and Lara can sink her teeth into that.
i used to work for a rich guy - really rich - and i would say, "so what" every time i got a paycheck. more and more i think i am starting to despise the rich and wealthy - seeing how they operate on a daily basis is disgusting. i won't watch any shows that kiss-up to the rich and dramatize what an excellent life it must be as a member of the 1%. we need reality shows that demonstrate that the rest of us work, live and have value - and honesty - more so than these wealthy fools. nobody needs to pay $65 million for an apartment - nobody.
10
It's curious how the 0.001% are touted as the apex of human evolution -- that our Oligarchs are the persons we should hope our children grow up to be. That the pursuit and acquisition of great wealth and possessions, and exercising great wealth's power, is the best expression of our species.
It's curious, too, how Wealth Porn Shows stroke the fantasy that in America, any of us, one day, might be the next Billionaire. That the game isn't rigged, the deck stacked, and that one set of rules doesn't exist for Them, and another for "the Hobbits".
6
The "wealth porn" in "Billions" is disgusting when so many people, 99.9%, have so, so much less with far greater need for the simplest of life's necessities: affordable healthcare, decent housing, healthy food, a clean environment.
But even more troubling is the ego driven corruption in the law enforcement agencies which are supposed to police that one tenth of one percent.
All that conflict over wealth and egos makes for great drama. It also makes a great plea for a more equitable society. "Billions" is the best, though probably unintended, advocate around for socialism.
7
@Steve C
Socialism? Why should Iet the Government control things? Trading in 1% for another 1%
This is the real American Dream. No real money or opportunities for the 99%, but you can watch the .01% on TV!
7
I remember reading in Architectural Digest a couple decades ago, which interior designer to choose to decorate your apartment to make it look like you were from an old money family when your pile of cash was more recently minted.
Regretfully, Logan Roy’s 5th Avenue apartment mock-up looks like it was ordered from the West Elm catalogue.
Hollywood should have invested in a New York decorator to come up with a more convincing set. What better experts are there on how the private-jet-set lives?
4
People behaving badly.
Ah, the currency of America, behave and do whatever you want in the unbridled pursuit of wealth and conspicuous consumption.
There is not a single redeeming character on Billions.
Much like what mostly represents in DC, acts out on Wall Street, Hollywood, Silicon Valley, etc.
This country is in for an epic fall. It will not be pretty.
4
The concept "wealth porn" implies that these shows exist simply to display the wealth of the characters without concern for plot, the characters, or much of anything else. I haven't seen "Billions," but "Succession" explores the absurdity and dysfunction of the country's most elite. The characters are ridiculous and intended to be. It seems pretty clear that the author of this article doesn't understand the most basic aspect of the show.
2
Study in contrasts between then and now: According to the 'extras' on the DVD of the 1992 movie 'Advocate's Devil', for the Manhattan penthouse of attorney John Milton (Al Pacino), who is none other than the Dark Lord, the movie used what was at the time the NYC dwelling of ... wait for it ... Donald J. Trump. Milton's digs were furnished on the principle that 'nothing succeeds like excess', the epitome of garish, Trumpian tastelessness.
I don't watch 'Billions'. Perhaps because I don't believe the rich *are* unhappy, or 'dead inside'. We plebs want to believe that. But the truth is undoubtedly that they sleep quite well. 'The rich are different from you and me,' Fitzgerald said. 'Yes, they have more money,' riposted Hemingway. Both wrong. The uber-rich are different not because they have no conscience - plenty of non-affluent people also have if any conscience, a small, shabby, and very flexible one - but because they don't understand why anyone would need or want one, though, like Trump, they do see the advantage or need to pretend to have one, on occasion.
I admit I have never had the chance to be corrupted by extreme wealth. I am poor but honest.
Gotta go now and buy my Powerball for tomorrow night. Mind, I'm only buying it because they say the money goes to programs for the less fortunate. And if by some chance I win, I will surely give away all the money to worthy charities.
3
People acre more about style/clothing than ever before. Even The Walking Dead, which is not about wealth, is style focused (the characters clearly display a post-apocalypse style). The clothing in Game of Thrones is sumptuous.
1
This kind of thing was done with more flair and flamboyance in the eighties with Dynasty. And similar shows and mini-series. Seems tired and played out by now. And without the added bonus of Joan Collins.
2
@Andy And how did they write this article without even one reference to Robin Leach and his 'champagne wishes and caviar dreams'? That show was unabashed wealth porn. Nor did it pretend to derogate rather than glamourise and admire its subjects.
Money can't buy happiness. But poverty can't buy anything.
5
I don't watch many of these series any more.
For me it's not about the money, nor reality. It's the intrigue, plots, and the characters that the actors are playing now.
I enjoyed watching them in other series and movies, like Giamatti in Sideways, and Lewis in Wolf Hall, where they played totally different characters!
That's what acting is all about.
2
Everyone in my zip code wars Moncler puffers ($1300), Gucci sneakers ($650), and Golden Goose sneakers ($600).
Much of my wardrobe is from Barneys Warehouse. I just bought a leather jacket one sale from 1480 to 311. I'm looking at a 4500 suit on sale for 1600. You don't have to be a billionaire to shop sales online.
What all the rich people, aside from Brian Cox, have in common are thin bodies and great hair. These shows are as much about physical good looks as they are about wealth. I live in a very pricey Manhattan neighborhood in large part, because its one of the last thin places in America. Any who about wealth is also a show about thin people. Perhaps people don't watch the shows to look at wealth. Perhaps they watch to look at thin bodies and great hair (also nice clothing). What sets Billions apart from Mike and Molly isn't just the income bracket. It's the bodies and clothing.
5
@Anti-Marx
I hate autocorrect.
1
It's interesting to me that almost all the comments here vilify the super wealthy, even admitting that they don't know any. It's exactly this simplistic view of life that has brought us to where we are today. There are many super rich individuals doing very good things and many super rich people doing horrible things. Without the super rich, there are arts organizations that would never survive, land that would not be protected, and hospitals not supported. Let's allow for some nuance in this discussion. Just as it is not fair to trash people at the bottom, let's not trash people at the top wholesale.
183
@Karen I agree with you, but diverge on one thing. Our infrastructure is teetering on the brink in some areas. While I love that some have used their wealth for hospitals, etc. (I regularly pass the Benioff Children's Hospital in Oakland and silently thank him for that), I also recognize that they also use their wealth to get protections from government. I would rather see more of their revenue funneled towards modernized rail systems and repaired bridges, or an effectively functioning health care system than a new wing on the MOMA.
97
@Karen Much of the charity is fueled by tax write offs. Maybe, they could go ahead and do something admirable and pay the same taxes, they would have paid, in the 1960s. Maybe kids could afford their college tuition, scientists could develop life saving treatments, without a $ sign, and average wages could rise again. (by not strangling workers, owned by wall street firms)
95
@Karen Yes, arts organizations and hospitals or whatever the supper rich happen to care about at the moment.
The Sackler wing at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, funded by criminal drug dealers, for example: a good thing or a bad? If good, then why not accept El Chapo's offer to donate money to equally good causes?
The rich get to decide what charities are important. Not only do they have the money, but they get charitable tax deductions on top of it--which means that the rest of us subsidize the causes they choose.
The super-rich give a smaller percentage of their wealth to charities than poorer people, and they tend to support the arts and educational buildings (as long as their names are on them). The less wealthy tend to give to those suffering hunger, homelessness, etc.
Tax the rich fairly (how could Romney pay 11%, Trump probably zero, and you and I 30-some percent?), and democratize to a much greater extent where the money goes. What's important to the .01% may not be important to most of us.
Oh, before I forget, regarding the "dinky private plane. 'I wouldn’t be caught dead in that sardine can,”'he wrote. (Said sardine can retails for around $40 million.)"
I hate to say this, but if he were caught dead, most of us wouldn't mourn that extensively.
171
I watched a few episodes of Billions (for the actors) and Succession (for the storyline). I quit. Ultimately, I found the stories weren't compelling or interesting. "The Crown" on Netflix is essentially very wealthy people with better accents. For being royal born, they still do things of consequence. Plus, they really do live in castles, including their weekend getaways.
2
I don't want to hear about what the rich are doing
I don't want to go to where the rich are going
They think they're so clever, they think they're so right
But the truth is only known by guttersnipes
“Garageland,” the Clash
64
The Clash telling us like it is. I once heard Johnny Lydon in a radio interview putting down Joe Strummer because Strummer didn’t invite him to his upper crust parties.
3
"Enough is as good as any feast."
108
“Rich people have become so different from the average person,” said Shamus Khan, a Columbia University sociology professor who researches the political influence of economic elites.
This re-states the old saying, The rich are different and the very rich are very different. I suppose a sociologist absolutely must put forth some effort to make this longstanding understanding of wealthy people seem timely, seem like it is a reflection of the age we live in.
It isn't. What bothers me about the professor is, he concerns himself with "the political influence of economic elites." I expect any expansion on that thought terminates at the point it can be provided to elected officials as more fuel for the leftist fire.
12
So many of these comments are made by folks who never watched the show. In fact, it doesn’t in any way glorify the lives it portrays but serves as a very instructive primer on how these folks got here and what it takes to stay there, as well as the motivation and actions of those “ good guys” trying to bring them to heel. Wanna know how we got here? Watch and learn. But be prepared to learn that the “ good guys vs the bad guys” scenario we all love might not be what we think it is.
43
@sw exactly. Billions is about two titans who rule in their own world, clashing - one on the rich side, the other on the supposed side of "justice" - the government prosecutor. What the show reveals that each engages in dirty dealings, bad ethics and display an unspeakable hunger for more power. Neither are all bad or all good - they are a combination of both.
10
@sw I agree. I haven't watched Billions, but I did watch and enjoy Succession. I think it's pretty clear there that we're supposed to find all of the main characters loathsome and petty to some extent. They and their lifestyles are not at all portrayed as worthy of emulation.
2
I once knew a man who was so poor, all he had was money.
225
@Dan
Very cool and profound. Nice.
21
@Dan
I love that. I think I saw that one time on a bumper sticker on a beat up Bentley.
8
The hand of man is puny compared to the hand of nature. Want to see something truly astonishing? Gaze at an old Ansel Adams photograph. Or better yet, see the Grand Canyon, Yosemite or Jackson Hole for yourself. It's a "luxury" you can afford without being a billionaire or even a millionaire.
Let the billionaires admire their handbags, shoes and planes. Why buy a mid-19th century painting from the Hudson School, when you can still paddle on a pristine lake in the Adirondacks, and listen to the loons at dusk?
The real world, full of wonder and beauty, is out there. Let's hope billionaires never discover it.
224
@alexander hamilton
Beautiful truth.
Freedom is in the present moment, preferably in one of the settings you describe!
18
@alexander hamilton
Beautifully stated. Unfortunately, they have discovered it, via Trump and his greed. Bears Ears in Utah being just one example of public lands on the butcher block!
20
@Alexander hamilton Hate to inform you, @A. Ham, but nominal billionaires of their day have colonized the Adirondacks with their "great camps" during the late 1800s and buying up a lot of Keene Valley and Lake Plastic as 9/11 refugees.
An artist friend makes expensive bespoke decorative finishes and doodads for the latter day great camps and told me a funny story about one of his clients asking him to remove tags off furniture and oriental rugs he saw because he didn't think the optics would be too good if the local carpenters and tradesmen working on the place spied a rug that cost more than they made in a year or more.
12
If this type of drama is classified as “wealth porn” or “living vicariously” for the majority of the population, what do the billionaires call this type of show- “Slice of Life?”
20
@Susan One rather obvious example of the American culture of wealth is their sense of entitlement and culture of dependency.
Even H.L. Hunt who is another who just lucky enough to find oil, was sure he was genetically superior to the great capitalist proletariat and get this...should have voting power commensurate with wealth. Yet another example of how capitalism leads to fascism, where we are all headed.
The trouble with labeling these programs as porn, is that it's not parody as is erotic porn...but very real ostentatiousness.
7
as they say " absolute wealth corrupts absolutely".
2
"Wealth porn", indeed. Just look at the junk that's polluted "social media", from these wannabe porn stars.
3
Ah, the Faustian bargain--for what price will shallow people sell their souls? I don't care, and don't want to know any of them. Tax the hell out of them, because very few are like Bill Gates--the creators of an actual product, true entrepreneurs. Most do little or nothing of value, have no real skills but think they are masterful and essential. Their hubris seems boundless. These shows illustrate what we who teach English have always known because we teach ancient Greek tragedy, we teach Shakespeare, we teach Toni Morrison, we teach the classic morality tales, new and old, that show us that wealth and power are often corrupting, that hubris is the deadliest sin and that all three may feel good at first, but generally lead to misery. There are no new stories and human nature does not change. Greed has been with us through the ages, and we should still discourage rather than encourage that. Virtues are virtues for a reason. Even Freud said all that matters is love and work. Something most of the folks portrayed on these shows--and their ilk, know nothing about.
9
@Eva Lockhart...Bill Gates BTW, didn't do anything at all but get supremely and astronomically lucky. [He] simply got IBM to license software he didn't even own.
Once IBM signed the deal, Gates went out and bout SsDos, Seattle software's operating system. He renamed it MsDos and turned it into Windows.
Just as the DoJ went after IBM's mainframe monopoly, they went after the Windows the PC operating monopoly,
When the SCOTUS didn't take it up, even Robert Bork, plaintiff's council, said that the court had given a de facto monopoly to MS.
Upon delivery, IBM found flaws and they had to rework it. The Interactive desktop Gates stole from Apple that the courts later allowed pursuant to [its] interpretation of an agreement. The mouse was developed by Xerox Labs they thought...had no future. Gated...did nothing.
Then MS set out to crush any other program added to Windows and prevent retailers from alternatives. This was reflected in you having the option of another OS but you paid for Windows anyway. And that other OS had no add-ons because they all had to work with, you guessed it...Windows.
4
The statement that struck me was "Shows like “Billions” suggest wealth is less about the items themselves than how the characters react to them."
People become accessories in the show. The people who are portrayed working for these wealthy people are a disposable as the expensive watch. The last episode with the cousin lured into the dysfunctional Roy family calls the help on the estate "hobbits. When he said that I felt he lost all of humility. I guess I will find out in season 2.
Rox of Spazhouse, Intuitive Research
2
"Billions" is a sophomoric version of Roadrunner vs. Wile E. Coyote... What a waste of talent.
2
We elect the rich to pubic office, we idolize the rich, we gleefully watch the rich playing with a baseball or a football or a golf ball. Millions every year turn on the TV to watch rich people giving each other awards... and then we wonder why the rich feel superior and entitled. Hilarious!
https://emcphd.wordpress.com
12
@Rev. E. M. Camarena, PhD Wealth is not entertainment. Watching it in movies or TV series is not idolization.
Rather, I like to watch the super rich because I want to see if they are sociopaths or psychopaths, most capitalists...being on of the two.
1
Who watches this kind of junk TV? I seriously don't get it.
7
@J. Faye Harding
A lot of folks. Season 4. Can’t wait. Acting I should top notch.
This story illustrates the Mumbai-slang-Hindi rap lyrics from the new Bollywood blockbuster hit movie Gully Boy (about a rap star rising from a slum background, with great rap lyrics focusing on social justice for a change instead of misogyny):
Tu nanga hi to aaya tha,
Kya ghanta lekar jaayega?
(you came here [ie were born] naked,
what are you going to take when you go?
[ie you will take nothing when you die])
Mumbai too has more than its share of soulless billionaires who rose to the top through great corruption, and flaunt their unimaginable wealth with extreme poverty at their feet.
7
One hedge funder emailed the “Billions” creators (who declined to identify him) to complain about Axelrod’s dinky private plane. “I wouldn’t be caught dead in that sardine can,” he wrote.
1
@Fonz
Sounds like a personal problem to me
I'm not sure we need more tv shows about wealth porn highlighting the rapidly widening income gap between the rich and the poor.
The 26 richest billionaires own as many assets as the bottom 50% (3.8 billion people) who make up the poorest half of the planet’s population.
A wealth tax of just a measly 1% would raise an estimated $418 billion a year – enough to educate every child not in school and provide healthcare that would prevent 3 million deaths.
273
@JM: Or we could up it just a few points, they’d never miss it, & have enough to support every person on the planet,without work, & in comfort.
Never happen. They’d call us uppity.
18
@White Wolf They would definitely call us socialist, commiees, etc
9
@White Wolf
We could tax everybody who makes over $24,000.00 at 100%.
Just think about all the money society could raise!!!!
2
Let's see their tax returns.
8
I was an extra for both "Billions" and "Succession" - got the gigs because I owned my own tuxedo. I had to fly in from Ohio so I lost money on the roles, but would do it again on a moment's notice. In one episode, I was a Yale Law School grad at my 50th Reunion Dinner. In another episode I attended a great dinner and charity event for RECNY, and saw some extraordinary afro-jazz dance. What a blast. A guy from Ohio - a billionaire for a day!
On my own time, I'm an international trashfilm writer/director... https://www.imdb.com/name/nm2706291/
5
Now these are the type of people who build libraries to get their children into college, not by paying off with dirty cash.
6
While this article and accompanying photos purport to muse on the exploitation and greed necessary to create a billionaire class, the chosen words and images tell this reader they worship at that same altar. As another commenter said, “gross”.
2
Why watching the likes of Konstantin Kilimnik, the Kushner clan , Paul Singer, Carl Icahn or Sheldon Adellson-like people would be compelling is a head scratcher. The fact that over 100 apartments had to be scouted says it all: Overpriced vulgarity that’s used to launder money. Period.
7
Just don't let any of the characters run for president. It was a bad idea in the real world.
4
Whenever I watch television and cinema showing the lives of the rich and powerful such as Billionaires or the more historical Game of Thrones, I am utterly struck by how sick and miserable all the characters are.
2
This carrot-dangling of a lifestyle many wouldn't mind having, but most everyone will never have is dangerous. It makes us crazy and depressed when we can't even get a small piece of this pie. Some people will to do anything to get even remotely close to this lifestyle (lie, cheat, steal, step on others, etc.) It's kryptonite to our moral compass and creates way too many unresourceful negative behaviors. Watch PBS and join Rotary... it's much more worthwhile in my opinion.
2
“People imagine that it’s going to bring some meaning to them or satisfy some need,” he said. However, “rich people often describe themselves as feeling dead inside.”
It is that feeling of such false personal superiority based on what they have accumulated, that that makes everyone else (except other ultra-rich people) seem to them as meaningless. Such a world with so few "real" other people is empty. No wonder they feel dead inside.
In every moment we feel superior to other people that much we are dead too. Every person is the world that created them in smaller form. And to see other people as having less meaning than us is a stench in the nostrils of the Creator, or if you prefer, filth thrown on the name of the vast reality that gave them birth.
1
Of course, it's all fake, even if the props are real. What's unfortunately real, it portrays an all but hidden American Royalty of Wealth metastasizing in real time. Is there any evidence at all this is where the founding fathers wanted us to be? I can't find any unless the intent 231 years ago was to protect their own personal Royalty.
1
"Billions" is about far more than the window dressing that seems to be the target of many comments. It's a well-written, character-driven show and this display of material wealth is just background to create a sense of authenticity for a show about our new Gilded Age.
"Billions" is all about power--power derived from financial success or from political achievement. With so many people concerned about the rise of fascism in America, the connection between the two is a timely and important theme. It's also about the power of personality, the marketing of power, sexual power, etc.
With each season, characters accrue power, lose it, make alliances to reclaim it, scrabble back from defeat, sell a bit more of their souls, destroy the people around them, become outcasts, etc. It's about how money is the architect of America's class system and how our justice system is color-blind--it only sees green.
One of the great moments in this series was the last scene of the final episode of the first season. In a show dominated by men, a woman--wife to one, employee and confidante to the other--seems to have played them off each other (after being betrayed by both) and emerged victorious. And neither of them realize it. A ghost of a smile plays across Maggie Schiff's face as she allows herself a moment to savor victory but it's quickly replaced by her sober, disciplined demeanor. Caught between two self-destructive male egos, she walks away from the wreckage, unscathed. For now.
8
Another great scene was the one early on that revolved around the number fourteen.
@Boris, Natasha and the Deplorables exactly. The two men bumping bellies, vying for power, is very good. Both are corrupt.
@Boris, Natasha and the Deplorables
Mozel! You get the show. It’s fun and over the top. The writing is the appeal for me. I encourage everyone to watch it.
Being a Texan, I have family friends that have oil wells. One family I know has an income from oil wells averaging $8 million a MONTH. It makes me curious what one DOES with all that income...what a problem to have, huh?
Perhaps, that is why these shows are fascinating to many.
Succession is such a great show. It illustrates how the money is the powerful hand that rules the family dynamics. It can be so destructive, instead of being a blessing.
The healthiest family I've ever known was a family of 8 kids, single mother, poor, but so proud...they all loved and helped each other graduate college and their love was palpable at gatherings.
Sometimes, money can be a curse.
I still wonder how one handles 8 million a month!
7
What is this fixation on the rich? You people must have nothing to do. Get a job--get a life. There is nothing wrong with people being rich. If there was then so many people would not play the lottery with the hopes of winning the $1 billion drawing.
Just think if the tax rate was 70% on income as AOC says it should be, the winner of the $1.537 billion lottery in October, 2018, would have had $877.8 million pretax lump sum payout, and on that would have paid $614.5 million of federal tax. If from NY City, that person would have paid 8.82% NY state tax ($77.4 million) and 3.88% NYC tax ($34.1 million), for total taxes of $725.9 million, and net after tax cash winnings of $151.9 million. A lot of money, but I think most people would think this tax rate on their lottery winnings is unfair.
One would think that income derived from effortless luck ought to be taxed more highly than income from the expenditure of creative energy, so providing a special exemptions for lottery winnings isn't justified.
Besides, if all of the wealth in the country were evenly divided among everyone, within 5 years 50% of the people would be broke because they don't know how to handle money. They would waste resources. Better to keep wealth in the hands of those who know who to manage it, and create a system whereby if they cannot deploy it productively, it gets taken from them (i.e., capitalism--you lose your capital if you don't deploy it wisely).
2
I agree on the fixation on the rich. I just don’t get it.
2
@Hooey
Besides, if all of the wealth in the country were evenly divided among everyone, within 5 years 50% of the people would be broke because they don't know how to handle money
I agree with this.
@Hooey Nothing wrong with some wealth. And wealth redistribution historically has worked poorly. But there is something wrong with hoarding most of the private capital in a few hands. Democracy in untenable when a tiny few hold most of the wealth. Democracy requires two things to function well: a strong middle class and an honest bureaucracy. Both are under serious assault in this country, and should we reach a tipping point, many of the super rich might end up introduced to the guillotine. None of us want that scenario. We want more equitable distribution of wealth, not redistribution. Do you really think the CEO of an organization is worth 2,500 times more than one of his or her sales managers? What do they do to justify that?
4
My experience has been that rich people live in fear of losing their money. They relate to others as threats to their money, to cheat them or otherwise take it. It warps their lives in an ugly and unhappy way.
I'm not unique in seeing this. In 18th Century Britain, social comment was that wealthy families lived in fear of losing what they had inherited but could never earn back for themselves.
10
I distinctly remember as a kid in the early 1950s, that the term was: independently wealthy. I never met a billionaire but I’ve met quite a few millionaires almost all of whom are any but independent. When your house is too big, when you own too much land, when your business becomes responsible for the lives of numerous people, you’ve lost control of your time, lost your independence, you’re just plain wealthy.
1
I sometimes worry that shows like these are just a tactic to lull the working and middle classes into a state of false superiority. These shows portray the rich as having money, but lacking the "important things" in life. So, the average watcher eventually say "they can have their money--we have happiness and integrity!" And, yes, the wealthy are then all-too happy to take that money--and leaving the rest to believe that they are unhappier than average. I doubt that. I'm sure they have plenty of happiness.
It's similar to the movies lauding the working class in the 1980s--with the message that the common, hard-working man was so much better than the rich. "You can take my job but you can't take my integrity" seemed to be the subtext. And, well, they did. They took the jobs and the working class is not even portrayed in movies or tv anymore.
13
This is a very important point. I know several very rich people and not a one of them would describe themselves as “dead inside.” It’s nonsense. They are certainly not miserable and they aren’t all that different, either. They have the same tragedies as the rest of us, loss, children who disappoint, health issues, love life problems, lack of time, too many distractions, poor decisions, the list goes on. Having money rarely softens the blow it just removes one particular issue from the mix (not enough money) and adds another (how to manage all of it).
The quote “The rich are different” was from another era when wealthy families stuck together and dictated the life choices of family members: who they could marry, where they lived, what schools they could attended, what professions they could enter (or were not allowed to enter). All decisions concerned the wealth and status of the family. It was a very proscribed, old money life. These days old money isn’t what it used to be and most rich people are as free as you and me, just with a lot more money.
2
My father worked seven days a week for 52 years and died with an estate valued just over 35 million dollars.
I never once saw him happy
19
@Luciano and there are poor people who are never happy either.
I have worked in big metal fabrication shops with spaces 80' wide, 300' long, and 60' high. They may have 50 ton travel cranes spanning the width. The cranes are operated with button boxes 4'off the floor, hanging from pendants. They can lift just about anything short of a locomotive. You don't have to be rich to work there. It's a gas!
4
@Heckler
You, and the rest of us, make it possible for the rich to be idle....living off our sweat and blood lie the vampires they are.
I cannot watch Billions - I tell my friends it is enough to still be living in TriBeCa! I don't want to watch make believe jerks when I have to pound the pavement (briefly) with the real life ones.
I did succumb to Succession though but only because of Cox. What? I'm only human.
6
Billions of reasons to stay as far away from this as possible.
8
This is the saddest part of it all, "“Part of the fun of the way our audience experiences this wealth is by feeling how unimportant it is to these people,” Carter said." I wonder how many viewers are learning to be like the miscreants in the shows.
The wealth inequality we are being destroyed by today is monumental - and appaarently "unimportant" to those who inherited/stole it. It's sick.
This is a perfect example of why WE THE PEOPLE must DEMAND that the inherited/stolen wealth be taxed back at 99.9% and that the corporate, "non-profit", foundations, trusts, off-shore accounts and other entites that protect it be put out of business.
The 0.01% have had their run. They have no social conscience. OUR lawmakers must level the playing field - as Teddy and FDR/Elanor Roosevelt did in their time.
OUR lives and democracy depend on it.
19
Good conversation, books, a nice meal with beer and wine to start off with.
A good partner. Good friends. That is what life is about.
Would I like to be rich? Sure. Would I sacrifice my friends and family for it. No. But a guy like me never has to worry about making a lot of money. To make money you have to recognize the urge in others. One wealthy person's dreams are often built on the dreams of riches in other people. Stock market busts occur because there are many who want to be rich but the top is a narrow ledge where so many get knocked off. People who make money use others who also share such dreams. They use the same tailor. The world of the very rich seems to be that of rats running endlessly on their wheels who can never rest to relax in the sublime.
I think there are a lot of people who shun the trappings of the wealthy and, rather, value the human contact with those around them. That gives me hope for humanity. It is those who prize virtuous conduct in themselves and others; those who right the craft when it capsizes from the excesses of the rich and famous. Right now, we have a wave of idealism filling the sails of the democratic party. There are millions who see the dangers that come from the excessive greed of the Koch Bros, the Sheldon Adelsons, Trumps, Mnuchins, and from corporate execs at Exxon/Mobile, WalMart, etc. These are the real brokers of the future of our nation.
7
Yes shows about uber wealthy that make the main players in Hollywood uber wealthy.
2
Porn is, and always has been, bad for you....
11
When are Americans going to realize that they will never, ever attain this lifestyle and start to think about how to spread the wealth as opposed to fantasizing that it will be theirs?
48
@Jeffrey Gillespie I can understand fantasizing wanting to be comfortable, but not this. This misses the point. It's empty. vacant, unless you are deeply involved in and supporting the arts, education, medicine, especially the new generation of talented young people in all of these.
3
@Jeffrey Gillespie
"Lifestyle" is such a weak, flabby word. Anything described as lifestyle is beneath consideration.
1
We are getting real time insight into how the 1% lives with the ongoing scandal of bribery and skullduggery to get mediocre students into prestigious schools. One girl whose parents had paid over a half a million dollars to gain admission for her into USC, was given a heads up about the scandal while she was on the yacht of the USC President! While Trump is cutting millions from the education budget and Betsy DeVoss is essentially pouring money into schools that teach about Noah's Ark instead of evolution, the future of the U.S. is in jeopardy.
52
@Rena W.
Public education transpires in expensive new buildings. Meanwhile, the best young minds in the country are being instructed in converted barns and garages at prep schools.
1
The new and destructive normal of American values....
American culture has become completely aspirational.
Americans admire and emulate the super-rich.
And the super-rich as "deserving" of all - the luxury real estate that gentrifies cities, the tax breaks, everything actually....
No matter how low anyone's income, we now aspire to the luxury life style and believe we can attain it - a Lotto ticket, flipping a house, buying upscale brands that we can't afford.
(In my office, there are clerical staff with Canada Goose coats and Burberry jackets!)
Take a look - Trump's most fervent supporters admire the glossy excess lifestyle, the former nude model third wife etc).
Trump supporters don't want to tax millionaires because they think they might someday be millionaires themselves
Remember the old days when people admired TV characters like " The Waltons" or "My Three Sons"?
Long gone...
26
@LS
Agree 95%.
The other 5% I disagree with is your first sentence : "the new and destructive normal of American values…
The "robber barons", "tycoons", those who bought castles in Europe to rebuild them on the Hudson river or on various Xanadus sprawled in the country… belong to an already old American tradition that Th. Veblen's Conspicuous Consumption describes very well.
Be wary of this American mythology about American virtues of hardworking and community oriented men and women driven by puritanical values : they've always been for show.
At the time of the robber barons Jacob Riis‘ documented the tenements in New York in his book "How the Other Half Lives" (1890).
We naturally tend to look where the sun shines, but it never is the whole story.
Today things are different. Poverty is well documented and we all know that 25 millions of Americans live under poverty level : something must be done about it.
It must be done now, and by OURSELVES … Not in the future by a Koch brother who buys himself a new cloak of virtue of by benevolent maverick billionaire.
12
This has always been the American Dream.
@Becky B
I don't think the American Dream was to become a mogul… but rather being able to make a decent living in a normal life offered by the land of plenty.
The idea isn't the same… although the notion of what is "wealthy enough" can be slippery …
Gross. Money over family, community, moral integrity.
This does not end well, for anyone.
10
Billionaires are a dime a dozen these days. It's going to take a remarkably well crafted character to be memorable and/or define the era. But (dare we say it?) it's a rich vein- because, 'exploitation's the thing,' no? I like the zoo notion- both for the reference to extra special real estate with superior care and feeding, and to behavioral science- yes, put them all in a zoo where they can be studied for their superior traits. 'The Family Office' as the new Jeeves, with bribes for Junior's way into Yale, or running cover for that trip to the Little Orchids of Asia spa. And then there's politics! What fun.
3
I’d love to know who supplies the artwork at Damian’s office. Better than ArtForum!
If you watch TV in general, you are on the borderline of living a fool's life. If you watch shows about the ultra rich, you have definitely crossed that line. Is life so cheap that we can squander hours of our lives watching this junk? But, of course, everyone has a life to live of their own choosing, but it does seem a pity that many people will live a fool's life and, perhaps, realize it when they get to the end of it.
21
@Jack
Don't worry about them, they don't realize it.
Rich people are nothing but poor and middle class people with money. They have the same vices, problems, and dysfunctions as the rest of us but do them wearing nicer clothes and living in nicer surroundings. Ultimately, we all get old and death gets us in the end no matter how much money you have.
7
All of this billionaire and wealth worship is misguided. Those people don't get millions by ethical means, and no one human being should hold that much wealth. It's pathological. We've regressed terribly. Even Hollywood's portrayals of "average" people depict homes, furnishings, clothing and situations far beyond the reach of 90% of us. "All in the family" wouldn't even be attainable fir most people today.
5
To amass that kind of wealth, you had to step on a lot of souls to get it. If you live your life with honor, decency and fairness, you will remain tied to "middle class life" at best.
The truth is, no one with that kind of wealth is a good guy. I suppose that's why Billionaire and Succession are so fascinating to watch. The characters in these shows will stop at nothing (even turning on family) to safeguard their fortunes and legacies.
11
@Valerie
But hey, it's fiction designed to appeal to the lowest common denominator.
2
Get over it. The theater (or 'drama') has been a fantasy of the rich since the Greeks, about 2500 years ago. A fantasy of the modest or poor is meaningless. 90% of the population don't need to fantasize poverty or going paycheck-to-paycheck.
4
@Carling Valid point, but why "Get over it?" When a small group of individuals control a good portion of the entire planet's wealth, dealing with that becomes a debate critical to national security, or at least about what we are as a nation. A nation of a tiny number of super-wealthy surrounded by a mass of people reduced to serfdom is not a democracy, but it is a powder keg.
9
@Joe Yes; however, you may have missed my own point. The article has an edge of scorn and indignation, especially at the end, as if there were something perverse or anti-social about portraying the Rich and Fabulous. My point is that drama does not get critiqued by class politics unless the drama's fictional attitudes are political. Which would be self-defeating; a cast of 10 rich, reactionary, and stupid characters is a crude send-up, not a drama.
Also the L.A. and New York real estate reality shows feed into this. We used to think they were amusing, now turn my stomach turns after the tax cuts.
8
Try buying a house in LA buddy
You can only watch these shows as a kind of anthropological study, and I believe they do capture something of the class they're trying to portray. The paranoia, self-obsession, and lack of true self-esteem exemplified here does make one think about the Trumps and all their ilk.
4
@K Yates
" anthropological study," my foot! Those soap operas are invented by screenwriters, and not necessarily well paid screenwriters. TV is bogus.
1
@Heckler, I was speaking with mild irony. Truly.
Especially regarding the final comments of the article, it strikes me that the very wealthy do not even register the amazing views, etc. To reach that level of wealth you must be single-minded, which allows little time for personal growth or developing an appreciation for fine architecture, design, etc. The decoration that surrounds them must be the vision of someone else. I think that must be why we see the almost obscene prices for artworks. The buyers probably have little interest in the aesthetics, and see a Van Gogh as an asset rather than something of beauty. It's a pity more can't see the good they could do with their wealth.
11
@Joe This has not been my experience of the extremely wealthy. They purchase high-value art because they like it, they can have it, and it holds or grows in its value. I would certainly buy a Rembrandt if I could!
2
@Pizza Bones Thanks Pizza Bones. It's a valid point and I really want that to be true, but I can't completely believe it. I don't have experience of the super rich. The richest guy I know (a friend who lives in Danville) probably has about $30 mil and is a decent, regular guy. I don't begrudge him that wealth, but I know him well enough to know that he spent so much time working that he probably couldn't tell a Rembrandt from a Vermeer. I've been in the houses of many wealthy people through my work, and the taste runs more to bland tasteful landscapes or still lives by unknowns to anything fancy, although one did have a Miro. I guess my point is that most don't have the time to cultivate the interest, but do see a way to keep great wealth in a non-liquid/taxable way. Sort of a reserve fund maybe. And to show it off, but that is true of all of us.
@Joe
I suggest that Bill Gates stands your contention on it's head. Many other rich folk, as well.
1
If we as a society can find a way to redefine what success is - away from ideals of unsustainable excess and greed and towards what is "enough" - the world will be much better off.
17
Not all billionaires feel like they need to flaunt their wealth. It's worth noting, yet again, that Warren Buffet still lives in a modest house in Omaha. Of course, he probably has a vacation home in Aspen. According to the OC Register he is trying to sell the Laguna Beach home after lowering the price by millions. Maybe, that is the real difference between rich and middle class. You can lose millions and not worry about it since it's only a rounding error to your total net worth.
3
@Just paying attention Here in San Francisco many families with enough money to live in big piles in Pacific Heights, live in my decidedly more funky (but nice) neighborhood. They might drive a Prius, if they have cars at all, have very "lived-in" looking Victorian homes,
and they socialize with regular working folk (like me) rather than billionaires. I always assumed that they are trying to raise their kids in a more "normal" environment so they don't end up with lives like those portrayed on these TV shows.
@Just paying attention
There are many vacation homes in Colorado and at beaches. What's the big deal?
I overheard this morning that Axe Capital is short Boeing (BA) and is adding to the position.
Also hearing that the oldest Axelrod child jsut got in to USC to play water polo.
19
@Honest Abe
Water polo is brutal, IMO. The kid can have it.
This is a fantasy. Real rich people are very cheap, that's why they're rich.
I'm still waiting for the series about Warren Buffett's glamorous life reading 10-K reports.
4
Sure Billions is about money. But it's much more about relationships.
The psychologist who works for the billionaire is married to the prosecutor who's obsessed with bringing the billionaire down. Except now the 3 have formed a team-- maybe.
It's a great show.
13
I have occasionally visited the rich’s haunts. Islands, ships, coastlines, hotels, cultural events and fundraisers. Many simply DO NOT CARE. And they rarely encounter the 99%.
Our indignation does not affect them.
I advocate extremely high tax rates.
Extreme to us. Insulting to them. Tough toenails is an old expression.
92
I don't envy billionaires but I really enjoy "Succession," and I'm glad the creators of this and similar shows go to such trouble to create a realistic-seeming portrait of extreme wealth. I'm greatly troubled by the rampant inequality in our society, but at the end of the day I want escapism, and shows that feature strong casts, clever writing and attention to detail get my vote.
7
I look forward to the episode in which children are schemed into elite universities, they get caught, and then buy off the prosecutors. No, not really. Haven't watched and won't.
6
@Chrisinauburn Colleges court the children of billionaires. There is no need for scheming at that level because buildings simply don't name themselves.
1
Don't worry, Stephen, trust me, I won't tell a soul . . . your secret is safe!
"The paintings are scanned copies or pastiche — and the tapestries are not exactly priceless. The audience will never know,” said Stephen Carter, the current production designer.
2
I take solace knowing most of the actors themselves don't live that well, and the billionaires probably don't look as good as the actors. Petty, but comforting.
5
WEALTH PORN is correct. Glamorizing the new money plutocrats and oligarchs who comprise the 1% of the 1% is offensive and obscene. All of that money with no taste or civic sense. Gates and guards will not save them in the end when their over ostentatious lifestyles and "let them eat cake" attitudes cause the rest of US society to reject them in revulsion. The middle class has long been unable to afford to live in Silicon Valley as the 1% from all over the world have come there to roost. No more 49er football tickets for the middle class. The rich have bought them and don't even come to the games.
5
For a reality check, watch the documentary "Generation Wealth" where ex-billionaire hedge fund manager Florian Homm has finally realized that all the money in the world (and he had a lot!) can't buy you the love of your family.
8
Think of what these shows model: the conflation of self worth with net worth, the utter disregard for the consequences of one's actions and for those affected by them. It's also "reality" shows like Shahs of Sunset, all the "Real Housewives" franchise, the Kardashians, that can be considered wealth porn. It's utterly sickening to see the lives of these vapid, grasping people held up as something to envy and emulate. Nine years ago this newspaper featured a study which showed that the rich are less empathetic than the poor--a finding which surprised no one. Several more studies and articles in WaPo and Scientific American since then have reiterated this point. (Though simple observation of the ways in which the Waltons. the Koch brothers, Bezos, Adelson, and of course our fearless leader treat their employees is ample demonstration of conscience-less greed.) This skewed value system is the real "trickle-down." With intolerance, contempt, and arrogance toward all who are not inside the charmed circle, how can we hope to defeat the insurmountable problems--such as climate change-- facing us? Think of the irony of some penultimate future moment, in which the survival of humanity depends on people cooperating through completely selfless acts--but no such people can be found.
10
@Second generation I thought we weren't meant to judge people based on their economic position. For example, suggesting that the poor and unemployed are victims of their own lacking moral fiber and character. If that's so, shouldn't the rich be spared from your sanctimonious judgements?
2
I don't enjoy shows or movies like this glorifying the uber wealthy, crime, stardom, "reality" TV, celebrity, etc. It keeps us dumb and reinforces the false narrative of the American dream. It makes these people seem better or more valuable than us "plebs", which couldn't be further from the truth, because we are the ones who create the wealth, they likely just inherited it from someone else.
4
Ugh, all that blond trim? Puh..leaze. What are we in a prefab neighborhood? And those steel-framed armchairs? My elbows are cowering in fear! 4-inch recessed lighting? Somebody get me a bucket!!!
2
Queue the guest cameo by Bernie Sanders: ‘Wouldya look at these cathedral ceilings, fuggedah about it.’
I always thought it was obvious that the drive for wealth was to create heaven on earth. Now, I don't personally believe in a place called heaven, nor for that matter, any ethereal afterlife vacation spot, but I do share what other humans want, which is comfort and security. What I've heard about heaven from those who would like to go there is that it's all about comfort and security, forever.
Forever. That's the part where the billions come in. Billions is so big, so expansive, that it buys you lifetimes of comfort and security. It's not that people want the good times for a weekend vacation, they want it for eternity. Of course, things being what they are, most people have to settle for the weekend jaunt.
Ah, but then all the proverbs issue forth from those who have given all this lifestyle pap some thought, and they say that heaven cannot be fabricated by "stuff" anymore than the scenic designers and location scouts can but for an hour or two create a false pretense of wealth for the camera, and so too can the directors and producers but only hire actors to pretend the dramatic lives of the plutocrats are real, and yet still the audience members to this staging are to pretend the drama is real long enough to feel the same about it as they do heaven. That's porn part.
3
I love the new genre name "wealth porn."
1
Nothing wrong with the rich. They're just different. Like the poor.
2
Loved the behind the scenes info about the set, costumes and even the costume designers themselves!
Thanks for an entertaining article!
6
Oy vey! Such a fuss.
4
“Janet’s” comment about “embrace philanthropy”....I like that. Thank you. For the decent humanity.
When I think of what these riches mean for the other end of the economic scale, it just is disgusting and repugnant.
As I mentioned, it gets old.
10
@Jim
I started to reply to Janet's comment. So. I'll reply to this one.
Something we of the masses need to remember re: philanthropy - an entity worth 10 billion (or 10,000 million) could give away 99.9% of that and still have a cool million left.
Or, looked at another way, that entity donating $10, 000,000/year to charity would be comparable w/ the great majority of us donating around $100 (or less)/year.
So, let's not all get so overjoyed at the ultra-wealthy's philanthropy...
they are different from you and me.
basically the rich are screwed up.
6
@pamela Is it 'screwed up' to not have to shop at Target? Or ever to have to ask what something costs? Everything is relative.
4
@pamela Well, ordinary people today spend most of their days staring at their phones, doing the things with those phones that people who have those phones do with them.
I'm not sure how much a difference it is, these filthy rich folks sit in luxury doing and thinking the kinds of things people who do not have to deal with other people do and think.
In other words, both parties spend very little time interacting in real life with real people.
I am having a hard time figuring out where these people live. You get pro athletes, they build palaces and these are situated in gated communities, apart from the rest of the world.
I would imagine out of snobbery, if nothing else, the filthiest rich would require something beyond a gated community for where they will build their palaces.
If the world fell apart tomorrow and all the 1% were stuck in crowds with the rest of us, would you be able to tell who they are just by looking? Or by how they behave?
I have my doubts about that. The old, old money in this country, those families that still speak like Katherine Hepburn, they might stand out. Tech billionaires, not so much.
With the alarming growing gap between the rich and the poor,
this is just what we need...another "I'm Filthy Rich and You Poor Suckers are Not" TV series.
How about a documentary instead revealing how Donald Trump's tax cuts for the rich actually raised taxes for the middle class and poor in this country.
101
@JM I found an interesting graph a while back. Couple of months ago.
So the "gap" between rich and poor took off right around '96 or '97. Everything else aside, the current position on that graph began as the internet and corresponding tech really hit the mainstream.
So if you go back and you can find the data, you would see that the California gold rush of 1848 created the same disparity.
Industrialization has caused this several times. The people who can afford to invest and who invest successfully, they don't need some formal qualification to invest. No degree required.
So those people, the winners in the early decades of the internet's existence, represent the cause of the "gap." It is currently trending level. It will eventually trend closer to center, maybe exactly where it was before the tech boom.
It's easy to blame this on any number of characteristics of American society. If you can make the distinction, booms are a characteristic of the American economy, of successful capitalism. Society in general is apart from the economics of "booms."
I don't care for the filthy rich. As far as I know, they do not even exist, I expect I will never meet a billionaire. But these people took the chances and reaped the rewards. I don't believe this is justification for plundering their vaults.
2
@Marius Pudzianowski I have met a few billionaires, and I have no problem advocating for MUCH higher taxes on them.. They won't notice as much as their "advisors". We need to go back to Eisenhower era tax rates, to rebuild our country's crumbling infrastructure, for a start.
24
@JM
Right on, JM. Taxes raising for the middle class for sure - especially in NY, NJ, CT and CA with the loss of the deduction of SALT. The only true tax shelter (of sorts) for the middle class. Thanks a lot to the DH in the WH.
1
Yuck. I hope the programs are donating the costumes and the costs thereof to anti-poverty organizations. Clearly that would be the natural karma-offset that a wise, compassionate showrunner would be interested in. (Hah.)
9
Its quite funny to read all the comments here just dripping with denial and envy. The rich are "dead" inside. They are SO unhappy. (doesn't look much like that to me). You can't take it with you (Ya, but it's sure nice to have while you are here).
But then again - we elected the saddest Bozo of them all - a guy who has the "Envy & wealth lust" disease more than practically any small person around.
Outside of the really poor, most folks have it better these days than your average king in centuries past. We've got it extremely good and seems like we've never been less happy...
14
This article recalls a scene from Dicken's Tale of Two Cities:
"Drive him fast to his tomb. This, from JACQUES."
2
Nothing new about wealth porn, check out any Thin Man movie to know the masses what to see how the better half live...
3
Harmless, mindless entertainment? Don't think so. It is this type of aspiration and adoration that helped lead us to the gold-plated phony occupying the White House.
147
@Mikeyz--"Gold plated phony" is such an apt phrase!
8
Interesting, I watch "Billions" but find the most uninteresting thing about it to be the portrayals of the lifestyle of the 0.1%. It seems to be banal, contrived, or just downright stupid (like when they are eating "delicacies" with napkins over their heads). If that is what the actual super-rich are doing with their time and money, it is the best argument against the "trickle-down" theory I can think of...
3
I learned about the ortolan from this very newspaper:
https://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/15/dining/the-ortolan-a-tiny-songbird-as-a-french-cause-celebre.amp.html
3
My personal response is, “Meh,” but on a serious note, I just wish the reality-TV shows would stay on TV, not graduate to the White House.
37
I never watched or even understood the popularity of Dallas or Dynasty. Frankly, I never heard of this new show until "picking up" my digital NY Times this morning. What clap trap. Meanwhile literally billions of human beings struggle to get clean water and air, decent shelter and food. How do billionaires sleep at night? Or may be they pride themselves on not needing sleep.
3
@peter bailey Hey, Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous was an enormously popular show.
This country absolutely dotes on all things celebrity. Celebs are not the upper-upper crust, but you will never encounter any of them in line at the pharmacy.
The type of rich folks in these shows I've never heard of before, you don't know who they are, what they do, where they might live, nothing.
I do have a theory on the apparently irrational accumulation of more wealth that anyone can ever possibly spend.
My theory is, it's like the old arcade games. You get the high score, you enter your initials and you win until someone beats your score.
It's the most concrete guess I could make. No kidding, if I had more money than I could ever spend, first thing I'd do is hire a team of lawyers. They could cover my escape from society.
They can also distribute... I was thinking $25,000 to every person I ever knew and liked.
Then they can gain every assurance that my life living where no one can find me will continue. I might even decide to use some of my money to build a bonfire on a beach, because I was thinking I'd like to buy an island.
So rich that I could burn tens or millions of dollars in a bonfire and not even use it to cook hotdogs. Just burn the stuff and laugh.
@peter bailey And why would the NY Times waste newsprint on this nonsense when Flint, MI still doesn't have clean water to drink?
Now I like watching these shows for the decorations and clothing lol!!! I always look for ideas - there's nothing wrong with that.
1
If you think that you need to live in that cold, ugly, unwelcoming apartment to impress people, you are one pathetic excuse for a real person, with a gaping hole where your soul should be. A bit like Trump who incessantly needs to impress people with his "wealth" because that is the only standard by which he thinks people measure other people. People like him never understand that many of us regard that unrelenting need to impress as proof that he is really none of the things that he believes are impressive.
Nor do he and people like him ever grasp that some of the most genuinely impressive people you meet in life are materially impoverished while spiritually or intellectually wealthy. That is likely a bit too complex a thought for people who think that the watch you wear says all there needs to be said about you. It does, just not in the way they think it does.
5
@Bounarotti The best people in the world are materially impoverished.
What is it you consider impoverished? I bet the house I grew up in would suit you.
I've made a few decisions about people based on the fact that someone told me how much money they had, how their parents paid for everything, etc.
A couple of instances, I brought this up with such people. Each time was a mistake. I don't have to like someone having it so much easier than me, but in the end, it's none of my business.
I don't dwell on past mistakes, but those do crop up in my memory from time to time.
A lot of that has to do with growing up. When you're all grown up, even if you're out drinking and talking too much, those situations -- speaking out of turn about someone I really don't know -- no longer develop.
@Bounarotti
In the case of Trump, I have the feeling that the extreme bad taste of his Trump Tower apartment is just a show to make people believe he is wealthier than he really is. No wonder he doesn't want to show his tax returns.
1
I eagerly await the reboot of the Beverly Hillbillies. Jethro would look great in a cashmere hoodie and Ellie Mae can carry some critters around in her Chloe carry bag. They'll have to upgrade the mansion though; the one on the original show looks like a shotgun shack by 2019 standards. It would be great to have a scene where Granny chases away one of the Karsashians with her shotgun.
26
Yuck. These photos, especially the interiors are are cold and unbeautiful but not so luxurious. This is what some see as a model to aspire to or envy? What a complete waste of everything seems to be the model of behavior by this bunch.
Accumulating and coveting wealth for its own sake on this magnitude strikes me as a form of mental illness. No wonder so many in this sphere are so unhappy.
3
@Stephen Csiszar I read the part where it says that one apartment of palace, whatever it was, overwhelms visitors.
I can say with complete certainty that I would not find such places "overwhelming" in any way.
I would immediately notice the high ceilings. They make heating and air conditioning much more expensive propositions.
Inert observations like that.
@Stephen Csiszar
I keep seeing comments about how unhappy the truly wealthy are. You can't possibly know that. It's just wishful thinking on your part, a cliché to make everyone else feel better about not being wealthy.
Americans need to stop watching this garbage. Say no with your remote. Change the channel and watch a documentary about climate change.
33
@Sheila Blanchette Never watched, never will.
1
@Sheila Blanchette, These are well-written, well-acted shows. You are free to watch your documentary about climate change (is that the only other option here?) and be miserable. I'll watch my premium cable fictional dramedies and be entertained.
2
This apartment. Cozy, comfortable, beautiful... not! The design esthetic of millenials needs to be trashed.
If only Adorno and Horkheimer were alive to see current American Culture.
1
I will be reading some Adorno. Thank you.
The world worships shiny objects. There is no proof these lucky people have anything to add to society, even if they employ society. You are not adding to society when you pay people minimum wage....or the lowest rate to keep them.
In a fair world, that show would be satire and the premise would be ridiculed in public. But no. We have to live in a culture of stupidity and ignorance. This is what you get: just because we aren't feeding poor people to lions, does not mean we are any better than any culture before us.
2
@Mogwai In a fair world, inconsequential things like TV shows are not great grounds for railing against the content of them.
And you seem very sold on the incredibly popular concept of "culture." What you would call stupid and ignorant, I bet, is entirely borrowed from democratic agenda.
I'd call it ignorant, if not stupid, not thinking for yourself. To do that, you would need to familiarize yourself with ideas that run contrary to your own.
That's not a real popular thing to do these days. Not in this "culture."
P.S. When everything is a culture, nothing is a culture. And today, everything -- Everything -- is a "culture."
The stupidity and ignorance gets SOOO old doesn’t it?
I travel a great deal. Even to the mirror, so to speak (but at least I try), occasionally.
But indeed, s ‘n i is EVERYWHERE.
GAWD....It’s like dragging a ball and chain around.
Can't wait for the new season! I am rewatching earlier seasons just to enjoy Paul Giamatti and Damian Lewis. As well as the tasteful but expensive clothing and accessories worn by the lost soul, Wendy.
4
When I fantasize about hitting the lottery, the part that is most fun is thinking about how I will give it away.
59
Some wealthy Americans have taste, even when they came from the working class originally. I worked for a few of them in the last years of my career. Some were kind and gracious and some were arrogant and haughty. But the ones in mansions tend to have to have major protection for themselves and their families, from armed guards to Schutzen trained German Shepherds. Not a way I would want to live.
The old money British do it better. I stayed in a country house on 3000 acres while on a special garden tour many years ago and it had Aubusson carpets and original major paintings to say nothing of family portraits with the Queen. But the husband tended to live in jeans and old cashmere sweaters with holes in the elbows because he was managing the raising of pheasants and grouse as well as sheep. The sheep were mostly for atmosphere but the birds were for hunting parties that helped to pay the upkeep on a famous old house. And the wife arranged the estate visits to help her friends manage the upkeep of their properties which often included a chapel. One place where we lunched was in a mini-castle that had been used in a Woody Allen movie, had a special board room for business meetings and the host was a member of Parliament. The grounds were rented out for polo and cricket clubs and the chapel for weddings. All of these estates were entailed and often the oldest son did not want the responsibility so the property might go to a younger son or even a distant cousin.
6
@Julie Carter Hey, do you know of any of those British estates looking for a highly capable and fully competent adult male American?
I enjoy digging holes and swinging hammers. I'm good with physical labor. I'm good with many other things, too, but I feel people respect a person who whistles and sings along with the radio on some kind of construction project.
Please notify me if you hear of an opening. I've even been over there a couple of times and I loved it. The Irish might not like the English. The Scots may not like the English. The Welsh may not like the English.
But I like the English and I like the rest of them, too.
1
"At the end of the game, the king and the pawn both go back into the same box."
Italian Proverb
"Trying to quench the thirst for riches with money is like throwing butterfat on a fire."
Unknown
There is nothing admirable about lifestyles of the rich and famous, except for those who embrace philanthropy.
53
I know people are attracted to big, bright, sparkling things, but when you get on that merry-go-round of who has the biggest penthouse, car, plane or boat, it’s a futile time-consuming effort of the irrational among us.
The one important thing I learned from growing up with the rich back East during the 60s is that intelligent rich citizens do not flaunt their wealth. We lived right smack between 2 presidents of banks in Manhattan, and our homes, though being very attractive, were not the McMansions they live in today.
I've heard all sorts of horror stories about kidnappings and muggings, etc., and the victims are usually rich people who flaunt their wealth. When I go out to a shopping mall now, I use a regular nondescript car and dress maybe a step or two above a street person. When the muggers see me drive up, park and leave the car, they don't see me as a victim, they see me as their competition.
4
@Wally Wolf "when you get on that merry-go-round of who has the biggest penthouse, car, plane or boat, it’s a futile time-consuming effort of the irrational among us."
So you have discounted the possibility that these people engaging in time-consuming efforts to be less bored.
I think you maybe have not given much thought to boredom as a catalyst for all kinds of things and then it becomes the reward from such things.
It's a really cool concept. I read about it in a book. I may even have written that book under a pseudonym.
I haven't seen any of the TV shows mentioned here. But I'm reminded of an episode of "LA Law" wherein a young attorney, played by the actress Susan Dey, was very depressed over something and could do nothing other than waste her time.
They showed her laying in bed in the middle of the day watching, "Life Styles of the Rich and Famous."
I chose that moment to turn off my television and pick up a book.
3
As my Dad would say to us--"how much is enough?" Obviously, in the culture we live in, there is never enough.
5
@Amanda Jones Did you take your name from Some Kind of Wonderful?
That was Leah Thompson at her very most beautiful.
Right now, we have Buffett and Gates attempting to spend their entire fortunes on charitable donations before they shuffle off into eternity.
They are not having an easy time of it. In fact, though they have sent tons of money to various places, their net worths keep rising.
I figure, as more people with that kind of money realize they can't spend it if they tried... that their descendants, whoever they may be and no matter how stupid they are with money, won't be able to spend it all either...
I figure that will create a point at which more people with more money than they could ever spend will lose some of the motivation to continue raking it in hand over fist.
Check this out... NFL players simply, as a rule, do not retire until they can no longer play well enough to stay in the game. Great players stay into their mid and late 30s, a few remain longer.
In the past five years or so, though, a good number of top talents have said, I'm financially secure and independent, I can still walk without a cane, I'm a bit worried about head injuries.
Then they retire early. This will not continue to happen in only the NFL. People in all fields who realize that they can afford to enjoy the very best of the world during the best years of their lives will continue reaching the conclusion, I don't need any more money.
Thanks for offering a profile of two worthless and repugnant shows about the highly vile "high value" set. Both Billions and Succession are revolting. To say that "the design of these shows implies, more and less subtly, a critique of wealth itself," is questionable. They still rest on a worship of wealth. It they didn't, we'd have shows about how there are now as many people living in New York City's homeless shelters as during the Great Depression, and that seventy five percent are families with children. As if that wasn't bad enough, these shows are a boring. The purported dramatic tension of "Billions" is as undiscoverable as Donald Trump's tax returns.
Dallas (1978), and Dynasty (1981) existed in a different America where middle-class wealth still widely existed. Most Americans were too young to receive any advantage from it before it disappeared, and many have only heard of it, as if it was the Pleistocene.
"These shows may even provide a perverse comfort to the rest of us, reflecting how great wealth can often produce feelings of alienation." It is a cruel joke to even mention, just as it is no revelation that "the wealthy characters...often choose money over family, community or moral integrity", or that "Rich people often describe themselves as feeling dead inside.”
With the exorbitant cost of healthcare, medications, groceries, and housing, average people are struggling not to wind up dead all the way through, both on the outside and the inside.
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@Robert B Geez man, they’re just tv shows...
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@Robert B I could not stand Billions, where the standard scene is two men screaming about how big their "egos" are. And why are they screaming? Because the plot demands they yell and connive. The only motivation is the need to yell and throw a tantrum against that background of planes, antique rugs, and indoor pools.
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@Robert B
AMEN!
And this (ultra) wealth worship, I feel could have been the intended desired end of the media's wealth focus. For example, think about current advertising, every home, "get-together", vacation, etc depicted, alludes to levels of income (or even wealth), that most of us don't/won't ever attain.
My wife and I, at well above 100K combined household gross income (we have adult children and a grandchild in the house so that takes a toll) live nothing like the typical TV commercials "look", and never have.
So, I believe this possible conscious development of wealth worship could have been another step towards their further insulation. If we love/worship them we're much less likely, as a monolithic block, to demand some kinds of changes in our modern society.
The sooner the rest of us are completely "over it", it being our worshipful love affair w/ the absolute "stinkin" wealthy, the better!
Maybe then we can start down a more balanced and mindful path as regards extreme wealth disparity....
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Interesting.
Not one of the suits shown has gold buttons on the cuffs.
I used to work with some VERY wealthy people - men and women. From a distance you wouldn't think they were dressed any better than a good dresser. Up close the men (when they WORE suits!) often had solid gold buttons and diamond - BIG diamond! - cuff links.
That said, I live in Europe and gave up tv about 7 years ago. I can't BELIEVE there's a reboot of Dynasty! That deserves a search on the internet and a bottle of cold champagne (or gin. Irish, of course.).
Susan
ExPat in Ireland
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When I think about the great divide between the ultra wealthy and regular folks, I think, very simply, no one gets out of here alive, not even billionaires. It's something to ponder on a rainy day.
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@Wally Wolf
No one gets out of here alive, and no was asked, or could be asked, to be born. These might prompt the rich to ponder their part in the morality play.
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@Wally Wolf Why not ponder them sharing some of their wealth with the needy and many thousandaires of our world.
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@Wally Wolf
"no one gets out of here alive"
Something to ponder everyday when you stand in front of the mirror.
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The flavor of the interior decorator is spread throughout this spacious cold apartment and settings which feel chilly and impersonal to this viewer. There is a sense of blandness, a lack of warmth, where the blinded windows on a sun filled day in the library are depressive, clashing with a garish chandelier.
Space has become one of our most precious commodities, but one has to know how to use it to make it beautiful, and when visiting an acquaintance in his new apartment on Fifth many years ago, he pointed to an empty wall in passing, adding that he would search for a painting to cover this void. 'Perhaps the painting will come to you', I replied, 'give it some time'.
One does not have to be a millionaire, let alone a billionaire, to have a sense of good taste; but taste is subjective at best and is not always accompanied by an exquisite eye.
Ask yourself whether in two years from now or less, you will remember any of these rich photos here, and I will choose the accordion lamp shade to place in a yard sale.
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I can personally vouch for the authenticity of one of the more obscure sets on "Billions." In the first season, the psychologist maintains an office within the hedge fund headquarters to see her "patients' - the stressed traders, etc. I noticed on her bookshelf in one shot the emblem of a well-known publisher of psychiatric textbooks. I rewound, froze the frame, and on the bookcase were five or books that my late father, a famous psychoanalyst, had authored. My family and friends were extremely proud when I sent the image to them and I posted it on Facebook. I contacted Showtime to express our happiness to see my father "honored" in this way, but they sent a robo-email reply of "Thanks for watching!" - anyway it was a thrill. His books may also be on the shelf of Meryl Streep's psychologist in the movie "It's Complicated."
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“Let me tell you about the very rich. They are different from you and me. They possess and enjoy early, and it does something to them, makes them soft where we are hard, and cynical where we are trustful, in a way that, unless you were born rich, it is very difficult to understand. They think, deep in their hearts, that they are better than we are because we had to discover the compensations and refuges of life for ourselves. Even when they enter deep into our world or sink below us, they still think that they are better than we are. They are different.”
You probably know that quote is from F. Scott Fitzgerald, who died a has-been at 44, in a state of semi-solvency. It's from "The Rich Boy", written in 1924.
If pressed to name an actual rich person from 1924, most people will come up blank, or name Henry Ford, or a generic Rockefeller or Mellon.
Sic transit, and all that.
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@Steve Paradis Its a good quote but today's rich are different too.
Our nouveau riche came from upper middle class backgrounds and now have hundreds of millions. These people are more of a threat than the boring Kochs.
They really think they earned their $ through smarts, not getting lucky that a global stock market and investors not wanting to miss the next Facebook will invest in anything amplifies clicks (not even e-commerce with real $, just clicks!)
Believing so strongly in their own brilliance, they are now setting upon society to remake it in their idealized image.
Let the Kochs buy a new wing to Lincoln Center (where plays that mock them are shown) or a new library at Cornell (where students cheer their demise).
Our new $100 million overlords want to be far more ingrained in the nation's leadership and that should give us all pause.
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@Steve Paradis
And then there is this from the “Queen of Mean” Leona Helmsley:
“We don’t pay taxes. Only the little people pay taxes.”
https://www.forbes.com/sites/robertwood/2015/04/17/10-notorious-tax-cheats-queen-of-mean-leona-helmsley-proved-little-people-can-put-you-in-jail/#78d7f482d087
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@Arturo
You can thank our right wing dominated Supreme Court for making it easy for the uber rich to dominate our politics. Buckley v Valeo’s ridiculous ruling that money=speech and Citizens United opening the floodgates to corporate spending on elections. (I know, I know, they can’t give directly to candidates. Just super pacs that can game the system and spread dishonest propaganda with no consequences.
27
I’m tired of billionaires. Like many people, I wouldn’t mind an extra $10,000 a year, but that would do me. I don’t want to have to worry about paparazzi or being kidnapped off the street. I don’t like that billionaires keep wanting to make even more money. Why? What does it do for them? Do they simply collect money the way other people collect dolls or stamps?
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@Carol M, People who acquire great wealth (as opposed to those born into it) do so by having an intense focus on only one thing: accumulating wealth. Think Donald Trump, for example, who can only understand government policy by asking "what is in it for me, how do I benefit" (and never "what is in it for my country, how do the American people benefit").
This single-minded focus on wealth accumulation that leads to your first 10 million (most of them start with at least a few million) will stay with you to your first 100 million and your first billion. It's who they are; it's all they care about. They are always looking over their shoulder at someone richer, some new level of wealth and privilege to obtain. You'd almost feel sorry for them for missing out on so much that life has to offer except, of course, they have so much.
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@Bill
There isn't a shred of proof anywhere that Donald Trump is a billionaire. He might be billions in debt but as far as net worth he is fake news.
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@Bill
Trump also expresses glee for policy by stating that"our military is now rich!'.
Or 'we should sue them and make lots of money'.
For whom exactly?
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Succession is just awful, the writing, acting, plot (if there is one) would receive a failing grade in junior high school literature and drama. Billions, while campy and absurd, plays on conflict and tension and is somehow brilliant in causing the viewer (or this one) to be conflicted in pulling for both Chuck and Axe! Meanwhile I do believe the character of Tailor rounds out the comic book financial cast of super heroes in a brilliant way. Malkovich has to go - so corny. I often google various items Axe has in his possessions starting with the Italian bicycle he gave away in season 1. I believe I found it for about $25,000.
14
@Righty ‘Succession’ definitely is over the top. But I find myself trying to figure out which Trump family member is which character. So maybe there is a touch of realism..
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@Concerned MD
I love Succession. Found it wildly entertaining, and the bachelor party episode was one of the funniest and most entertaining hours of television I've seen in the past year, easily.
9
I have to agree that some of the jets often featured in these shows about living a billionaire lifestyle are planes that if I was a billionaire, I too wouldn't be caught dead in. Trump gets that and that is why he has a custom Boeing 757.
Unlike the much adored Gulfstreams of the millionaire class, the 757 has much more room and is significantly more spacious. Tall persons don't need to duck walking down the center of the aircraft.
But if you are Saudi rich, and Trump doesn't come close, then a custom wide-body is the way to go. There is nothing like a good wide body aircraft to make you feel like you have truly landed.
Now admittedly, Trump has been able to temporarily upgrade to perhaps the finest wide-body in the world, that 747 that can survive the electronic devastation of a nuclear electro-magnetic pulse, that can refuel in mid-air, that can take-off and land on even the most meager of runways. But its just a rental.
So a word of advice to the producers of these shows, keep it real please.
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I always love the ladder in the library thing. So stereotypical. And we know they don’t read.
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@Concerned MD,
Perhaps this is a 'Fake Library', and the ladder gives it a sense of reality. My parent had one for his small family library collection, the latter old and an historical one, but if he had found me on the ladder, not only would he have been stunned, but an explanation would have been expected and I would have been in high dudgeon.
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@Miss Ley in real life the one thing that all billionaires do, statistically, is read books. It's funny to me that they are glamorized as non-readers in fiction.
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@Concerned MD
It's there as an excuse for the ladder they didn't have to climb …
5