Lawyers for Elon Musk have put the makers of a new four-hour documentary about the billionaire on formal legal notice, accusing the film of defaming him days before its premiere.
In a September 3 letter to a producer at Alex Gibney’s Jigsaw Productions, Musk’s attorney, Alex Spiro, accused the Oscar-winning filmmaker of building the documentary, titled Musk, around a predetermined conclusion.
Spiro also alleged that Gibney had declined to fact-check the film with Musk or people close to him.
“This project did not begin as an inquiry. It began with a conclusion,” Spiro wrote.
The documentary premiered on Tuesday at the Venice Film Festival, where it received a lengthy standing ovation and strong reviews.
Gibney traces Musk’s rise from a South Africa-born dot-com entrepreneur in Silicon Valley in the early 2000s to one of the world’s wealthiest people.
The film also explores his personal life, including his childhood and his 14 known children with several women.
Variety described the documentary as a “lacerating portrait”, while Deadline called it “damning” and said it portrays Musk as “petty, narcissistic, megalomaniacal, cruel.”
Spiro’s letter puts Gibney and Jigsaw Productions on notice, as well as parties involved in the film’s release, including HBO, Bleecker Street and Universal.
The letter focuses in particular on a sequence that Spiro says promotes a conspiracy theory alleging that Musk knew early on election night in 2024 that Donald Trump had won because his Starlink satellites had been used to influence the result.
Jigsaw Productions pushed back in a statement to The Hollywood Reporter, arguing that scrutiny of powerful public figures is protected by the First Amendment.
“This is something all Americans should defend,” the production company said, including Musk’s associates, who it noted had previously highlighted his description of himself as a “free speech absolutist.”
Gibney’s documentaries have frequently examined powerful individuals and institutions, including the Church of Scientology and Enron. His film Zero Days explored the use of cyberweapons and the Israel-Iran conflict.
He won the Academy Award for Best Documentary for Taxi to the Dark Side, which examined US military interrogation practices in Afghanistan.
Citing the possibility of litigation, Spiro’s letter also instructed those involved in the documentary to preserve all records relating to the project, including footage, interview transcripts, research materials and internal communications.
Musk has also criticised Gibney and the documentary on X, the social media platform he owns, describing the film as a “hit piece that misses” and dismissing it as boring.
