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Dumpster Fyre, a new podcast about Fyre Festival, sees founder Billy McFarland reflect on his mistakes and the events that led to the disaster
Take a moment with me to remember where we were in January last year. How different things were. You were coming down from the excess of December by deciding which of your jeans ‘sparked joy’ and thanking those that no longer did for their service. You didn’t know what contact tracing meant or that the woman who does your eyelashes was on a path to becoming a social media conspiracy theorist.
There was only one question that really mattered. Should you watch the Hulu documentary or the Netflix documentary about Fyre Festival, the luxury music festival that went up in flames?
Simpler times.
Fast forward to today, where you’re still stuck on the couch as you were in January, but now if you had the means, you might just pay $12,000 for the luxury of a sad sandwich and a flight.
Fyre Festival is back again, now in podcast format. Serial scammer and festival founder Billy McFarland is now a convicted felon in his 29th month in prison in Ohio where he is serving six years for fraud.
Dumpster Fyre is recorded in 15 minute phone conversations permitted to inmates, where McFarland discusses the festival’s downfall with journalist and podcaster Jordan Harbinger, planning to “start from the beginning and go through every step and just kind of keep it raw” on the culmination of events and mistakes that led to disaster. All proceeds from the podcast will go towards paying back the $26 million McFarland owes in restitution.
The podcast has allegedly led McFarland to be put in solitary confinement in prison pending an investigation by the federal Bureau of Prisons.
“We believe the investigation stems from his participation in the podcast and the photographs that were taken and utilized in the trailer, which were all properly taken,” McFarland’s lawyer, Jason Russo, tells the New York Times. “We don’t believe he’s violated any rule or regulation, and there can’t possibly be anything else. He’s been a model prisoner there.”
Listen to Dumpster Fyre here.
Photography by Netflix.
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