Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Fake Famous’ On HBO, Where Journalist Nick Bilton Tries To Buy And Fake Instagram Fame For 3 Twentysomethings

Fake Famous, the first documentary from former New York Times and Vanity Fair reporter Nick Bilton, examines the ins and outs of being “internet famous” these days, mostly focusing on Instagram influencers. According to Bilton, over 40 million accounts on Instagram have over 1 million followers, and over 100 million accounts have over 100,000 followers. “Can they all be famous?” he asks.

FAKE FAMOUS: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

The Gist: What Bilton sets out to do in this documentary is pick three people with relatively small Instagram followings — in the four-figure range — and see if he can make them “fake famous.” This means getting them enough followers where companies will send them free stuff, and, eventually, actually pay them to advertise stuff on their feeds. He also interviews experts — including Justine Bateman, who had her own massive fame in the ’80s and ’90s and has written a book on the topic, and journalists plugged into influencer culture like the New York Times‘ Taylor Lorenz — who can discuss the ups and downs of influencer culture.

With the help of a casting director, Bilton found his three subjects from 4,000 applicants: Dominque Druckman, Wylie Heiner and Chris Bailey. He sets up photo shoots that fake a glamorous lifestyle; in one scene, Dominique puts her head near a dirty kiddie pool full of flower petals, and with a professional photographer and the right lighting, it looks like she’s living an amazing life.

He also buys followers from various companies that create follower bots, then on the trio’s posts he goes to another bot company that sells likes (back when the number of likes were publicly seen on IG posts) and comments. Both needed to be timed and added in a way to not alert IG’s software that the account was being helped along by bots. Though, according to Bilton and the experts he interviews, they don’t try too hard to stop the bots, because followers mean money, no matter where they come from. Most of IG’s biggest accounts, including celebrities like Kim Kardashian, have millions of bot accounts following them.

What Bilton finds is that two of the three people he picked felt completely uncomfortable with the fake followers and likes, and one of them just wanted to be their authentic selves online. But one of them really ended up making the fake followers and fake photo shoots work. You can guess who that is by seeing their profiles (linked under their names above).

What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: Fake Famous is not as depressing as The Social Dilemma, but certainly more cynical than a documentary like The American Meme.

Performance Worth Watching: Without a doubt, Druckman, an actress who had mostly booked student films to that point in her career, embraced this fake fame the most. She changed her looks and really got into the work you need to do to “feed the beast.” She also came to appreciate what this newfound fame did for her acting career, as well as what she was able to do with that fame when the COVID lockdowns started.

Memorable Dialogue: Chris Bailey, who wants to be the “real me” on IG: “If you asked me if I’d rather take 100,000 fake followers or 100 real ones, I’m taking the real ones, all day.” Bilton respects that attitude, and so do we.

Sex and Skin: Nothing really, aside from shots of Druckman in a swimsuit.

Our Take: Despite the fact that there are some very funny and weirdly satisfying aspects of Fake Famous, it somehow seems incomplete. When Bilton and the professional photographers he hired shoot these fake IG posts that are supposed to look glamorous, and when Bilton and Druckman point out that influencers continued to post at the beginning of lockdown like nothing had changed, the movie presented its case, that most influencers’ actual influence is a mirage, quite well. We laughed especially hard when Bilton made a scenic photo of someone looking out an airliner’s window out a toilet seat and a projected stock image.

But there are other aspects of the film that made us wonder if Bilton had adhered to the old journalist axiom that the assignment is done at the deadline, no matter what shape it’s in. For one, Instagram hid likes from public view in late 2019, so one big way that people gauge popularity and influence has been gone for over a year. Hearing that Bilton bought likes from bot providers now sounds old fashioned, as everyone has now gotten used to the fact that likes are no longer currency on IG. He never addresses this change, although he addresses the start of the pandemic lockdown, which happened after IG hid likes.

Another aspect that feels incomplete is that two of the three subjects had no desire to embrace the fakeness. Wylie got spooked when an acquaintance told him that he shouldn’t lose himself in chasing fake followers. Chris, on the other hand, just never felt comfortable with any of the fakeness; he seemed especially uncomfortable shooting in what was essentially a soundstage made too look like a private jet (which was hard to get a timeslot for).

So instead of trying to find new people willing to go with the experiment, he essentially concentrated on Dominique leaning into the experience. Yes, the social experiment still worked, but we would have liked to have seen more examples of it working than just a single person.

Our Call: STREAM IT. Fake Famous tries to keep the topic of fake fame lighthearted instead of depressing, but it still points out how being an “influencer”, while having lots of perks, isn’t the same as being famous, and never will be.

Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.

Stream Fake Famous On HBO Max