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Jerry and Marge Go Large is an upcoming dramedy releasing on Paramount+. The film is based on the true story of an old aged couple who managed to hack the lottery legally and become millionaires during their retirement.
Bryan Cranston and Annette Bening portray real-life couple Jerry and Marge Selbee in this riveting drama about their surreal lottery journey. The film will premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival on June 15 before being available to stream on Paramount+ on June 17, 2022.
Take a look at the couple who inspired the Bryan Cranston-starrer dramedy.
The story of Jerry and Marge Selbee: Professional lottery players from Michigan and stars of Jerry and Marge Go Large
Gerald "Jerry" Selbee is a seemingly ordinary man from East Leroy Township who attended Athens High School and went on to graduate with a bachelor's degree in mathematics from Western Michigan University. Nothing too out of the norm except his brain that can compute mathematical problems at a very advanced level.
It was this mathematical prowess that made him a millionaire after he hacked the lottery by identifying a mathematical loophole that inspired the film Jerry and Marge Go Large. Jerry was a puzzle solver throughout his life. He saw puzzles, patterns, and ciphers in everyday things where others only saw noise. Even at his humdrum job as a materials analyst at Kellogg's factory, he managed to break the code of the American cereal industry.
Jerry was dyslexic as a kid and did not perform well on his reading assignments. It was through a standardized test in eighth grade that he learned of his prodigious mathematical acumen. At that age, he could solve college-level mathematical problems.
In the senior year of high school, Jerry married his high school sweetheart Marjorie. The couple had six kids together over the next decade. While Marjorie remained a dutiful and supportive housewife, Jerry tried his hand at various jobs and earned a pile of diplomas. The Jerry and Marge Go Large duo made the perfect team.
Jerry and Marge Go Large: The beginnings of how the couple made it large
After retiring from his job at Kellogg's, Jerry, along with Marge, opened a convenience store in downtown Evart. The analysis that went into choosing the store that the couple went on to call, pretty simply, the Corner Store, is also an interesting story. Unsurprisingly then, Jerry applied his puzzle-solving expertise to the running of the store as well, maximizing the profits.
Eventually, the Selbees installed the first and only lottery machine in Evart in their store. It became so popular that soon they were selling $300,000 worth of lottery tickets per year and pocketing $20,000 in profits.
More than 15 years later, in 2000, the Selbees decided to sell the store and retire peacefully. One fine morning in 2003, Jerry came across a lottery game called Winfall while visiting the store he formerly owned and the rest is history. Jerry and Marge Go Large's trailer begins with this eureka moment experienced by Jerry while studying the lottery game.
In an interview with 60 Minutes, Jerry revealed that it took him about 3 minutes to figure out the odds and hack the lottery game. To work the lottery on a bigger scale, Jerry started GS Investment Strategies LLC, a 32-member corporation that invested in lottery tickets and reaped profits. The group eventually earned over $26 million in profits over a period of nine years.
Jerry and Marge Go Large: The aftermath of the couple's bizarre lottery adventure
After the Winfall lottery game in Michigan was shut down, the Selbees found a similar game called Cash Winfall in Massachusetts and became a lottery syndicate there too. The bizarre lottery outcome forced an investigation by the Boston Globe. The investigation forced the lottery operations to impose restrictions that led the Selbees' corporation to cease their profit-making venture.
Despite making millions off of their lottery winnings, the Selbees continued to live humble lives and put their profits to practical use. The money was dedicated to the betterment of their small town. The corporation's members managed to put their children through schools and colleges.
Meanwhile, the Selbees funded their own children's and grandchildren's educations with the money. They also used lottery winnings to establish a construction financing company to help build homes for military veterans in Northern Michigan.
In 2018, Jason Fagone wrote an article in the Huffington Post about the Selbees, that eventually inspired the Paramount+ original film Jerry and Marge Go Large. The film has been directed by David Frankel, who is also known for Devil Wears Prada and Marley & Me.
Jerry and Marge Go Large is set to premiere on Paramount+ on June 17, 2022.
