Inside the Epic Downfalls of WeWork, the “Vegan Bernie Madoff,” and Spain’s Former King

A special delivery from the Vanity Fair Archive View in your browser | Update your preferences     A daily digest of things to discuss over drinks March 19, 2022 Five stories of botched experiments and spectacular failures ripped from the pages of the Vanity Fair Archive.   The Boy Who Cried Work Adam and Rebekah Neumann grew WeWork to a $47 billion valuation by convincing mentors like Masayoshi Son and Jamie Dimon, along with much of Wall Street, that he had a near-mystical understanding of the working style of millennials. Then, on the eve of its IPO, people realized it was just a real estate company. Inside the crash of a unicorn. R E A D  M O R E »     The Runaway Vegan With customers such as Chelsea Clinton and Alec Baldwin, Sarma Melngailis's raw-vegan restaurant made her a food-world star. Then, in 2011, she met Anthony Strangis. In 2016, facing prison for larceny and fraud, Melngailis said she was still trying to understand the spell he cast. R E A D  M O R E »     It Seemed Like a Good Idea (at the Time) Launched with a blast of Instagram glamour—Bella Hadid! Kendall Jenner! Coachella in the Bahamas!—2017's Fyre Festival became one of the biggest debacles in music-festival history. Stranded concertgoers expecting private villas found wet tents, drunken chaos, and no musical acts. How did an ambitious hustler from New Jersey end up believing his own bull? Bryan Burrough followed the trail of then 25-year-old Billy McFarland. R E A D  M O R E »     The Epic Fall of Michael Avenatti Stormy Daniels's former attorney is a hyperaggressive narcissist with shadows in his past—which made him a perfect adversary for Donald Trump. For a few months, the #Resistance hero even thought he could be president. Then the past caught up with him. R E A D  M O R E »     King and Controversy For decades, Spain's Juan Carlos was one of the most powerful and popular monarchs in Europe, hailed as the father of his country's democracy. Then 2013 hit him with a crisis: his younger daughter and her husband enmeshed in a corruption scandal; his marriage to Queen Sofía on rocky terrain; his relationship with a glamorous German businesswoman under scrutiny. Bob Colacello got the latest from the inner circle in Madrid. R E A D  M O R E » Get on the list Subscribe to our Hollywood newsletter for your essential industry and awards-season news, every day. Sign Up Now     This e-mail was sent to you by VANITY FAIR. To ensure delivery to your inbox (not bulk or junk folders), please add our e-mail address, vanityfair@newsletter.vf.com, to your address book. View our Privacy Policy Unsubscribe Copyright © Condé Nast 2022. One World Trade Center, New York, NY 10007. All rights reserved.