MrBeast on His Quest to Turn YouTube Fame Into an Entertainment Empire
The master of viral videos now has a CEO to rein in spending on Lambos—and give his “banger content” an even wider reach.
Jimmy Donaldson, aka MrBeast, in New York. “I don’t want to be the main character of every show.”
Photographer: Sinna Nasseri for Bloomberg Businessweek
In early August, a seven-person team is on the ground floor of Beast Industries in Greenville, North Carolina, studying how to light water on fire. This has been going on for a few weeks. Lead producer Maddie Montana has already identified the essentials—propane to fuel the fire, a conduit to funnel the fire to the water—and is now penciling out the cost of a propane tank, PVC piping and cement. When Jeannot Szwarc filmed Jaws 2, their research has revealed, the crew poured oil directly on the water and lit it on fire. That’s not the way it’s done anymore—it’s too dangerous. Montana’s team is sensitive about revealing too much; all she’ll say is that she needs to be able to control the blaze for a video titled Would You Risk Burning Alive for $500,000?