Mandy's Blog

The Queen of Versailles could easily be a timepiece about America’s rise and fall of the early '00s. Their story is typical - though they may not be your typical American family - of the devastation created by the Great Recession. There are stories of the many ordinary people who lost their jobs and homes in 2008-2009, the scenario is all too familiar, but this is a story about a family who became addicted to money and spending and suffered the consequences.

Both from humble beginnings, David, a 74-year-old billionaire, prides himself as the ‘King of time-shares’ owning the largest privately owned timeshare company in the world, Westgate Resorts. Along with his trophy wife, Jackie (ex beauty queen, Miss Florida 1993) who is thirty years his junior and their eight children they enjoy a grand lifestyle and they’re not too shy to flaunt it. They have their own private planes, Rolls Royces, host parties for the Miss America pageant and have a personal staff of nineteen for their household. In 2008, they were at the top of their game, they were seen as wealthy and politically influential. It is only ten minutes into the film that David boasts about illegal dealings and being solely responsibly for the re-election of Bush in the 2000 elections - in what would later be a catch-22, it is this very man and his government’s actions that would fail him. 

Wanting more, David and Jackie embarked on a project that would mark their biggest achievement yet – set to be the largest single family private home in America - a 90,000 square feet of Versailles palace on American ground. Filmmaker, Greenfield met Jackie by chance at a Hollywood party and immediately fell for the couple’s tale. Funding the documentary herself, Greenfield set to document the rise of this monstrosity of a house and the happy go lucky all American family living the ‘high life’. 

What came next, nobody was prepared for. When the recession hit and the real estate market collapsed David’s empire crumbled. Everybody had stopped buying time-shares and he announced 7,000 employee layoffs. Tens of thousands of families enter foreclosure, including Jackie’s childhood best friend. The Seigels were billionaires, yet they had no money. In this new economic reality, we follow the family as they struggle to scale down their ostentatious life of excess, including putting their unfinished home of Versailles up for sale.  

The second half of the film portrays a man who couldn’t control his appetites and a wife who couldn’t control her spending. Filmmaker, Greenfield says the film is really about ‘queen’ Jackie’s excess and how she just can’t stop spending. “It was the same (old) story about the American dream, but really about the flaws as much as the virtues of that dream, as well as about the mistakes that were made because of the economic crisis,” Greenfield says. “Jackie and David’s story, even though it was extreme, was kind of symbolic of the mistakes we all made on different levels.” The tragedy in this film is not the financial loss that we see the Seigels suffer but more their behavior we are witness to and that, Greenfield says is the reality check she wants viewers to realise, she continues “it gives us a chance to think about what’s important, what our values are, and what is enough.” 

Though portrayed through the harsh lessons of one extreme family, this film comes to the realisation that you can't take anything for granted.