about

betting on zero

"There should be a subgenre of documentaries solely defined by their capacity to incite righteous anger in the audience. Titles would include 'Blackfish,' 'Inside Job,' 'The Act Of Killing,' and Ted Braun's 'Betting On Zero.'"

-Indiewire

From ‘Darfur Now’ writer/director Ted Braun comes a riveting docu-thriller following controversial hedge fund titan Bill Ackman as he puts a billion dollars on the line in his crusade to expose Herbalife as the largest pyramid scheme in history. Herbalife claims Ackman is simply a market manipulator out to make a fortune from short-selling their stock, but Ackman insists Herbalife deliberately targets low-income and immigrant communities and robs them of their life savings. Herbalife is joined on the counterattack by longtime Ackman nemesis (and fellow Wall Street billionaire) Carl Icahn, while Ackman finds an unlikely ally in Chicago activist Julie Contreras, who rallies the Latino community to get the Federal government to intervene. Blending tales of high-stakes corporate intrigue with working-class people caught in the crossfire, Braun paints a stirring picture of the American Dream gone wrong.

BETTING ON ZERO premiered at TriBeCa Film Festival in April, 2016, where it earned a special jury mention for investigative filmmaking.

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ABOUT THE DIRECTOR

Writer-director Ted Braun’s critically acclaimed first feature film, DARFUR NOW, was nominated for best documentary of 2007 by the National Board of Review and The Broadcast Critics Association, and went on to win the NAACP Image Award for best documentary of the year. Warner Brothers distributed DARFUR NOW worldwide and financed along with Participant Media, which spearheaded a global social action campaign. For his work writing and directing the film, the International Documentary Association awarded Braun their 2007 Emerging Filmmaker of the Year. Braun is an Associate Professor in Screenwriting at USC’s School of Cinematic Arts where he has just been appointed the Joseph Campbell Endowed Chair in Cinematic Ethics.

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about the producers

GLEN ZIPPER

Glen Zipper is a founding partner with Zipper Bros Films and formerly the Head of Documentary Features for Exclusive Media’s Spitfire Pictures. In addition to producing the Academy Award®-winning documentary UNDEFEATED, Glen recently produced the non-fiction horror film THE NIGHTMARE (dir. by Rodney Ascher), DEEP WEB (dir. by Alex Winter), KILLING THEM SAFELY (dir. by Nick Berardini, A FASTER HORSE (dir. by David Gelb), and executive produced ALL THINGS MUST PASS for director Colin Hanks.

Glen is currently producing TREAD for director Paul Solet ("GRACE"), and ZAPPA, which set the record as the highest funded documentary in Kickstarter history. His other prior credits include the Grammy Award®-winning FOO FIGHTERS BACK AND FORTH and the Emmy Award®-winning GEORGE HARRISON: LIVING IN THE MATERIAL WORLD. Twitter: @glenzipper

DEVIN ADAIR

Devin Adair is founder of Adair Entertainment. Devin produced BREAK POINT (JK Simmons, Jeremy Sisto, Amy Smart) which premiered at SXSW and BETTING ON ZERO with Glen Zipper. Devin is in pre-production on GRACE, a film she wrote and will direct, produced by Trish Hofmann (GET ON UP, Emmy and Golden Globe nominated HEMINGWAY & GELLHORN, DEVIL, NOTORIOUS, THE NEW WORLD), Gabe Cowan, (SXSW audience award winner CHEAP THRILLS and numerous other films including Courtney Cox’s directorial debut, BEFORE I GO), and Laure Sudreau, founder of Ourobors Entertainment.

SONYA BURRES

Since completing her studies at the American Film Institute (AFI), Executive Producer Sonya Burres has worked as a producer, line producer and executive producer. She produced the award-winning feature ALWAYS SAY GOODBYE and co-produced the film ZOE. From 2001-2006 Ms. Burres and her two Norwegian partners operated a commercial production company, Brown Cow Pictures, that filmed internationally. She has produced projects for ShowTime and Channel 4, and writes about cinema and television for a variety of outlets.

BETTING ON ZERO is the first film presented by Biltmore Films, an independent film production and development company based in North Carolina. Biltmore Films specializes in business and financial subjects.