‘Swiped’ True Story: How Accurate Is the Lily James Hulu Movie About Bumble CEO Whitney Wolfe Herd?

After watching Swiped on Hulu—the new Lily James movie that began streaming today—you’ll understand why there aren’t more women CEOs in tech.

Directed by Rachel Lee Goldenberg, who also co-wrote the screenplay with Bill Parker and Kim Caramele, Swiped tells the true story of Whitney Wolfe Herd, the founder and CEO of Bumble, a dating app in which men are not able to message women unless the woman sends a message first. But before she created Bumble, Wolfe was a co-founder of Tinder, the dating app rife with harassment and unsolicited dick pics that inspired the creation Bumble.

Also starring Dan Stevens, Myha’la and Jackson White, Swiped will clue viewers in on the little-known, drama-filled story of Bumble’s creation, which has in part been kept quiet due to Wolfe’s legal obligation to non-disclosure agreements. It’s a good story, but Hollywood is known to stretch the truth. Don’t confuse watching Swiped with watching a documentary, because not everything in the movie is true.

Read on to find out how accurate the Swiped movie is to the true story of Whitney Wolfe.

Is the Lily James Hulu movie Swiped based on a true story?

Yes, Swiped is based on the true story of Whitney Wolfe Herd (played by Lily James), who was a co-founder of the dating app Tinder and went on to found and run the “women message first” dating app Bumble. In 2014, Wolfe sued for sexual harassment, and reportedly reached a settlement of “just over $1 million.”

Many real people are depicted in the movie, including Wolfe’s husband Michael Herd (played by Pierson Fodé), Tinder CEO and co-founder Sean Rad (played by Ben Schnetzer), Tinder co-founder Justin Mateen (played by Jackson White), and Russian tech CEO, Bumble co-founder, and Badoo founder Andrey Andreev (played by Dan Stevens).

How accurate is the Swiped movie to the true story of Whitney Wolfe?

Like most movies based on a true story, Swiped has changed, condensed, and cut aspects of Whitney Wolfe’s true story in order to make a more efficient, entertaining film. In the case of Swiped, there is a disclaimer at the end of the movie that the real Whitney Wolfe did not participate in the movie, thanks to her legally binding non-disclosure agreement, and that the story had “been fictionalized for the purpose of dramatization.” In other words, the parts of Swiped that deal with Wolfe’s sexual harassment lawsuit—aka how she was treated and discriminated against during her time at Tinder—is all speculation, and not necessarily the way things really went down.

That said, many parts of Swiped were pulled from real life and publicly available information—like the barrage of texts that Wolfe received from Tinder co-founder Justin Mateen (played by Jackson White in the movie), whom Wolfe briefly dated, which were included in the lawsuit that Wolfe filed against Tinder. Screenshots of those texts show Mateen threatening men Wolfe saw after the breakup, Mateen warning Wolfe not to speak to “middle-aged Muslim pigs,” and calling Wolfe “heartless,” “pathetic,” and a “psycho.”

The lawsuit also included screenshots of Wolfe’s text exchange with Tinder co-founder and CEO Sean Rad, in which Wolfe told Rad she wanted leave the company “peacefully.” Rad was not sympathetic, and went into lawsuit-protection mode, telling Wolfe to stop texting and send him a formal resignation letter. “Your employment continuing is not likely an option at this point,” Rad texted her, a line that ended up in the film.

Wolfe texted “Why are you being weird and getting all legal and stuff,” another line that Lily James says in the movie.

Other details in the film—such as Wolfe’s strategy at college campuses of crashing sorority meetings to get sign-ups for Tinder, and then rushing to over to frats promising hot girls on the app—are also true, according to Wolfe’s 2018 profile in Texas Monthly. That same profile confirmed other true details from the film: Russian tech CEO Andrey Andreev (Dan Stevens) rejected a pitch from Wolfe for a social media app for teen girls called Merci and encouraged her to launch a new dating app. It’s also true that Wolfe hated the name “Bumble” at first, which was pitched by another member of her team. (Wolfe wanted to call the app Moxie, a named that was nixed after she realized it was already the name of a soda.)

That said, some parts of the movie seem to be completely invented. The character played by Myha’la, Tisha—a Black woman who pushes the movie version of Wolfe to be more intersectional—does not seem to be based on a real person. A photo of the real Wolfe and her early Bumble colleagues in Texas Monthly shows a team of white women.

In an interview with Dazed Digital, Myha’la reflected on her character’s addition to the script. “I actually think that [director and co-writer] Rachel [Lee Goldenberg]’s decision to include a Black woman’s perspective in this was the thing that we can relate to today, because I feel like in the 2010s nobody was talking about intersectionality in those offices,” Myha’la said. “They just weren’t. Or if they were, it was a quieter conversation. I think it was cool that she [Tisha] was the only character thinking about it in that way. “

But perhaps the most eggregious invention for the movie is the big speech Wolfe gives at the end of the movie, condemning Andrey Andreev (played by Dan Stevens). It is true that a 2019 bombshell Forbes investigation from journalist Angel Au-Yeung (whose name was changed to Stephanie in the movie) revealed a pattern of abuse, sexual harassment, and tax evasion at the headquarters of Bumble’s majority owner Andrey Andreev, which led to Andreev selling his stake in Bumble to Blackstone four months later. It’s also true that in her initial comment to Forbes for the story, Wolfe defended Andreev and said she never witnessed any toxic behavior, saying, “He’s become my family and one of my best friends.”

Here’s the part that’s a lot less true: A few days after the story was published, Wolfe changed her tune and distanced herself from Andreev. However, rather than a firm, dramatic, heroic speech condemning misconduct given at a launch event—as is depicted in the film—Wolfe submitted a lengthy, and much more wishy-washy, statement to Tech Crunch. Though she said she was “sickened” by the allegations, she also maintained she never witnessed any misbehavior, and disputed a detail in the report that claimed she was CC’d on an email detailing some of the allegations.

In response, Forbes issued it’s own statement via a spokesperson: “The responses are designed to obfuscate and deflect from the facts as borne out by the rigorous reporting. We stand by our reporting 100 percent.”

You can read the real Wolfe’s full statement below:

All of us at Bumble are mortified by the allegations about Badoo (Bumble’s majority owner) from the years before Bumble was born, as chronicled in the Forbes story. I am saddened and sickened to hear that anyone, of any gender, would ever be made to feel marginalized or mistreated in any capacity at their workplace. From my time speaking with the reporter, I was only able to share my personal experiences, which have been nothing but positive and respectful, ranging from 2014, before Bumble existed, and during the 5 years since. To this day, we at Bumble have never seen or heard of any of this behavior from any team members, and if we had we would have never tolerated it. However, I would never challenge someone’s feelings or experiences. I offered to the reporter to extend my contact info to anyone who felt their experience was negative and said I would be an ally and open ear to them. That offer still stands. As a woman who has been through dark times, please know that I am deeply sorry for anything that could have taken place that made anyone feel uncomfortable before my time building Bumble. And know that I feel personally responsible by association for the well-being of each and every team member in the group, regardless of what company or what office around the world, from the past or the present. Badoo is currently conducting an investigation into the allegations, as well as compiling documentation to expose the factual inaccuracies that exist within the article. I’d like to take the opportunity to clarify that I was never copied on any email from these allegations, as Forbes suggested. I learned of the majority of these allegations at the same time as the public. We at Bumble remain fiercely committed to our mission, while being openly apologetic to anyone who feels our mission is compromised. We assure you that we would never conduct business in a manner contradictory to our values and would never tolerate the type of toxic behavior described by Forbes.

So, no, the real Wolfe did not “blow up her life” to defend alleged sexual misconduct victims, as shown at the end of the movie. The real Wolfe is a little more complicated than the version of her in the film that shows a feminist hero who stands up firmly for her ideals .