An attempt to make a right-wing superhero movie based on a Southern Confederacy-promoting superhero comic book character created by right-wing blogger Theodore Beale crashed and burned after $1 million in funders' donations went missing.
The financing for the film proved to be "a complete disaster," according to an article by Daily Beast reporter Will Sommer. The funds for the proposed movie—titled Rebel's Run—were supposed "to be held in escrow to secure several million more dollars in funding."
But the money's disappearance effectively ended plans to bring the film to fruition.
Beale employed the services of a Utah-based firm called Ohana Capital Financial which appears to have been the dreamchild of a con artist by the name of James Wolfgramm.
According to Sommer:
"Ohana was the creation of James Wolfgramm, a self-described cryptocurrency billionaire who posted pictures of sports cars that supposedly belonged to him on social media."
"But in fact, according to a federal indictment filed last month, Wolfgramm’s wealth was a sham. The sports car pictures, for example, were pulled from other websites."
"Wolfgramm’s business also sold what were billed as high-tech cryptocurrency mining rigs—but those too were a hoax, according to prosecutors, with their screens just running on a loop to create the illusion of mines."
What Beale and those involved with the project—which had tapped Fox News personality Tucker Carlson's frequent collaborator Scooter Downey to direct—didn't know was Wolfgramm was "deeply in debt to one of his business’s other clients."
Wolfgramm spent $4 million of a Chinese manufacturer's money to fund his own lifestyle, according to a federal indictment.
Wolfgramm then used the money intended for Rebel's Run to pay for the manufacturer's product—personal protective equipment or PPE—and his actions raised the suspicion of Beale and the film's team which reported him to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).
Federal prosecutors charged Wolfgramm with four counts of wire fraud over the theft of the Rebel's Run money and other aspects of his business.
The scandal forced Beale to inform his supporters the movie would not be made, saying he wouldn't "count on us getting the money back." He also made the baseless claim the theft was part of a larger plot "intended to break our community."
A trailer for the proposed film has since been deleted.
News the film's financing collapsed opened Beale and the film's team up to significant mockery online.
Beale is only the latest conservative to run into financial problems while attempting to make a film.
Earlier this week, actor John Schneider—best known for playing Bo Duke on the hit 1970s television series The Dukes of Hazzard—was mocked after he complained "woke Hollywood" didn't help finance To Die For—his movie about a veteran "frustrated with the liberal left" and their "disrespect" for the American flag.
Schneider said he and his wife, filmmaker Alicia Allain, went "all in" on financing the project, noting if it "doesn’t work, we lose everything.”
