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Directed by lauded filmmaker and photographer Lauren Greenfield, who won the U.S. Directing Award for Documentary Film at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival for this film, The Queen of Versailles is a character-driven documentary about a billionaire family and their financial challenges in the wake of the economic crisis.
With epic proportions of Shakespearean tragedy, the film follows two unique characters, whose rags-to-riches success stories reveal the innate virtues and flaws of the American Dream. The film begins with the family triumphantly constructing the biggest house in America, a 90,000 sq. ft. palace. Over the next two years, their sprawling empire, fueled by the real estate bubble and cheap money, falters due to the economic crisis. Major changes in lifestyle and character ensue within the cross-cultural household of family members and domestic staff.
Magnolia Pictures will release The Queen of Versailles July 20th.
 
Directed and Produced by
Lauren Greenfield
Produced by
Danielle Renfrew Behrens
Executive Producer
Frank Evers
Executive Producer
Dan Cogan
Co-Producer
Rebecca Horn Black
Co-Executive Producers
Allison Amon & Lisa Mehling
Julie Parker Benello
Abigail Disney & Pierre Hauser
Patricia Greenfield & Gerry Grossman
Lilly Hartley
Mette Heide
Patricia Lambrecht
Jeffrey Tarrant
Director of Photography
Tom Hurwitz, ASC
Music by
Jeff Beal
Edited by
Victor Livingston
Sound Recordist
Michael Jones
Additional Editing
Brian Johnson
Adam Parker
Additional Photography
Shana Hagan
Sarah Levy
Lauren Greenfield
Still Photography
Lauren Greenfield
Field Producers
Rebecca Horn Black
Julie Frankel
Associate Producer
Jasmin Chang
Presentation Reel Producer
Molly O’Brien
Consulting Editors
Kate Amend A.C.E
Mary Lampson
Research Associates
Anna Laurent
Sandra Keats
Keri Oberly
Assistant Editors
Darmyn Calderon
Robin August
Additional Sound Recordist
John Slocum
Key Production/ Camera Assistants
Joshua Butt
Caitlin Nicole Williams
Production Assistants
Rachel Bujalski
Meaghan Henry
Keri Oberly
Drew Smith
Key Grip
Shiloh Eck
Aerial Photography Pilot
Preston Ewen
Post Production Supervisor
Todd King
Visual Effects Supervisor
Andy Goldman
Title Designer
Andy Goldman
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“GRADE A! SUCCULENTLY ENTERTAINING. The next big documentary-as-cultural touchstone.” – Owen Gleiberman, Entertainment Weekly
“A SPRAWLING, RICHLY DETAILED STUDY OF AMBITION, DESIRE AND THE WILD SWINGS OF FORTUNE. A gaudy guilty pleasure that is also a piece of trenchant social criticism. If this film is a portrait, it is also a mirror.” – A.O. Scott, NY Times
“**** SPELLBINDING. ATTENTION MUST BE PAID. An appalling, absorbing and improbably affecting portrait.” – Ann Hornaday, Washington Post
“**** AN INDELIBLE PORTRAIT OF AN AMERICAN FAMILY. You wonder if decades from now, Greenfield's documentary will be considered a key artifact of an era.” – Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune
“***1/2. I FIND THE SIEGELS FASCINATING.”- Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times
“**** It plays like a Christopher Guest parody of the financial crisis.” – Ben Kenigsberg, Time Out Chicago
“**** ASTOUNDING AND FASCINATING. A tremendous documentary packed with terrific details.” – Matt Pais, Chicago Redeye
“EXCELLENT AND UNEXPECTEDLY NUANCED.” – Sheri Linden, LA Times
“***** STARTLINGLY CANDID. Through a clear lens unclouded by politics or blame, it offers insight into the hazardous American practice of living beyond our means.” – Amy Biancolli, SF Chronicle
“SUPERB. BEAUTIFULLY CONSTRUCTED AND FREQUENTLY UPROARIOUS. It’s an astonishingly candid, surreal, unsparing yet sympathetic fly-on-the-wall view of life among the One Percent. IT'S "REAL HOUSEWIVES" MEETS "CITIZEN KANE." – Colin Covert, Minneapolis Star-Tribune
“ALMOST SHAKESPEAREAN. Love 'em or hate 'em -- or love 'em and hate 'em -- there's no denying they are mesmerizing.” – Chris Hewitt, St. Paul Pioneer Press
“JAW-DROPPING. EYE-OPENING. A FILMMAKING COUP. It combines the soul-revealing artistry of great portraiture and the head-shaking revelations of solid investigative reporting.” – Steven Rea, Philadelphia Inquirer
“THERE’S MORE GOING ON HERE THAN CLASSIC DERISION. It prompts us to think hard about what, exactly, we believe we’re entitled to.” – Ty Burr, Boston Globe
“Hilarious and upsetting. Like a Theodore Dreiser novel for our time, infused with the vivid, vulgar spirit of reality TV. It’s often laugh-out-loud funny, but also has elements of profound tragedy and allegory.” – Andrew O’Hehir, Salon
“DELICIOUSLY APPALLING. Their lives take on a surreal, and eerily fascinating, squalor.” – Joe Morgenstern, Wall St. Journal
“FASCINATING. Director Greenfield has crafted a rather brilliant metaphor for the runaway American dream.” – Claudia Puig, USA Today
“A brilliant metaphor for everything screwed up about the U.S. economy and the culture that shaped it.” – David Edelstein, New York
“RIVETING.” – Whitney Matheson, USA Today
“The movie has pulled off a small miracle: You become absorbed in the lives of these people for who they are and not what they own.” – Rene Rodriguez, Miami Herald
“JAW-DROPPING, FRIGHTENINGLY HILARIOUS.” – Lou Lumenick, NY Post
“**** COMPULSIVELY WATCHABLE.” – Elizabeth Weitzman, NY Daily News
“****” – Charles Ealy, Austin-American Statesman
“IRRESISTABLE.” – Leah Rozen, The Wrap
“YOU COULDN’T INVENT A BETTER METAPHOR FOR AMERICA’S ECONOMIC INSANITY.” – Peter Keough, Boston Phoenix
“FASCINATING. What ultimately makes the film so intriguing is Jackie herself.” – Tricia Olszewski, Washington City Paper
“UNEXPECTEDLY MOVING.” – Sean Burns, Philadelphia Weekly
“OBSCENELY ENTERTAINING.” – Dennis Harvey, SF Bay Guardian
“Hilarious, infuriating, timely and involving. A barbed comedy of manners; an emotionally acute portrait of a marriage and family on the verge of collapse. Regards its all-too-vilifiable subjects with a complexity that should impress viewers of all economic and political persuasions.” – Justin Chang, Variety
“GRIPPING. A minutely observed implosion of the American Dream, packed with pathos over a predicament not commonly associated with the nation’s reviled 1 percent: losing everything because of the shaky economy.” – Chris Lee, The Daily Beast
“The perfect lens through which to view the bursting of the country’s economic bubble.” – Jeremy Matthews, Paste
“MASTERFUL. A wickedly funny allegory about the American dream, greed, and privilege, the film is packed with quotable one-liners and is entertaining and engrossing throughout.” – Liliana Greenfield-Sanders, The Huffington Post
“A sad, funny film, full of the wonder of opulence and the shock of decay.” – Noel Murray, Onion AV Club
“Greenfield’s vision of a strain of nouveau riche both made and broken by imaginary economics stays with you: it's the wake-up call her subjects deserve.” Karina Longworth, LA Weekly
“An oddly spellbinding, must-see documentary. A portrait of American cluelessness by way of absurd financial irresponsibility, and a cautionary tale about the cost of living an unexamined life.” Jeffrey Wells, Hollywood Elsewhere
“Fascinating. A revenge fantasy for the 99 percent” – Daniel Fienberg, Hitfix
“Hilarious – I was captivated. An equal-parts moving and funny post-recession commentary on the American Dream.” – Christie Ko, ScreenCrave
“A compassionate film that still packs a punch.” Amanda Mae Meyncke, Film.com
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