SUNDANCE FILM FESTIVAL 2026 REVIEW! Jim “Fergie” Chambers is the subject of director/writer Sinéad O’Shea’s documentary All About the Money. Chambers is a scion of the extremely wealthy Atlanta Cox family (one of the top 10 wealthiest U.S. families). He grew up with nearly unlimited wealth and privilege, but as an adult, turned his back on the family and denounced capitalism. As an adult, he took a payout from the family of an estimated $250M in exchange for relinquishing any claims on the family assets.
He then left Atlanta for Alford, Massachusetts, where he bought property for a communist revolutionary base to train what he called “professional revolutionaries” intent on disrupting the capitalist system. He called his project the Berkshire Communists. They were pro-Hamas and expressed many antisemitic ideas.
This project fell apart when commune members were arrested as part of a pro-Palestinian protest of the Elbit company, an Israeli defense manufacturer. Paige, a commune member, was sentenced to 60 days in jail for vandalism. To avoid prosecution, Chambers fled to Tunisia, a country that has no extradition agreement with the U.S. He converted to Islam and began speaking Arabic.
In Tunisia, he invested in a football (soccer) club called Club Africain (CA). His revolutionary passion shifted to sports, but soon enough, he was disenchanted and began to see the same forces arrayed against him that always seemed to bedevil him wherever he went.
“… Chambers bought property for a communist revolutionary base in Massachusetts …”
I met Fergie Chambers at a gym he opened in my East Atlanta neighborhood in 2016. I didn’t know who he was, except for being the co-owner of the gym. He was very intense, but unfocused, burning with a manic energy. We learned later about his affluence and about his many legal troubles. His most famous escapade here came when he was arrested after taking a psychedelic substance and was found wandering outside naked. There were other incidents as well. The gym closed when Chambers walked away from it, leaving his partners high and dry.
The noteworthy point is not that Fergie abandoned the commune, but rather how foolish it was/is for anyone to believe him after so many ditched people and projects. Residents of the compound were left hanging. Paige expresses disillusionment and says now she thinks revolution should rise up from the people and not be bankrolled by a wealthy benefactor.
$250M means Chambers can go anywhere he wants in the world. He starts a project and walks away, and can do so repeatedly with impunity based on wealth acquired from his capitalistic roots, which insulates him from all consequences. The pull of the money is seductive, making people want to believe him when he shows enthusiasm for a venture, but they are inevitably let down. He wants to be seen as a victim, a tragic figure, while he enjoys a high quality of misery. Chambers is self-aware enough to admit he knows all this, saying people should regard him skeptically.
In an interview with WGBH Boston, O’Shea shared her conclusions: “This film is really a cautionary tale about the perils of extreme wealth more than anything. The people with the money are winning now, and there seems to be no checks. I do feel that somebody like Fergie truly does want to do good with his money. I think there are lots of other rich people who never really give it a second thought. But the house always wins.”
A final text card informs us that upon seeing All About the Money cut together, Chambers offered O’Shea the full cost of production if she would agree to never show it. She declined, saying: “It wasn’t all about the money.” This is a brilliant film that winds up shifting focus away from the commune to become an intimate exposé of how shockingly little accountability is demanded of the very wealthy.
"…an intimate exposé of how shockingly little accountability is demanded of the wealthy."
