Netflix subscribers flocked en masse to discover this series which looks at a financial and political scandal. This program became the most viewed on the platform in France one day after its release.
Documentary series are particularly popular on Netflix, which mainly specializes in “true crime”, true stories of particularly notable news items. It is therefore not surprising that a series covering a French scandal tops the most viewed programs in France, in less than 24 hours.
The Bettencourt affair: scandal among the richest woman in the world is an investigation lasting less than three hours which traces the affairs in which the French billionaire, heiress to the founder of L’Oréal, was involved. More than sixteen years after the affair broke out, this mini-series in three episodes by Baptiste Etchegaray and Maxime Bonnet dissects how the family conflict between “the richest woman in the world” (her fortune amounted to more than of 30 billion euros) to his daughter, Françoise Bettencourt Meyers, has become a real state scandal.
On the menu of this Dantesque affair: accusations of tax fraud, the financing of Nicolas Sarkozy’s presidential campaign and even clandestine recordings. “This scandal has no equivalent in recent French history,” summarizes Médiapart journalist Fabrice Arfi. This means that the Bettencourt affair has had a real impact on the media, political and societal levels.
Family heartbreak, tax evasion, high levels of power, all the ingredients of this extraordinary affair come together to make this Netflix documentary series addictive. The directors of The Bettencourt Affair: Scandal Among the Richest Woman in the World used archive footage to analyze this affair, but also testimonies from witnesses, such as journalists or, more surprisingly, Arielle Domsbale.
In less than three hours, we dive into this scandal which mixes money and politics as if we were watching a thriller or an investigative series. The documentary mini-series naturally took first place on the podium for the most viewed series on Netflix in France the day after its release, on November 8, supplanting the latest successes of the moment such as Lupin, All the Light We Cannot See , The suit or even Bodies.
On social networks, Internet users do not fail to react to this new program: “Very good Netflix documentary on the Bettencourt affair”, writes an X user. Another describes it as a “nugget”: “super well done, I I loved it too much.
The Bettencourt Affair: Scandal Among the Richest Woman in the World is available to stream on Netflix.