Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes sold one more untested product — a documentary about herself
Elizabeth Holmes let Nathan Fielder film her so viewers could meet the real her. They have, and her partner now suspects it was his dumbest idea yet.
A24 put You Can See Everything into 885 US cinemas on Friday 16 October 2026, and by Friday night it had taken $5.3 million, including $1.75 million from Thursday previews. Deadline expects around $12 million for the weekend: the second-best opening for a documentary in 17 years, concert films aside, behind only Fahrenheit 9/11 and its $23.9 million in 2004. Not bad for a three-hour film shot over four years for less than $10 million.
The film is Nathan Fielder and Lance Oppenheim's portrait of Elizabeth Holmes and her partner Billy Evans in the run-up to her stint in federal prison. The couple let the cameras into their home. On opening weekend, Evans went on the All-In podcast to explain why, and to admit he still hasn't watched it.
"I haven't seen it. I might think this is the dumbest thing I have ever done."
— Billy Evans, on the All-In podcast
The pitch: meet the real Elizabeth
Evans's reasoning is a sales deck, and a familiar one. Holmes was facing an 11-year sentence and was barred from speaking publicly, while everyone else told her story for her: John Carreyrou's book Bad Blood, the HBO documentary The Inventor, the Hulu series The Dropout. That narrative, Evans said, was "pretty ossified". The film was meant to un-ossify it: "here she is, see her and make up your own mind."
His evidence was a pilot study. Every friend and relative who met Holmes in person, from his grandmother down, thought he was crazy at first and then "radically" changed their opinion. The documentary, he said, was supposed to "scale that up". A small sample that seems to work, a promise that it will work for millions, and nobody checking the results before launch. Holmes has run this play before.
Theranos promised a diagnosis from one drop of blood. This time the promise was a new reputation from one film.
Evans admits there is "certainly concern", but insists it was "ultimately our decision". Fair enough. Nobody at Theranos was forced to sign anything either.
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What the audience made up its mind about
Viewers have done exactly as asked. They just haven't reached the verdict the deck predicted.
- The trailer: before press had even seen the film, A24's teaser left viewers disturbed by Holmes's manner and her claims that she did nothing wrong at Theranos. Evans concedes she "looks insane" in it, "especially the music".
- The critics: universal acclaim and Oscar buzz since the Telluride premiere in September. The Hollywood Reporter notes that Fielder's face contorts into scepticism at every "desperate fib".
- The young crowd: 75% of the opening-night audience in Los Angeles and New York was under 35, and the film sits at 4.7 on Letterboxd, inside its all-time top 50.
Variety's summary is that the couple's decision "is backfiring". Reddit is less diplomatic. The top comment under the Evans story on r/entertainment, with 235 upvotes, takes him at his word: "I made up my mind that Billy himself is a psychopath and looks even more insane than Elizabeth." Another reply: "He's so not prepared for how much everyone is going to hate him once they've seen the movie."
The Oscar problem
Holmes wanted to replace The Dropout as the story people tell about her. She may well get her wish. If You Can See Everything rides its reviews and box office into awards season, the definitive Holmes text in popular culture becomes the one she volunteered for, and it shows her doing what she did at Theranos: pitching, with the product unchecked.
British audiences get their turn on 20 November, when A24 releases the film in the UK and Ireland itself, five weeks after America. Plenty of time for the internet to spoil it.
Theranos took twelve years to unravel. Its founder's comeback needed one Friday.
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