Marshall Heyman
Appearances
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
But I feel like anybody would respond to someone who was like, I will give you security and make the rest of your life secure.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
According to Gina and Alexander, a lot of Villa Carlotta residents said yes to David's whole Soho House pitch. They all just handed over the cash. And if you're thinking this is when David took everyone's money and ran, that wasn't David's style.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
And what was spending that weekend like in Malibu together? Was it fun?
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
But I did it. And then, just as the Soho House IPO sale was about to happen, David and his girlfriend go on a trip to Europe.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
While David was maybe or maybe not gallivanting on the croisette in Cannes and drinking Aperol spritzes in Paris, worry starts to brew at the Villa Carlotta. A neighbor gathered David's crew for a talk.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
This is the first time they're all realizing that David seems to have sold them on the same bill of goods. Altogether, they'd claimed to have given David more than $200,000. And this one neighbor had some suspicions.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
It's another rule in Hollywood. You don't fact-check people. It only gets you enemies. And David seemed to have just so many friends. He could set up big meetings. He could make introductions. He could get tables at fancy restaurants. But this neighbor and her boyfriend? They'd look David up.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
David had been doing this routine for decades, boasting about his connections and his investment knowledge so that he could take money from the people closest to him.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
After he graduated from Duke in 1985, he started an investment company in New York City. Within only a couple of years, he collected nearly $10 million from investors. He'd send them sham quarterly earnings reports. But the only investment they were really making was in David. With their money, he bought himself expensive cars, jewelry, art, multiple apartments.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
David Bloom introduced himself as a businessman, a Duke grad, an art lover. He had just moved into the Villa Carlotta. He was small, about 5'2", always well-dressed, always carrying a drink.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
And then, at just 24 years old, he was sentenced to eight years in prison. When he got out in 1996, he did it again. A few years later, federal prosecutors accused him of defrauding at least 10 workers at a Manhattan restaurant out of between $50,000 and $200,000. He spent six years at the Vernon C. Bain Correctional Center, which is a prison boat in the Bronx.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
In 2011, after getting out of jail the second time, he moved to L.A., where he could start over. He never even changed his name.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
The neighbors all believe not only has David made off with their original investment, for most of them tens of thousands of dollars, but the hundreds of thousands of dollars they were counting on getting in return, they weren't going to get those either. Did you reach out to David to be like, what is up?
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
Possibly. But now the apparent victims, all drawn in by David's various connections, now have a connection of their own, each other. And there was a lot of anger at the Villa Carlotta.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
They decide to use their numbers against him and confront him as a group.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
They have a lot of questions for him, like, what's going on? Where's our money? Why did you do this to us?
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
But being patient hadn't gotten Gina and Alexander anywhere with David before. At least not anywhere good. Alexander worried that after this big confrontation, David would slip away into the middle of the night, never to be seen or heard from again.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
That's another Villa Carlotta resident we'll call Alexander. He works in marketing.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
Alexander stayed awake outside David's door that entire first night. It was kind of a stakeout. The next morning, David did try to escape the Carlotta, but Alexander wasn't going to let that happen. Not on his watch, at least.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
On this first day, Gina Alexander and another neighbor split that $22,000 three ways amongst them. It was just a tiny fraction of the money they said they gave David. But David didn't leave the Villa Carlotta. He wasn't evicted either. He stayed there for a full month, a snake in the Garden of Eden, surrounded by his angry victims.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
Alexander hounded David for the money over text message, over email. Whenever he saw him, he tried everything in his arsenal.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
Alexander eventually got a little more money back, but it wasn't nearly enough. Do you think that... Have you thought about what the people who he scammed have in common?
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
It can be hard to tell whether the Villa Carlotta residents are more upset that David took their money or that they fell for his fake social connections.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
What strikes me about the way people from the Villa Carlotta talk about David Bloom is that no one really seemed to like him. Even before he allegedly scammed them out of hundreds of thousands of dollars. But David had something even more important in Hollywood than likability. David had connections. Connections that he promised would lift everyone up around him.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
When police finally arrested David for what he'd allegedly done to Gina and the others, it was August 2022. But he was released after posting $45,000 bail, and he was let off with just a citation. While David walked free, the victims of the Villa Carlotta stayed in touch with law enforcement, sharing any evidence that would help build a stronger case against David Bloom.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
A year later, in August 2023, the police had enough evidence to issue another warrant for David's arrest. In the wee hours of the morning on Monday, August 28th, David Bloom was taken into custody. He was charged with defrauding nine victims out of $250,000 between the years 2021 and 2023. On January 2nd, 2025, he pleaded not guilty to all charges. He could face up to 14 years in prison.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
As of this recording, David's case is still ongoing, inching along. We reached out to David's lawyers, but didn't hear back from them. Alexander's left the Villa Carlotta. There's just too many bad feelings for him there. But Gina stayed. It feels comfortable. It's home for her. And neither of them plans to invest money with friends. Not ever again.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
The Villa Carlotta apartments really are for people on the up and up, people who already have some money but are passing through Los Angeles to make some more. It's a cross between a chic hotel and a luxury apartment building. Every unit's fully furnished. It has a saltwater pool in the courtyard. There's a high-end fitness center and a concierge.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
You get daily housekeeping and a palm garden that's also, quote, a tranquil urban refuge. Studios cost about $4,500 a month and a two-bedroom, two-bath will run you just over $7,000.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
David Bloom told his new neighbors he had a house by the Chateau Marmont with two cars and a swimming pool. But he felt lonely there after his girlfriend left him. He wanted to live closer to the center of things. And very quickly, David put himself in the middle of the social scene at the villa. He seemed to know just what to talk about to win over everybody.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
David told another resident who had a tomato sauce line that he knew the head of Whole Foods. He'd set up a meeting for her to get her product on the store shelves. With Gina, it was as simple as getting a table at a popular restaurant.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
There are only a few places in Los Angeles where the CNBC crowd goes to eat. Craig's in West Hollywood is one of them. It's the kind of restaurant that serves a $33 vegan chicken parm and a nearly $50 sundae named after a TikTok star. If you go to Craig's, you're bound to see famous people. They're part of the ambiance, part of the furniture.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
Gina and David seemed to have a lot in common. They talked about art, theater, culture, food.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
And was he the kind of guy who would, like, order stuff for the table?
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
Gina noticed that David seemed to know a lot of people, powerful executives and CEOs on both coasts.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
According to David, Ted Sarandos wanted him to bring the Villa Carlotta crew over for dinner.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
Still, Gina didn't think much of it. You're no one in Hollywood if you don't sometimes cancel on people. David moved on, too, to wowing Gina with his investment knowledge.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
The residents of the Villa Carlotta apartments first remember seeing David Bloom in the summer of 2021. The neighbors were excited just to be near each other again. Every gathering felt like a party, and everyone was welcome.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
And this was when his neighbors alleged David made his elevator pitch. He was ready to cash in on his connections.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
Look what Ron sent. Ron Burkle is in a similar stratosphere as Ted Sarandos. He's the chairman of the board of Soho House, which is an international social club. Soho House was about to expand, and Ron was offering his friend David shares in the initial public offering, the IPO.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
Of course, Hollywood is a town about gambles. Every movie, every TV show, every project is a roll of the dice. But it just takes one hit, one box office score to take your career to the next level. And what David was promising here was that for every $2 Gina invested, she would get a little more than $26 in return. That might not sound like much, but it would be a 13 times return on our money.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
So in that risk-reward frame of mind, Gina wrote David a check for tens of thousands of dollars. Neighbors claim David also pitched the Soho House IPO to other Villa Carlotta residents, including Alexander.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
And are you typically someone who invests in things? Like, is that something that you've done in the past?
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
From what Alexander understood, this sounded like a slam dunk.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
Gina says she trusted David so much that she didn't hesitate when David pitched her a second time.
Big Time
Something’s Up at the Villa Carlotta | 8
With the numbers David was giving her, she believed she stood to gain nearly a million dollars from the Soho House IPO.