Is ‘I Care a Lot’ Based on True Story? Marla Grayson’s Inspiration, Explained

I Care A Lot—which is now streaming on Netflix in select countries including the U.S., and on Amazon Prime in other regions—is part comedy, part thriller, and part gangster movie. It stars Rosamund Pike as an ambitious businesswoman named Marla Grayson who makes her money by stealing from old people.

Technically, the racket Marla is running is legal. She’s a court-appointed guardian who gets put in charge of an elderly person’s assets when they are deemed unfit to care for themselves. Working with a corrupt doctor, she targets aging wealthy victims, seizes their homes, moves them into a care facility, and then sells all their stuff.

Unfortunately, Marla’s latest old lady victim (played by Dianne Wiest) just so happens to be the mother of a prominent Russian mob boss (Peter Dinklage). The ensuing gangster thriller that follows is entirely fictional. But is any part of I Care A Lot based on a true story?

Is I Care A Lot based on a true story? Is Marla Grayson based on a true story?

I Care A Lot is not based on a true story, and Marla Grayson is not a real person. All of the characters and plotlines in I Care A Lot are fictional. The only part of I Care A Lot that is kinda, sorta based on a true story is the premise behind Marla’a guardianship scam.

Writer/director J Blakeson was partially inspired by real-life news stories about shady guardians like Marla Grayson. In an interview for the film’s press notes, Blakeson said, “It started when I saw news stories about real-life predatory guardians who game the system and exploit their wards. And I was horrified. Imagine opening your door one day and there is a person standing there holding a piece of paper that gives them total legal power over you. That idea terrified me—and seemed very relevant right now. It plugged into themes that I am interested in exploring —themes about the power of authority, about people vs profit, control vs freedom, humanity vs bureaucracy. It reminded me of Kafka’s The Trial​. I knew I had to explore it.”

Blakeson went on to say that he “went down this Google rabbit-hole” regarding professional guardians in America. (Blakeson is English.)

“[I was] reading lots of news stories and became horrified about the terrible things that so many of them were doing—especially given that most of their actions existed in a legal loophole,” he said. “This provided a lot of themes that interested me, like ambition, the American Dream, and humans becoming commodities. So the story started there. I sat and wrote it on my own and very quickly it formed into what is now I​ Care a Lot​.”

If you want to go down a similar rabbit hole that Blakeson did, check out New Yorker reporter Rachel Aviv’s excellent 2017 essay on the guardianship phenomenon, “How the Elderly Lose Their Rights.” It’s a great read, and no doubt inspired many elements of Blakeson’s script.

Watch I Care A Lot on Netflix