Just add glamour
HOW THE REAL-LIFE MOLLY BLOOM MADE POKER COOL AMONG THE A-LIST SET
Poker is not glamorous. Is it played for life-altering amounts of money? Every single day, all over the world and online as well. Is there some romance attached to risking high stakes? Certainly. Poker movies wouldn’t be a genre unto itself if this was not the case.
Yet, the reality of the game is never glamorous.
Stroll through your local poker room on a given weeknight — arrive after midnight for the full experience. The smell of nervous energy jolting through strangers sitting shoulder to shoulder, the electric mobility scooters parked against the wall, the floor staff fielding calls from concerned spouses, and the overriding tendency toward degeneracy — it is among the most lacklustre places on earth.
This is why we credit Molly Bloom with accomplishing the seemingly impossible when she curated, planned, stage- managed and even bankrolled exclusive private poker games for the super rich and Hollywood elites alike during the heady days of the last decade’s poker boom. Starting in the basement of a seedy (but legendary) Los Angeles nightclub, Bloom moved into exclusive hotel suites full of A- list talent playing “nosebleed” stakes — a world where $ 10,000 buy- ins were only the beginning.
Bloom is the author and subject of Molly’s Game: The True Story of the 26-Year- Old Woman Behind the Most Exclusive, High- Stakes Underground Poker Game in the World, a bestselling book and feature film which marks the directorial debut of acclaimed screenwriter Aaron Sorkin. It tracks the meteoric rise and subsequent downfall of Bloom’s outlet for the moneyed classes of Los Angeles and New York.
Through her poker games, she built a roster of rich gamblers with more money than sense and, in the process, she managed to answer a simple ( yet profitable) question: what do you get for the man who has everything? With an undeniable work ethic and a keen sense of what makes men tick, Bloom did more than slap down a table and hire a dealer. She provided the perfect food, the perfect harem of beautiful women to laugh at the jokes and squeeze the biceps of industry titans; Bloom crafted the perfect setting. She created an atmosphere that allowed paparazzi fodder such as Leonardo DiCaprio, Alex Rodriguez and Tobey Maguire to become mere faces around the table.
Even while gambling away millions of dollars, it was rarely about the poker for many of the players in her games. Barely competent, with little more than a passing knowledge of the game, her players would watch as stacks of chips well into the hundreds of thousands changed hands in mere minutes. “There was a bit of blood sport here, power plays but for sport,” explains Bloom.
The trust- fund babies, hedge- fund managers and bankable movie stars of Molly’s Game were drawn to her events for much the same reason. Bloom built a safe space, a “clean, honest game” as she describes, where the playboy’s risks were acceptable and managed.
At their heart, these were still poker games filled with gamblers and degenerates. That they arrived in Maybachs and Bugattis doesn’t change a gambler’s heart. Games lasted for days, where the insidious nature of gambling compulsion showed its face to Bloom. “I think there was a lot of addiction going on here. When you’re willing to play poker for two days and lose millions of dollars, it’s no longer recreation. It’s taking over.”
This clear- eyed assessment of her subjects led to the creation of a formula to keep the games “good” and all the players happy. “One, to run a clean, honest game that didn’t feel sleazy. Two, make sure everyone got paid right away. And three, a well-curated environment.”
The creation of this“wellcu rated environment” was no accident and it was through Bloom’s tireless efforts that the games attracted so much attention, from players to underworld competitors and eventually the FBI. As the players put in their 30- hour sessions, so did Bloom. She chased payments, covered debts out of her own pocket and did whatever the health of her games demanded.
“This was my full- time j ob,” Bloom says. “When these guys want to play, they’d get on the phone and get a game together. I don’t think anyone was out there hustling for players, connecting, bankrolling a game, building the kind of environment like I did.”
When asked if high stakes arenas will continue to exist as poker’s popularity wanes, Bloom suggests that the games “have always existed and they will continue to exist. High stakes, low stakes, poor or rich — people will find a way to gamble.”
The film adaptation of Molly’s Game comes out in a slightly different world than the one Bloom describes in champagne- soaked detail in her book. While Bloom details tantrums, come- ons and the sketchy behaviour — players refusing to pay what they owe or, to the growing interest of the United States Department of the Treasury, they pay with the money of their investors — of all types, t he one- t i me nationally ranked moguls skier is ready to move on from her past and embark on “Molly 2.0.”
Nonetheless, when Bloom is asked about the skills it took to develop what she describes as “the most decadent gambling playground for men,” she admits there is still a practical function for her know- how. “Because I’m good at networking and creating network- worthy events and experiences, I think a cool application of that would be to build a community and connect ambitious women,” she says. “From co- working spaces to membership clubs and building i nto the digital space from there.”
For now, though, Bloom is happy to see her tale told in larger-than-life fashion, with her story filtered through the mind of Sorkin, with the talented Jessica Chastain representing her onscreen. “I am so humbled and it’s been extraordinary, but now everyone is going to expect me to look like Chastain and sound like Sorkin. I told him, you’re going to have to write my lines for the rest of my life. I’m going to be so disappointing!”
Not quite 40, she has no plans to make a return to the poker world despite her tendency toward high stakes.
“I’m definitely a gambler, as exemplified by the massive risks I’ve taken.”
Based on the dramatic first act of her life, there’s no telling where she might end up next — but it would be foolish not to anticipate a bit of glamour attached to whatever Bloom ends up doing.