Gilded Age Gossip

I’m Jasmine Jolis, a travel and heritage filmmaker from Virginia, and I make the Gilded Age Gossip series: the true stories behind HBO’s The Gilded Age.I’ve always been drawn to beautiful old places and the people who lived in them. Every mansion has a public story and a private one, and the private one is always better. When The Gilded Age came back, I started filming the real Newport mansions and telling the real story behind each character. Who was the real Bertha Russell? (Alva Vanderbilt.) Did a mother really lock her daughter away until she agreed to marry a duke? (Yes, and the dowry was about $2.5 million in railroad stock.)My first episode, about Marble House, passed 199, 000 views on Instagram in its first days, and viewers keep asking the same thing: “Wait, did that really happen?” That question is the heart of my event. You get the scandal, then you vote, then you find out what was real.I love teaching because history lands best as a story told live, with a room full of people gasping at the same moment. I keep it fun, fast and fact-checked. Every story is sourced, and the archive photos are the real ones.A little more about me: I hold a master’s degree in political science and a bachelor’s in communications, and I’m working on my Ph.D. in public policy. The Preservation Society of Newport County has approved me to film The Breakers, Marble House and Chateau-sur-Mer this holiday season.Pour a cup of tea and come gossip with me about the Gilded Age.