November 11, 1974
Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, USA
The Wolf of Wall Street true story confirms that, like in the movie, Stratton Oakmont was the name of the real Jordan Belfort's Long Island, New York brokerage house. Belfort and co-founder Danny Porush (played by Jonah Hill in the movie) chose the name because it sounded prestigious ( NYTimes.com ). The firm would later be accused of manipulating the IPOs of at least 34 companies, including Steve Madden Ltd. (their biggest deal), Dualstar Technologies, Paramount Financial, D.V.I. Financial, M. H. Meyerson & Co., Czech Industries, M.V.S.I. Technology, Questron Technologies, and Etel Communications.
Belfort's Stratton Oakmont brokerage firm ran a classic "pump and dump" operation. Belfort and several of his executives would buy up a particular company's stock and then have an army of brokers (following a script he had prepared) sell it to unsuspecting investors. This would cause the stock to rise, pretty much guaranteeing Belfort and his associates a substantial profit. Soon, the stock would fall back to reality, with the investors bearing a significant loss. -NYTimes.com
At its peak in the 1990s, Stratton Oakmont, Belfort's firm that he co-founded with Danny Porush, employed more than 1,000 brokers. -TheDailyBeast.com
No. "We never abused [or threw] the midgets in the office; we were friendly to them," Danny Porush (the real Donnie Azoff) says. "There was no physical abuse." Porush does admit that the firm hired little people to attend at least one party. Jordan Belfort's memoir The Wolf of Wall Street only discusses the tossing of little people as a possibility, not something that actually happened. -MotherJones.com
The events in The Wolf of Wall Street movie took place during the late 1980s and early 1990s. Jordan Belfort and Danny Porush founded the brokerage firm of Stratton Oakmont in the late 1980s. The securities fraud and money laundering charges brought against the firm involved companies that Stratton Oakmont helped raise money for in public stock offerings from 1990 through 1997. In 1996, Stratton Oakmont was banned from the brokerage industry, which eventually forced the company to close its doors. -NYTimes.com
No, at least not according to the former co-founder and president of the Stratton Oakmont brokerage firm, Danny Porush (portrayed by Jonah Hill in the movie). The real Porush says that he is not aware of anyone at the firm calling Jordan the "wolf." Porush says that it's just one of a number of exaggerations and inventions in both Belfort's book and the movie. -MotherJones.com
Yes. In exploring The Wolf of Wall Street true story, we learned that Jordan Belfort claims to have met Matthew McConaughey's character's real-life counterpart, Mark Hanna, in 1987 when he was working at the old-money trading firm of L.F. Rothschild. His new acquaintance was an uproarious senior broker at the firm and introduced Belfort to the excess and debauchery that Belfort would later make a daily staple at Stratton Oakmont. Like in the movie, the real Mark Hanna behind McConaughey's character told Belfort that the key to success was masturbation, cocaine and hookers, in addition to making your customers reinvest their winnings so you can collect the commissions. -TheDailyBeast.com
Yes. In The Wolf of Wall Street movie, Jordan Belfort (Leonardo DiCaprio) is shown snorting cocaine off a prostitute's backside and nearly crashing his private helicopter while high on a cocktail of prescription drugs, including Quaaludes, morphine and Xanax. In researching The Wolf of Wall Street true story, it quickly became clear that Belfort used drugs heavily in real life too. In his memoir, he states that at times he had enough "running through my circulatory system to sedate Guatemala."
Yes. Belfort was known to stir his troops into action by belting out words of motivation through a microphone. However, his speeches were often filled with more self-adulation than DiCaprio's speeches in the movie.
The real Jordan Belfort claims this is true in his memoir. The female employee let them shave off her blonde hair for $10,000, which she used to pay for D-cup breast implants. Co-founder Danny Porush also says that the shaving took place, "...the worst we ever did was shave somebody's head and then pay 'em ten grand for it," says Porush. -MotherJones.com
Yes. The character in the movie, Brad Bodnick, who has a goatee and is portrayed by The Walking Dead 's Jon Bernthal, is based on Jordan Belfort's real-life Quaalude supplier, Todd Garret. In his memoir, the real Jordan Belfort claims that Garret sold him approximately 10,000 Quaaludes.
No. According to co-founder Danny Porush (played by Jonah Hill in the movie), the scene where Leonardo DiCaprio's character pals around with a chimp is pure monkey business. "There was never a chimpanzee in the office," says Porush. "There were no animals in the office...I would also never abuse an animal in any way" (though he does admit to eating the goldfish, see below). -MotherJones.com
Yes. According to Jordan Belfort's memoir, the real Donnie Azoff (whose actual name is Danny Porush) did marry his first cousin Nancy "because she was a real piece of ass." After twelve years of marriage, the couple divorced in 1998 after Danny told Nancy that he was in love with another woman ( NYPost.com ). Danny and his ex-wife share three children together.
Though the movie and Belfort's memoir might seem like gross exaggerations of the truth, depicting heavy drug use and sexcapades in the office during trading hours, they're not exaggerations at all says the F.B.I. agent who finally took Belfort into custody, "I tracked this guy for ten years, and everything he wrote is true." Kyle Chandler portrays the agent in the Martin Scorsese movie. -NYTimes.com
Yes, but according to Belfort the car wasn't a Lamborghini like in the movie, it was a Mercedes. He was so high in a drug daze that he couldn't remember causing several different accidents as he tried to make his way home. In real life, one of the accidents was a head-on collision that actually sent a woman to the hospital. -TheDailyBeast.com
Yes. According to the real Donnie Azoff, whose actual name is Danny Porush, the scene where Jonah Hill's character eats a goldfish is based on a true story. "I said to one of the brokers, 'If you don't do more business, I'm gonna eat your goldfish!'" Porush recalls. "So I did." -MotherJones.com
In one scene of The Wolf of Wall Street movie, bricks of cash are taped to a Swiss woman's body. "[I] never taped money to boobs," the real Danny Porush says (played by Jonah Hill in the movie). According to Jordan Belfort's memoir, the event did happen but his partner Porush wasn't there. -MotherJones.com
Yes. As shown in The Wolf of Wall Street movie, Steve Madden had been a childhood friend of Belfort's partner Danny Porush (renamed Donnie Azoff in the movie and portrayed by actor Jonah Hill). Their fondness for drugs and alcohol reunited the two of them. During the initial public offering of his footwear company, Steve Madden Ltd., Madden acquired a large number of shares of his company, which were actually being controlled by Belfort and his firm, Stratton Oakmont. Once shares became available to the public, Stratton Oakmont got down to the business of selling them to unsuspecting suckers. Billing Madden's company as the hottest issue on Wall Street, Belfort's brokers in turn drove up the price. Eventually, Steve Madden was to sell off his shares when the hype was at its peak, just before the stock began its inevitable decline. Similar to what is seen in the movie, Belfort still maintains that Steve Madden tried to steal his Steve Madden shares from him. However, Jordan Belfort did make approximately $23 million in two hours as part of the deal with Steve Madden, who would later be charged as an accomplice to Belfort's scheme. -NYTimes.com For his part, Steve Madden was sentenced to 41 months in prison and was forced to resign as CEO of Steve Madden Ltd. He also resigned from the company's board of directors. However, he did not leave the company entirely. He kept his foot (or shoe) in the door by giving himself the title of creative consultant, for which he was well-compensated even while he was in prison. -Slate.com
Yes. In real life, Belfort's 167-foot yacht, which was originally owned by Coco Chanel, sunk off the coast of Italy when Belfort, who was high on drugs at the time, insisted that the captain take the boat through a storm ( TheDailyBeast.com ). Listen to Belfort tell the story during The Room Live 's Jordan Belfort interview . As he states in the interview, his helicopter didn't fall off the boat during the storm like in the movie. Instead, they had to push the helicopter off of the top deck of the boat to make room for the rescue chopper to drop down an Italian Navy commando.
FBI agent Gregory Coleman, renamed Patrick Denham for the film and portrayed by actor Kyle Chandler, made tracking Belfort and his firm, Stratton Oakmont, a top priority for six years. In an interview ( watch here ), Coleman says that the factors that drew his attention to the firm were "the flashiness, the brashness of their activities, the blatantness of the way they were soliciting people and cold calling people, and the number of victims that were complaining on a daily basis." -CNBC
Yes. The Wolf of Wall Street movie shows Jordan (Leonardo DiCaprio) hitting his wife (Margot Robbie) with his hand and fist. According to his memoir, he actually kicked his wife Nadine down the stairs while he was holding his daughter. She landed on her right side with "tremendous force."
Yes. In real life, he put his daughter Chandler in the front seat of the car without a seat belt on, before crashing it through the garage door and then driving full speed into a six-foot-high limestone pillar at the edge of the driveway. Like in the movie, he was high at the time.
When he was finally arrested in 1998 for money laundering and securities fraud, Jordan Belfort was sentenced to four years in prison. This was after agreeing to wear a wire and provide the FBI with information to help prosecute various friends and associates. In the end, the true story reveals that he served only 22 months in a California federal prison. His cellmate in prison was Tommy Chong of "Cheech and Chong" fame, who was serving a nine month sentence for selling bongs. -TheDailyBeast.com
It wasn't so much a what as it was a who. Tommy Chong (one half of "Cheech and Chong") was Jordan Belfort's cellmate in prison. After laughing at some of Belfort's stories from his days running the firm, Chong encouraged him to write a book. -TheDailyBeast.com
Jordan Belfort attempted to model his writing after Hunter S. Thompson ( Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas ), who was known for using plenty of exclamation points.
Danny Porush, renamed Donnie Azoff for the movie and played by actor Jonah Hill, served 39 months in prison for his part in the corrupt dealings of Stratton Oakmont, the firm that he co-founded with Jordan Belfort. Porush currently runs a medical supply business in Florida, where he lives with his second wife Lisa in a $4 million mansion. A 2008 Forbes article pointed out his company's fraudulent tactics, which included trying to persuade people to order diabetic supplies and getting them to provide information about their physicians that could be used to bill Medicare. A number of complaints surfaced accusing Porush's company of sending unsolicited packages that were accompanied by unexpected Medicare charges. Back in 2001, Porush was arrested in connection to a fraud scheme surrounding Noble & Perrault Collectibles, a company that sold commemorative coins over the phone. Victims saw their credit cards charged repeatedly, at times for thousands of dollars, while often never receiving any merchandise for purchases that were largely unauthorized to begin with. -Sun Sentinel Enjoying a well-to-do life in Florida, Daniel Porush and his wife drive matching Rolls-Royce Corniche convertibles. With regard to The Wolf of Wall Street movie, Porush said, "I really have no comment other than to say I would never try to profit from a crime I'm so remorseful for." -NYPost.com
Catching the Wolf of Wall Street includes more of Belfort's outrageous stories that were not included in his first book. As we investigated The Wolf of Wall Street true story, we discovered that Jordan's books, The Wolf of Wall Street and Catching the Wolf of Wall Street , netted him a $1 million advance from Random House. He also earned $1 million for the film rights to his story ( TheDailyBeast.com ). In a response to criticism over these profits and future profits from the movie, Jordan Belfort said the following via his Facebook page, "I am not turning over 50% of the profits of the books and the movie, which was what the government had wanted me to do. Instead, I insisted on turning over 100% of the profits of both books and the movie, which is to say, I am not making a single dime on any of this." According to Jordan, the money is being used to pay back the millions still owed to those who were scammed by his brokerage firm Stratton Oakmont.
Yes, the real Jordan Belfort appears at the end of the movie as the person who introduces Leonardo DiCaprio's character before he takes the stage at his Straight Line seminar.
Yes, but only loosely. The brokerage firm in the movie Boiler Room , released in 2000, was inspired by the illegal practices of Jordan Belfort's Stratton Oakmont firm. In the movie, actor Ben Affleck portrays Jim Young, the Belfort-esque co-founder of the firm, who, like Jordan Belfort, trains his brokers in the "pump and dump" scheme. -NYTimes.com
Watch The Wolf of Wall Street movie trailer. Also, view Jordan Belfort interviews and home video footage of him speaking at a Stratton Oakmont party in the 1990s.
Jordan Belfort Speaks at the Stratton Oakmont Christmas Party (1994) The real Jordan Belfort speaks at the 1994 Stratton Oakmont Christmas party. He tells the firm's employees that he is "proud" of what he has accomplished and that the employees should also be proud of the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity they have been given. At the end, he shares a moment with co-founder Danny Porush (Jonah Hill in the movie). The video was posted by Mary Detres, author of the book , which provides an insider's account of what it was like to work at the notorious brokerage firm. |
Jordan Belfort Interview Grant Lewers interviews Jordan Belfort on in 2010 about his memoir . Belfort talks about his life and what led him to start his firm. He offers his four keys to success that he teaches during his seminars and he recounts various stories, including his drug addiction, the story about his yacht sinking from the book, and trying to commit suicide. |
FBI Agent Gregory Coleman Interview (2007) This CNBC interview is from 2007, around the time of the release of Jordan Belfort's first memoir . Following a brief interview with Belfort, during which he describes himself as an "arch-criminal" who was in a way a "cult leader," FBI agent Gregory Coleman speaks about why he was so determined to catch Belfort. |
The Wolf of Wall Street Trailer 2 The second trailer for the Martin Scorsese movie , based on the autobiography of the same name by Jordan Belfort. The movie stars Leonardo DiCaprio, Matthew McConaughey and Jonah Hill. |
The Wolf of Wall Street Trailer Martin Scorsese directs Leonardo DiCaprio in the film adaptation of Jordan Belfort's memoir chronicling his life as a fast-living, corrupt stockbroker during the 1990s. Belfort's criminal ways caught up with him in 1998 when he was convicted of securities fraud and money laundering for which he spent 22 months in Federal Prison. |
How accurate the wolf of wall street is to the true story.
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What happened to the real jordan belfort after the wolf of wall street, netflix's emily henry movie adaptation adds four new cast members, including good place & you stars.
Martin Scorsese's The Wolf of Wall Street is based on the true story of the infamous rise and fall of American stockbroker and criminal Jordan Belfort. Leonardo DiCaprio plays Belfort in the movie, exploring his outrageous lifestyle, the various figures in his life, and the crimes that led to his downfall. The dramatized version of events depicted in the movie rings mostly true to the 2007 memoir of the same name. However, there are a lot of criticisms of how Belfort depicts himself and the truth, including from people featured in The Wolf of Wall Street.
The real Jordan Belfort of The Wolf of Wall Street story has been called a manipulative conman by many, so it's plausible that his memories and anecdotes of the events depicted in the movie and book are flawed and exaggerated to suit his allegedly inflated self-image. A number of real-life sources have spoken out about the inaccurate depiction of events in Belfort's story, hinting that Belfort's fraudulent sensibilities might have fooled Hollywood as they did on Wall Street.
From voiceover narration to dark humor, The Wolf of Wall Street exhibits many of the stylistic trademarks of its director Martin Scorsese.
Various successes and failures depicted in the movie came from belfort's own admission.
There are several key details in Martin Scorsese's The Wolf of Wall Street that have been confirmed to be true based on Belfort's representation of himself and his brokerage firm Stratton Oakmont in his memoir. According to the memoir, Belfort actually had his in-laws smuggle money into Switzerland banks, and Stratton Oakmont really helped make the luxury shoe line Steve Madden go public. The depiction of Matthew McConaughey's The Wolf of Wall Street character Mark Hanna is also based on Belfort's description, including Hanna's crude philosophy that the key to success was masturbation, cocaine, and sex workers.
Other details in the movie that were accurate to Belfort's memoir include: Donnie Azoff (inspired by the real-life Danny Porush, played by Jonah Hill in the movie) did marry his cousin before later divorcing her, Belfort sunk a yacht in Italy that was once owned by Coco Chanel, and he did crash his helicopter trying to land while he was high. Most notably, Belfort truly did serve a reduced prison sentence after informing on his friends . He did not try to save Porush (Azoff) from incriminating himself, as is displayed in the film. He informed on Porush in real life.
Scenes in Accurate To Jordan Belfort's Memoir |
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Belfort's in-laws really smuggled money into Switzerland banks |
Stratton Oakmont really made luxury shoe line Steve Madden go public |
The depiction of Matthew McConaughey's character, Mark Hanna |
Donnie Azoff really married his cousin (he later divorced her) |
Belfort really sunk a yacht in Italy that was once owned by Coco Chanel |
Belfort really crashed his helicopter while high |
Belfort really served a reduce prison sentence for informing on his friends |
The depiction of belfort's crimes has become a controversial topic for the movie.
The Wolf of Wall Street has been criticized for how much it downplays the victims of Belfort's crimes, and it largely focuses on him ripping off the wealthy. According to the New York Times , Belfort targeted people from all types of financial backgrounds to buy his worthless stocks.
One California man used his home equity line of credit to invest with Belfort and has been impacted financially ever since (via New York Times ). The depiction of Belfort in Scorsese's movie as being some type of voice of an underprivileged class who was righteous in turning the system on its head and against itself has been debated since the film's 2013 release.
The real-life Donnie and Naomi also dispute a lot of what happens in both Jordan's memoir and Scorsese's movie. Nadine Macaluso, who is represented by the character Naomi, played by Margot Robbie in The Wolf of Wall Street , claimed that the movie was mostly accurate through Jordan's perspective, but not through an objective lens or with consideration to Nadine's point of view concerning their marriage. Nadine went on to get a Ph.D. and became an expert in relational trauma ( via The Independent ).
Danny Porush told Bustle that most of the film is completely fictitious, claiming that nobody in real life ever called Belfort the "Wolf" nor was there any throwing of little persons or chimpanzees that took place in the office.
As crazy as it seems, The Wolf of Wall Street was based on the true story of Jordan Belfort, who went on to deal with the consequences of his actions.
Does the movie glorify jordan belfort.
The glorification of the debauchery surrounding Belfort's lifestyle and business practices is suitable to the mystique around whether or not the film depicts real events. This disparity in what is actually true in the movie and memoir versus what other real-life parties have to say about fabrications is part of its reckless and dysfunctional appeal.
Even Scorsese himself came under fire for celebrating the corrupt actions of the bonafide con artist in his film, which is meant to be seen as an overarching satire of capitalism rather than a stamp of approval for Belfort . Regardless of its degree of accuracy, The Wolf of Wall Street is a wildly entertaining exercise on limitless greed.
Belfort has become more famous thanks to scorsese's movie.
While Jordan Belfort and his past crimes helped him make a name for himself after his time in prison, Martin Scorsese’s movie has further raised the man's profile. In the years following the release of The Wolf of Wall Street , Belfort has become more well-known as a pop culture figure and he continues to parlay the success of the movie into his own personal success .
Jordan Belfort’s net worth in 2024 might be significantly less than what he was making at the peak of his criminal activity, but he is still amassing a fortune thanks largely to his career attending speaking engagements. Much like with the movie itself, it has been debated whether Belfort’s speeches were taking responsibility for his crimes or celebrating the debaucherous lifestyle he participated in. Since the release of the movie, Belfort has released two books, 2017’s Way of the Wolf: Straight Line Selling: Master the Art of Persuasion, Influence, and Success and 2023’s The Wolf of Investing.
In 2020, Belfort sued producers of The Wolf of Wall Street for fraud, asking for $300 million in compensation. Belfort maintained that the producers of the company Red Granite were involved in a multi-million-dollar embezzlement scheme and used stolen money to buy the movie rights to his story. As of the filing of the lawsuit in 2020, there has been no news on the case.
Source: The New York Times , Time , The Independent , Bustle
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Directed by Martin Scorcese, The Wolf of Wall Street tells the true story of stockbroker Jordan Belfort (Leonardo DiCaprio), based on his memoir of the same name. It chronicles the rise of Belfort and the subsequent corruption of his firm as he engages in a wide assortment of criminal acts while amassing a staggering fortune. Jonah Hill, Margot Robbie, and Kyle Chandler also star alongside DiCaprio.
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The true Jordan Belfort yacht story is as strange and unbelievable as the hit movie The Wolf of Wall Street depicts it to be. There are several insider stories behind the sinking of the mighty yacht that are not widely known but are quite interesting and different from the reel version in several ways.
What happened to the Jordan Belfort yacht Nadine? As the movie, The Wolf of Wall Street shows, the superyacht Nadine sank close to the coast of Sardinia in 1997 while battling what many calls “the storm of the century”. Jordan Belfort narrates the event in detail in the memoir describing his life in the 90s, which is what the Martin Scorsese movie is about.
Did the yacht scene in The Wolf of Wall Street actually happen? The Jordan Belfort yacht sinking scene in The Wolf of Wall Street was heavily inspired by a real-life event, though the movie did take some creative liberties. For one, the yacht was called Naomi in the reel version since the name of Belfort’s wife (played by Margot Robbie) was changed in the movie. In reality, the yacht was named Nadine.
The movie captured each passenger’s fear and stress when the yacht got caught up in the 70-knot storm. There is some hilarity when Belfort starts yelling for his drugs to avoid the horror of dying sober. Several rescue attempts were made, but each was called off due to rising risks. By some twist of luck, the yacht’s engine room remained undamaged primarily for a while, because of which they were able to make their way through the sea.
The 167 ft Nadine, as its former passengers claim, was beautiful. When owned by Coco Chanel under the name Matilda, the yacht had five staterooms, large dining areas, and a helipad. The interiors were furnished with dark teak paneling. Each new owner customized the yacht’s name and interiors based on their tastes.
Martin Scorsese got the yacht Lady M to represent Nadine onscreen. While Nadine had a luxuriously vintage charm, Lady M is a modern vessel with contemporary features. Lady M was manufactured in 2022 by Intermarine Savannah, while Nadine was built in 1961 by Witsen & Wis. The 147 ft Lady M is currently worth $12 million and is similar to Benetti yachts in its glamorous design.
The entrepreneur and speaker Jordan Belfort’s shenanigans are well-known thanks to his detailed memoir and the hit movie based on some parts of his life. He spent 2 years in prison and now has practically negative net worth at 59 years of age. Yet, his extraordinary motivational speaking skills continue to attract and inspire people even today. It is easy for anyone watching the movie to wonder if many of the incidents are exaggerated. But considering Belfort’s eccentric life, even the Nadine sinking incident remains another regular anecdote shared in the movie.
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We sort out what’s fact and what’s fiction in Martin Scorsese's glitzy new film about a real-life scammer
Drugs, prostitutes, crashed helicopters — the debauchery in The Wolf of Wall Street is so outlandish that audiences might leave the theater thinking director Martin Scorsese took plenty of creative license in telling the story of Jordan Belfort, a New York stock broker who conned his way to earning hundreds of millions in the 1990s. But Scorsese’s film closely follows Belfort’s own memoir , also titled The Wolf of Wall Street .
That said, Belfort glorifies his vulgar antics in his book, so how much of his account is truly real is up for debate. After all, Belfort was a scam artist — he made a living by lying. Scorsese, knowing this, portrays Belfort ( Leonardo DiCaprio ) as an unreliable narrator in the film (see: the changing color of the car in the first scene and the driving while high on Quaaludes episode).
TIME fact-checks the movie against Belfort’s books (he also wrote a sequel entitled Catching the Wolf of Wall Street ) and a series of Forbes articles that have followed Belfort’s scheming.
Belfort’s first boss told him the keys to success were masturbation, cocaine and hookers. Ruling: Fact
According to the book, a broker named Mark Hanna (Matthew McConaughey) gave him this advice early on in his career.
Belfort and his partner owned shares of a risky stock and had their brokers at Stratton Oakmont brokerage aggressively sell the stock to inflate the price. They then sold the stock themselves to turn a profit. Ruling: Fact
Belfort and Danny Porush (called Donnie Azoff in the film and portrayed by Jonah Hill) utilized this age-old pump-and-dump scheme to get rich quick after graduating from scamming middle-class people into buying worthless penny stocks at a 50 percent commission.
Forbes magazine exposed Belfort, calling him a “twisted Robin Hood.” Ruling: Fact
Though Belfort wasn’t on the cover, Forbes did run a profile of him in which they called him “a twisted version of Robin Hood, who robs from the rich and gives to himself and his merry band of brokers.” Though it was a scathing portrait, the promise of quick $100,000 commissions brought job applicants to Stratton Oakmont in droves.
Stratton Oakmont took Steve Madden public. Ruling: Fact
Steve Madden did give a speech the day of the IPO, to which the Stratton Oakmont brokers responded with jeers. Madden, Belfort and Porush owned most of the stock and drove up the price. Belfort, Porush and Madden all went to jail for their scheme.
Belfort laundered his money into Swiss banks using his in-laws. Ruling: Fact
His wife’s mother and aunt both helped smuggle the money into Switzerland .
Now for the really ridiculous stuff…
Danny Porush (Donnie Azoff) was married to his cousin. Ruling: Fact
They’re now divorced.
The driving on Quaaludes scene. Ruling: Mostly fact
It was a Mercedes, not a Lamborghini. But the rest is true to Belfort’s memoir.
The office parties included a “midget-tossing competition.” Ruling: Fact
…According to Belfort.
The company billed prostitutes to the corporate card. Ruling: Fact
…And wrote them off in their taxes.
He crashed a helicopter in his front yard while high. Ruling: Fact
On a related note, he also did at least attempt to sober up in real life.
He sunk a yacht in Italy. Ruling: Fact
And the yacht used to belong to Coco Chanel.
He called his trophy wife “duchess.” Ruling: Fact
Though her name was Nadine, not Naomi.
He served a reduced prison sentence after ratting on his friends. Ruling: Fact
Turns out Belfort was even more of a jerk than they show in the movie. In the film version, Belfort tries to save his partner from incriminating himself. In reality, Belfort ratted out his partner Porush, among others, for a reduced sentence (the two reportedly no longer speak). Belfort spent only two years in prison and had Tommy Chong (of Cheech and Chong) as his cellmate. Chong convinced Belfort to write a memoir.
He scammed only the rich. Ruling: Fiction
Some writers have criticized Scorsese for portraying Belfort’s lifestyle as glamorous without showing the victims of his scam. Though Belfort claims in his book and in the film that he only took from the wealthy, the New York Times reports that many small business owners are still trying to recover financially from Belfort’s scheme. (The government claims Belfort has failed to pay his restitution, and reports suggest that Porush is still running get-rich-quick schemes.)
The yachting disaster is one of the most dramatic scenes in Martin Scorsese’s blockbuster The Wolf of Wall Street , and like many of the tales in the Leonardo DiCaprio flick, it’s based on a true story. In real life, predatory tycoon Jordan Belfort bought a yacht in 1993 called Big Eagle and renamed her Nadine , after his English-born second wife. The vessel had been built in 1961 by Witsen & Vis in Holland for fashion icon Coco Chanel, but had undergone many transformations by the time Belfort got his mitts on it. Originally 121 feet long, in the 1970s she was extended by nearly 15 feet, and in 1988 she was cut in half and had another 29-foot section grafted on, finally totaling 167 feet.
The luxury yacht used in Scorsese’s film actually bears little resemblance to the Nadine , being a far more modern vessel. The director hired the 148-foot Lady M , built by Intermarine Savannah in 2002 and refit in 2011, for filming. It features luxury accommodations for 10 guests, and a marble and granite interior with gold accents.
In Coco Chanel’s day the yacht was mainly used to cruise from Monaco to Deauville for the summer horse racing season. The real Nadine sank in 1997 during a storm off the east coast of Sardinia while crossing from Porto Cervo to Capri, much as the movie depicts. Belfort has said that his insistence on sailing in a storm caused the yacht to capsize. Luckily, everyone on board at the time was rescued by the Italian coast guard.
Jared Paul Stern, JustLuxe's Editor-at-Large, is the Executive Editor of Maxim magazine and has written for the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, the New York Times' T magazine, GQ, WWD, Vogue, New York magazine, Details, Hamptons magazine, Playboy, BlackBook, the New York Post, Man of the World, and Bergdorf Goodman magazine among others. The founding editor of the Page Six magazine, he has al... (Read More)
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A few weeks after biden was first elected to the u.s. senate, his wife and 1-year-old daughter were killed in an automobile accident while christmas shopping., david mikkelson, published sept. 28, 2020.
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Biden has at least twice publicly stated or suggested that the driver of the truck that struck his wife's vehicle, killing her and the couple's daughter, had been drinking, even though the driver was not charged with drunken driving (or any other infraction suggesting fault on his part).
No definitive evidence exists to prove or rule out whether the other driver had been drinking, and belief that drinking had contributed to the crash was reportedly prevalent among the local community and not something Biden simply made up on his own.
The seminal moment in the career of Joe Biden occurred in November 1972 when, as a 29-year-old lawyer whose only previous political experience was as a member of the New Castle County Council in Delaware, he pulled off an astounding upset victory over a Republican incumbent and won election to the U.S. Senate by a mere 3,162 votes.
Six weeks later, however, before he had assumed office, Biden's life took the most tragic of turns when his wife Neilia and their 1-year-old daughter, Naomi, were killed in an automobile accident. For the ensuing 36 years of his Senate career, Biden famously commuted via Amtrak to Washington, D.C., from the family home in Wilmington, Delaware, daily in order to be home for his sons Beau and Hunter, who had been severely injured but survived the crash that killed their mother and sister.
As in any such tragedy, one of the paramount questions is: what caused the fatal accident? Neilia Biden's station wagon was broadsided by a tractor-trailer truck at an intersection, but who — or what — was the underlying cause of the accident?
Social media posts circulated during Joe Biden's 2020 presidential run declared that Biden had misrepresented the accident as being the fault of a drunken driver, and even that Biden had deliberately lied about it:
It is true that at least twice, Biden has publicly stated or alleged that the driver tractor-trailer who hit his wife's station wagon had been drinking. During a speech he gave at the University of Delaware a week after the 9/11 terror attacks, for example, Biden said:
To the loved ones of the victims, there is nothing really we can say to erase this tragedy. And, those of you who think it's presumptuous of me to say that ... in a different circumstance, I got one of those phone calls ... I got a phone call saying, "Your wife's dead; your daughter's dead." And I've only said that three times in public before. But, I say it here because it's so important for you to understand. I got one of those phone calls. It was an errant driver who stopped to drink instead of drive and hit a tractor-trailer, hit my children and my wife and killed them.
And in December 2007, while stumping for the Democratic presidential nomination in Iowa City, Biden said the following while answering a voter's question about negative campaigning:
"Let me tell you a little story," Mr. Biden told the crowd at the University of Iowa. "I got elected when I was 29, and I got elected November the 7th. And on Dec. 18 of that year, my wife and three kids were Christmas shopping for a Christmas tree. A tractor-trailer, a guy who allegedly -- and I never pursued it -- drank his lunch instead of eating his lunch, broadsided my family and killed my wife instantly, and killed my daughter instantly, and hospitalized my two sons, with what were thought to be at the time permanent, fundamental injuries."
The accident took place at the intersection of Limestone and Valley Road in Hockessin, Delaware. At the time, it was a remote, rural section of New Castle County, described as follows by a probationary volunteer fireman who responded to the scene and attended the driver of the tractor-trailer:
Limestone Road was a popular trucker shortcut in the Piedmont foothills leading from Delaware into Pennsylvania. The intersection with Valley Road was extremely dangerous, located at the bottom of two steep hills. Truckers traveling in either direction used the momentum coming down one hill, in order to climb the other. The speed limit on Limestone Road, at the intersection, was 35mph and huge REDUCE SPEED signs were posted a half-mile in both directions. Whether Curtis Dunn was speeding is unknown, but he had applied his brakes, which was apparent from twin 150 ft. skid marks.
But as Politico noted in a 2009 profile of Biden, the other driver was not charged with drunken driving, or anything else that would indicate fault on his part. Based on evidence and witness accounts, it appeared that Neilia Biden had pulled into the truck driver's right of way at an intersection with a two-way stop, and the tractor-trailer driver was unable to stop in time to avoid striking her vehicle:
The driver of the truck, Curtis C. Dunn of Pennsylvania, was not charged with drunk driving. He wasn't charged with anything. The accident was an accident, and though the police file no longer exists, coverage in the newspapers at the time made it clear that fault was not in question. For whatever reason, Neilia Biden, who was holding the baby, ended up in the right of way of Dunn's truck coming down a long hill. "She had a stop sign. The truck driver did not," Jerome Herlihy told me. He's a retired judge who then was a deputy attorney general and once was a neighbor to Biden and remains friendly. A pal of Biden at the time asked Herlihy "to go out to the state police troop where the driver of the other vehicle was to make sure everything was going all right," and so he did. "In the end," Herlihy said, "I concurred in their decision that there was no fault on his part."
Does this mean Biden was untruthful — even lying, perhaps — when he implied that Dunn had been drinking? According to Lou Angeli, the fireman referenced above who treated Dunn at the scene, observed, no evidence definitively establishes or disproves that point:
In regards to intoxication, there was no way to determine if Mr. Dunn had been drinking, since neither of the police officers had breathalyzers aboard their cruisers. His injuries were such that his demeanor was similar to that of someone in a stupor, but those of you who serve in emergency medicine know that such behavior is often presented by victims who are in shock, or perhaps even diabetic. I've learned that all of the records pertaining to this accident are lost. It doesn't surprise me. Back then our ambulance incident report was filled out on a 5x7 card and filed away in a box. Once a month the information was transferred to a master list, which was later placed in storage. If Mr. Dunn was intoxicated, there was no way to determine that at the hospital either, since alcohol blood tests were not mandatory in 1972. The hospital records are missing, as well as the police reports.
Angeli asserted that this alleged aspect of the accident wasn't a "lie" Biden simply made up out of whole cloth, and that right or wrong, rumor and belief that drinking had contributed to the crash was prevalent among the local community:
To be honest, those of us in fire-rescue here in Delaware assumed that Mr. Dunn had been drinking, based on comments made by police officers at the scene. And in the Delaware fire service, rumors travel from station to station like wildfire. Until he remarried in 1977, whenever Joe Biden attended a public safety event, parade or spoke during a firehouse banquet, police officers and firefighters would approach him and discuss the accident and the tragedy of his wife Neilia and daughter Naomi falling victim to a drunken driver. Imagine how those discussions must have affected the young Senator.
Either way, we didn't turn up any instances of Biden's having publicly raised the issue in the last 13 years, and Biden has since apologized to Dunn's daughter, while his spokesman declared that Biden now "fully accepts the Dunn family's word that these rumors were false":
Biden called [Dunn's daughter Pam Hamill], she told me. "He apologized for hurting my family in any way," she said. "So we accepted that -- and kind of end of story from there." She sounded tired, and tired of talking about this. Maybe [Biden] was merely passing along rumors he had heard from investigators and others. A now-dead emergency worker who was on the scene that day suggested as much ... Or maybe Biden was engaging in what grief expert Rob Zucker described to me as "a retelling of the horror." It's something people sometimes do, he said, tweaking facts, shifting blame, if nothing else to make the grief more "palatable." "It's a common challenge bereaved parents in particular struggle with after a sudden, violent death. I think the fact that he has this way of sometimes understanding the story is really an expression of the challenge for any person to go forward in their lives," Zucker added.
Angeli, Lou. "The Biden MVA: The Response I Can't Shake." Fire-Rescue-EMS Around the World . 26 March 2009.
CBS Evening News . "Driver in Biden Crash Wanted Name Cleared." 24 March 2009.
Kruse, Michael. "How Grief Became Joe Biden's 'Superpower.'" Politico . 15 January 2019.
David Mikkelson founded the site now known as snopes.com back in 1994.
PORTICELLO, Italy — Survivors of a storm that sank a superyacht off Sicily recounted their ordeal to one of the doctors who rushed to their aid, with some saying it took mere minutes for the 180-foot ship to go down.
Dr. Fabio Genco, head of the Palermo Emergency Medical Services, told NBC News on the phone Thursday that he arrived in the seaside village of Porticello before dawn Monday, about an hour after the $40 million Bayesian sank in the violent and sudden storm.
Of the 22 people onboard, 15 survived despite storm conditions and darkness, climbing onto a lifeboat before being rescued by a nearby sailboat. The crew members have made no public statements so far, though some have been interviewed by investigators.
“They told me that it was all dark, that the yacht hoisted itself up and then went down,” Genco said, recounting what the survivors told him. “All the objects were falling on them. That’s why I immediately made sure, by asking them questions, if they had any internal injuries,” he said.
It appears they had just minutes to abandon the sinking ship, Genco said.
“They told me that suddenly they found themselves catapulted into the water without even understanding how they had got there,” he said, “And that the whole thing seems to have lasted from 3 to 5 minutes.”
Giovanni Costantino, CEO of The Italian Sea Group, which owns Perini Navi, the Bayesian's shipbuilder, told Sky News that there were no flaws with the design or construction of the yacht. He said their structure and keel made boats like that “unsinkable bodies.”
In an interview with the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera, he disavowed responsibility, blaming instead the actions of the crew. “Mistakes were made,” he said.
Genco said one of his colleagues who arrived at the scene before him initially thought that only three people survived, but the coast guard reported there were other survivors and more emergency services were called in.
When Genco arrived, he found scenes of panic and despair.
“Unfortunately, we are used to such panic scenes because we are used to the shipwrecks that happen on Lampedusa ,” Genco said, referring to the island southwest of Sicily, where the wreckage of boats carrying migrants on the sea journey from North Africa to Italy are often found .
Six of the passengers were declared missing Monday, and by Thursday, the bodies of five had been recovered from the wreck , some 160 feet underwater.
Among those who survived is Angela Bacares, wife of the British tech mogul Mike Lynch , whose body was recovered Thursday.
Another survivor has been identified as Charlotte Emsley, 35. She told the Italian news agency ANSA that she had momentarily lost hold of her year-old daughter, Sofia, in the water but managed to retrieve her and hold her over the waves until a lifeboat inflated and they were pulled into safety.
Dr. Domenico Cipolla at the Di Cristina Children’s Hospital in Palermo is also part of a team of medical professionals treating the shipwreck survivors. He told the BBC on Wednesday that Emsley and her daughter, as well as the father of the child, who Cipolla said also survived, are continuing to receive psychological help.
“Psychological support was constant and is constant even today, because basically it is the wounds of the soul that are the most in need of healing in these cases,” Cipolla said.
Genco also told NBC News that he was especially concerned about the child. “She did not understand anything. She was soaking wet and cold,” he said.
Karsten Borner, the Dutch captain of the Sir Robert Baden Powell, a yacht that was anchored near the Bayesian, said by phone Wednesday that he saw a thunderstorm come in at around 4 a.m. local time (10 p.m. ET) Monday, followed by what looked like a waterspout, a type of tornado that forms over water.
The International Centre for Waterspout Research noted on X that there was a “waterspout outbreak” off Italy on Monday, the day the Bayesian sank.
“I turned on the engine and made maneuvers so that we wouldn’t collide with the Bayesian, which was anchored about 100 meters from us,” Borner said. “Then all of a sudden it disappeared. Then the wind calmed down, we looked around and saw a red flare.”
Borner said he got into his boat’s tender and saw a life raft with 15 people on it. Members of the crew were administering first aid.
“I don’t know why it sank so quickly, but it may have something to do with the mast which was incredibly long,” he said. Questions have been raised about whether the mast was to blame for the accident as tall masts, even with the sails down, have more surface area exposed to the wind, which can contribute to tipping a vessel in a storm.
The CCTV footage that emerged Tuesday showed the yacht’s 250-foot mast, believed to be one of the tallest aluminum sailing masts in the world, lashed by the storm as it appears to tilt to one side before disappearing.
Claudia Rizzo is an Italy based journalist.
Claudio Lavanga is Rome-based foreign correspondent for NBC News.
Yuliya Talmazan is a reporter for NBC News Digital, based in London.
The 3-year-old died on Sept. 24, 2021 during an exorcism that authorities say included "praying, strangling, and pushing"
San Jose Police Department; Ray Chavez/MediaNews Group/The Mercury News via Getty
The family of a 3-year-old girl may soon be going to trial for her death, which occurred during a 12-hour "exorcism" back in 2021 .
Claudia Hernandez, Rene Trigueros Hernandez, and Rene Aaron Hernandez Santos are accused of killing Arely Naomi Proctor in a 12-hour "exorcism" at a church in San Jose, Calif., on Sept. 24, 2021, per a press release from the Santa Clara County District Attorney's Office.
Claudia, Rene Trigueros and Rene Aaron — Arely's mother, grandfather, and uncle, respectively — have been charged with felony child abuse causing death and could face up to life in prison.
Their preliminary hearing, which will determine whether there is enough evidence for the case to proceed to trial, began on Monday and is expected to last until next Tuesday, per KNTV .
In the press release, authorities claimed that the group "smothered and strangled the toddler until she died of asphyxia" at a "small, makeshift church."
"Starting around noon the day of the 3-year-old's death at the church, evidence shows that the three (the elder Hernandez is a pastor at the church) at various points were praying, strangling, and pushing on the child's 38-pound body to cause her to vomit up the evil spirit," the release further stated.
San Jose Police Department
According to authorities, Arely had "many injuries" that "were found all over her body," including injuries "to her neck and chest" and "internal bleeding in the heart, bowel, and pancreas, caused by the chest pressure."
On Friday, Dr. Michelle Jorden, the Santa Clara County's chief medical examiner who performed Arely's autopsy, said the child "died at the hands of another," per The Mercury News .
Apart from the previously announced injuries seen on Arely's body, Jorden testified that Arely had "bruising and markings" on her neck, "bruising and abrasions" on her face, and "numerous burst blood vessels and brain swelling."
The outlet reported that Jorden recalled Arely having "injuries in her mouth indicating that she had severely bit her tongue and had marks on her gumline from being violently shaken."
Jorden also revealed that Arely had "a tear in her aorta on the right side of her heart" and that all her injuries were consistent "with one being smothered."
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"I can't think of a situation where smothering could be considered accidental," said Jorden, per the outlet.
If you suspect child abuse, call the Childhelp National Child Abuse Hotline at 1-800-4-A-Child or 1-800-422-4453, or go to www.childhelp.org. All calls are toll-free and confidential. The hotline is available 24/7 in more than 170 languages.
COMMENTS
Her solution was to buy her own yacht. A 37m with a steel hull, built by the Dutch yard Witsen & Vis of Alkmaar. The yacht passed through many hands, finally ending up belonging to the Wolf of Wall Street, Jordan Belfort, on whose watch she foundered and sank in 1996. The yacht was originally built for a Frenchman under the name Mathilde, but ...
After their lavish wedding, Belford (Leonardo DiCaprio) covers Nadine's, or Naomi as she's known in the movie, eyes with a blindfold before revealing the huge yacht, which has been christened the ...
The Jordan Belfort yacht sinking scene in The Wolf of Wall Street was heavily inspired by a real-life event, though the movie did take some creative liberties. For one, the yacht was called Naomi in the reel version since the name of Belfort's wife (played by Margot Robbie) was changed in the movie. In reality, the yacht was named Nadine.
Like Naomi, Nadine was a model and met Belfort at a party before they married in 1991. Nadine and Belfort had two children together and separated in 1998 as depicted in the film (per the U.S. Sun).
Nadine is swallowed by the sea, just ten minutes after Captain Elliot departs her decks. While all guests and the crew of 11 survive, the prestigious motor yacht and her collection of toys (including eight jet skis, four motorbikes, diving equipment, a helicopter, and a seaplane) sink to the bottom of the Med in over 1,000 metres of water.
LEAVE THE CASH... TAKE THE QUAALUDES!The REAL Wolf of Wall Street tells how he sunk his 167-foot yacht, The "Nadine," with its own plane & chopper. This was ...
The real-life yacht was named "The Nadine" after Belfort's wife, who, like in the movie, he affectionately referred to as "The Duchess of Bay Ridge." In the movie, the yacht bears the name "Naomi" after the character portrayed by Margot Robbie (Belfort's wife's name was changed for the film).
How Accurate The Wolf Of Wall Street Is To The True Story. The Wolf of Wall Street is based on the true story of Jordan Belfort, a con artist who became famous for his fraudulent actions. The movie features memorable moments from Belfort's memoir, such as smuggling money into Swiss banks and sinking a yacht. However, several real-life figures ...
For one, the yacht was called Naomi in the reel version since the name of Belfort's wife (played by Margot Robbie) was changed in the movie. In reality, the yacht was named Nadine. Interesting insights on the sinking as portrayed in the movie. The movie captured each passenger's fear and stress when the yacht got caught up in the 70-knot storm.
Mary Cybulski / Paramount. Drugs, prostitutes, crashed helicopters — the debauchery in The Wolf of Wall Street is so outlandish that audiences might leave the theater thinking director Martin Scorsese took plenty of creative license in telling the story of Jordan Belfort, a New York stock broker who conned his way to earning hundreds of millions in the 1990s.
I do not own any content in this video, all rights reserved to Paramount Pictures.
The real story of the sinking of the Wolf of Wall Street's yacht. In 2000, Doug Hoogs interviewed Capt. Mark Elliott about the sinking of the motoryacht Nadine.Elliott was in command of Nadine on the fateful day in 1996 when she encountered a powerful mistral in the Mediterranean between the Italian mainland and Sardinia. All guests and crew survived, but the real story of the sinking, which ...
August 13, 2013By: Diane M. Byrne. To be fair, The Wolf of Wall Street, hitting theaters in November, stars Leonardo DiCaprio, Matthew McConaughey, and Jonah Hill. But to those of us in yachting, the megayacht in The Wolf of Wall Street movie is the real star. She's Lady M, and she plays the role of a well-known yacht from the 1990s, Nadine.
It really shows how much Scorsese understands movies though. If they had put the entire thing in the movie it would have been too long and drawn out and it probably would have lost focus on the characters and been more about the situation. Showing the plane crash outside the boat window was pretty interesting too.
Dec 10, 2021. It turns out that the preposterous scene in The Wolf of Wall Street where Leonardo DiCaprio's character, Jordan Belfort, and his co-horts are caught in a ferocious storm and nearly meet their makers, is true. According to an article by Brad Hutchins on bosshunting.com, the real Jordan Belfort was on a luxury yacht called the ...
Tribute to the super yacht Nadine. Nadine sunk off the coast of sardinia on 23 of June 1996. At that time owned by the wolf of the wall street, Jordan Belfor...
The luxury yacht used in Scorsese's film actually bears little resemblance to the Nadine, being a far more modern vessel. The director hired the 148-foot Lady M, built by Intermarine Savannah in ...
Aug. 20, 2024, 4:16 PM PDT. By Henry Austin and Corky Siemaszko. Newly released video captures a luxury superyacht being battered by a violent storm before it suddenly sank off Sicily with 22 ...
Six weeks later, however, before he had assumed office, Biden's life took the most tragic of turns when his wife Neilia and their 1-year-old daughter, Naomi, were killed in an automobile accident ...
Aug. 22, 2024, 8:28 AM PDT. By Claudia Rizzo, Claudio Lavanga and Yuliya Talmazan. PORTICELLO, Italy — Survivors of a storm that sank a superyacht off Sicily recounted their ordeal to one of the ...
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Sunday marks the 50th anniversary of the car crash that killed Biden's first wife Neilia Hunter Biden and 13-month-old daughter Naomi. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta) President Joe Biden and first lady Jill Biden walk between tombstones to attend Mass at St. Joseph on the Brandywine Catholic Church in Wilmington, Del., on Sunday, Dec. 18, 2022 ...
A medical examiner revealed new details during a preliminary hearing for the mother, grandfather, and uncle accused of killing 3-year-old Arely Naomi Proctor during a 12-hour "exorcism" at a ...