With the emergence of a hero yesterday on Capitol Hill, casting of Bernie Madoff the Movie would seem to be complete.
Yet the crowd scenes, jammed by well-known and lesser-known victims, keep growing.
Harry Markopolos, a modern-day Jeffrey Wigand, tried for years to get the Securities and Exchange Commission to pay attention to the questionable activities of financier Bernard Madoff. Not until $50 billion was lost and countless retirement funds eradicated did the agency listen.
Even then, it wasn’t Markopolos’ complaining, complete with extensive documentation, but an unexpected confession by Madoff that finally drew the government’s attention.
“I gift-wrapped and delivered the largest Ponzi scheme in history to them and somehow they couldn’t be bothered to conduct a thorough and proper investigation because they were too busy on matters of higher priority,” Markopolos told a House Financial Services subcommittee Wednesday.
Federal authorities, he said, were intimidated by Madoff, who not only ran a major Manhattan investment firm, but was a former governor of NASDAQ and vice chairman of the National Association of Securities Dealers.
“Mr. Madoff was one of the most powerful men on Wall Street,” he said. “…Clearly, the SEC was afraid of Mr. Madoff.”
Markopolos (we’re thinking Adrien Brody for the role) was followed by several stammering unfortunates from the SEC (Ron Howard’s brother and his friends), who were hard-pressed to defend the agency’s inaction.
So who should play Madoff? MarketWatch columnist Jon Friedman is laying odds on Dustin Hoffman, Michael Douglas or Richard Dreyfuss.
The key to a big box office could be the uncredited cameos by real-life celebrity victims: Sandy Koufax and his high school teammate, Mets owner Fred Wilpon. Kevin Bacon and his wife Kyra Sedgwick. Actor John Malkovich, talk show host Larry King, Zsa Zsa Gabor and the ghost of John Denver.
The list keeps getting longer. The Huffington Post has published the latest version - a 163-page document released by the court on Wednesday.
No matter how large the cast, the movie will never cost as much as the real life story.
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1 Comments
#1. TACOM 02.17.2009
Maybe, just maybe, part of the problem we have with white collar crime is that we so readily turn it into entertainment. Of course Hollywierd would trade on anything to make a buck. Nothing is too grimy or slimy for the tribe, when it comes to making a buck; even if it means turning on one of their own. If Hollywierd turns on one of their own, can they then be labelled anti-semitic? Just wondering.
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