Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future

Divorce Wars
and wrote an article
for 
Marie Claire
titled “‘I Was a Starter Wife’: Inside America’s Messiest Divorce.”
The public tended to side with Justine during all of this and couldn’t quite figure out why a billionaire
was fighting his wife’s seemingly fair requests. A major problem for Musk, of course, was that his assets
were anything but liquid with most of his net worth being tied up in Tesla and SpaceX stock. The couple
eventually settled with Justine getting the house, $2 million in cash (minus her legal fees), $80,000 a
month in alimony and child support for seventeen years, and a Tesla Roadster.
*
Years after the settlement, Justine still struggled to speak about her relationship with Musk. During our
interview, she broke down in tears several times and needed moments to compose her thoughts. Musk, she
said, had hidden many things from her during their marriage and ultimately treated her much like a
business adversary to be conquered during the divorce. “We were at war for a while, and when you go to
war with Elon, it’s pretty brutal,” she said. Well after their marriage ended, Justine continued to blog
about Musk. She wrote about Riley and provided commentary on his parenting. One post gave Musk a
hard time for banning stuffed animals from the house when their twins turned seven. Asked about this,
Justine said, “Elon is hard-core. He grew up in a tough culture and tough circumstances. He had to
become very tough to not only thrive but to conquer the world. He doesn’t want to raise soft
overprivileged kids with no direction.” Comments like these seemed to indicate that Justine still admired
or at least understood Musk’s strong will.
*
In the weeks after he first filed for divorce in mid-June of 2008, Musk tumbled into a deep funk. Bill
Lee started to worry about his friend’s mental state and, as one of Musk’s more free-spirited friends,
wanted to do something to cheer him up. Now and again, Musk and Lee, an investor, would take trips
overseas and mix business and pleasure. The time was right for just such a journey, and they set off for
London at the start of July.
The decompression program began poorly. Musk and Lee visited the headquarters of Aston Martin to
see the company’s CEO and get a tour of his factory. The executive treated Musk like an amateur car
builder, talking down to him and suggesting that he knew more about electric vehicles than anyone else on

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the planet. “He was a complete douche,” as Lee put it, and the men did their best to make a hasty exit back
to central London. Along the way, Musk had a nagging stomach pain turn severe. At the time, Lee was
married to Sarah Gore, the daughter of former vice president Al Gore, who had been a medical student,
and so he called her for advice. They decided that Musk might be suffering from appendicitis, and Lee
took him to a medical clinic in the middle of a shopping mall. When the tests came back negative, Lee set
to work trying to goad Musk into a night on the town. “Elon didn’t want to go out, and I didn’t really,
either,” Lee said. “But I was like, ‘No, come on. We’re all the way here.’”
Lee coaxed Musk into going to a club called Whisky Mist, in Mayfair. People had packed the small,
high-end dance spot and Musk wanted to leave after ten minutes. The well-connected Lee texted a
promoter friend of his, who pulled some strings to get Musk escorted into the VIP area. The promoter then
reached out to some of his prettiest friends, including a twenty-two-year-old up-and-coming actress
named Talulah Riley, and they soon arrived at the club as well. Riley and her two gorgeous friends had
come from a charity gala and were in full-length, flowing gowns. “Talulah was in this huge Cinderella
thing,” Lee said. Musk and Riley were introduced by people at the club, and he perked at the sight of her
dazzling figure.
Musk and Riley sat at a table with their friends but immediately zeroed in on each other. Riley had just
hit it big with her portrayal of Mary Bennet in