Elizabeth Holmes's sordid saga goes from trial to TV series

SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) — “I am expecting quite a show.”

I didn’t realize how prophetic my words would be when ABC News correspondent Rebecca Jarvis asked in early September what I was expecting on the opening day of a high-profile trial dissecting an alleged scam orchestrated by fallen Silicon Valley star Elizabeth Holmes.

The interview became part of Jarvis' podcast, “The Dropout,” revolving around the trial the culminated in Holmes’ Jan. 3 conviction on four counts of fraud tied to the nearly $1 billion invested in Theranos, a blood-testing company that she founded at age 19 after dropping out of Stanford.

Now that she is facing a likely prison sentence, Holmes’ meteoric rise and mortifying collapse has been turned into “The Dropout,” a highly entertaining Hulu TV series based on the podcast and other sources that delved into a drama that shined a bright light on Silicon Valley’s dark side.

Holmes, who faces 20 years in prison when she’s sentenced in September, turned 38 last month while out on bail while living on a luxurious Silicon Valley estate.

The eight-episode series, which begins streaming Thursday, draws upon some of the evidence that emerged during that trial, particularly texts between Holmes and her former lover and business partner, Sunny Balwani. Other material had been previously laid out in the book, “Bad Blood,” by former Wall Street Journal reporter John Carreyrou whose 2015 stories exposed the flaws in Theranos’ technology and the 2019 HBO documentary, “The Inventor.”

But the Hulu series breathes life into Holmes’ saga like no other while also telling the stories of a cast of characters who were charmed, reviled and otherwise affected by her quest to become a billionaire and perhaps change the world along the way, much like her idol, the late...