Post by printo316 on Mar 31, 2024 20:35:01 GMT -5
The Billionaire Boys Club, or BBC, was an investing and social club organized by Joseph Henry Hunt (born Joseph Henry Gamsky) in Southern California between 1983 and 1989. It was originally simply named "BBC", the initials of Bombay Bicycle Club, a restaurant Hunt had frequented as a young man in Chicago. The "get rich quick" schemes the group offered to clients added up to what was essentially one big Ponzi scheme.
The club enticed the sons of wealthy families from the Harvard School for Boys (now Harvard-Westlake School; not affiliated with Harvard University) in the Los Angeles area with get-rich-quick schemes. Due to the reputation of the organization for being composed of young, inexperienced men from moneyed families, it was jokingly referred to as the "Billionaire Boys' Club". Hunt himself came from a single-parent family in the lower-middle-class suburb of Van Nuys and was able to attend the Harvard School only with the help of scholarships.
In 1984, Hunt was arrested for murdering Ron Levin, the group's main investor and himself a con artist, and Hedayat Eslaminia, the father of one of the club's members.
In 1987, NBC aired a miniseries based on the story of the Billionaire Boys Club, starring Judd Nelson as Joe Hunt, Brian McNamara as Dean Karny, and Ron Silver as Ron Levin.
On July 17, 2002, TruTV aired an episode of Dominick Dunne's Power, Privilege and Justice titled "Billionaire Boys Club", presented by author Dominick Dunne, which summarized the events surrounding the "club" and the kidnapping, murders, and trials. Investigation Discovery's Behind Mansion Walls revisited the case in the 2011 episode "Fatal Greed".
A feature film titled Billionaire Boys Club starring Ansel Elgort as Joe Hunt, Taron Egerton as Dean Karny, and Kevin Spacey as Ron Levin was released in 2018. The film debuted to a dismal opening night, grossing a meager $126.00, mainly due to the involvement of Spacey, who months earlier had been accused of several instances of sexual harassment and sexual assault. Judd Nelson, who played Hunt in the 1987 miniseries, played Hunt's father.
The true-crime podcast series Hollywood & Crime, narrated by actor Timothy Olyphant, covered the subject in the summer of 2020.
The club enticed the sons of wealthy families from the Harvard School for Boys (now Harvard-Westlake School; not affiliated with Harvard University) in the Los Angeles area with get-rich-quick schemes. Due to the reputation of the organization for being composed of young, inexperienced men from moneyed families, it was jokingly referred to as the "Billionaire Boys' Club". Hunt himself came from a single-parent family in the lower-middle-class suburb of Van Nuys and was able to attend the Harvard School only with the help of scholarships.
In 1984, Hunt was arrested for murdering Ron Levin, the group's main investor and himself a con artist, and Hedayat Eslaminia, the father of one of the club's members.
In 1987, NBC aired a miniseries based on the story of the Billionaire Boys Club, starring Judd Nelson as Joe Hunt, Brian McNamara as Dean Karny, and Ron Silver as Ron Levin.
On July 17, 2002, TruTV aired an episode of Dominick Dunne's Power, Privilege and Justice titled "Billionaire Boys Club", presented by author Dominick Dunne, which summarized the events surrounding the "club" and the kidnapping, murders, and trials. Investigation Discovery's Behind Mansion Walls revisited the case in the 2011 episode "Fatal Greed".
A feature film titled Billionaire Boys Club starring Ansel Elgort as Joe Hunt, Taron Egerton as Dean Karny, and Kevin Spacey as Ron Levin was released in 2018. The film debuted to a dismal opening night, grossing a meager $126.00, mainly due to the involvement of Spacey, who months earlier had been accused of several instances of sexual harassment and sexual assault. Judd Nelson, who played Hunt in the 1987 miniseries, played Hunt's father.
The true-crime podcast series Hollywood & Crime, narrated by actor Timothy Olyphant, covered the subject in the summer of 2020.