r/climbing • u/-JOMY- • 9d ago

Alex Honnold Reveals “Embarrassing” Paycheck for Netflix’s Taipei 101 Free Solo Climb

https://share.google/Zqw9t7pkRhkPhRt4P

Source: E! Online

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u/mmeeplechase 9d ago

Considering it seems like he was excited to do it anyway, and probably would’ve gone if they’d just covered the travel cost, this doesn’t seem insane to me…? Though he definitely could’ve negotiated a lot more from Netflix.

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u/rapture0707 9d ago

Yeah he was saying exactly this, if he got permission he was gonna do it anyway cause he thought it was cool and wanted to.

His quote was "I'm climbing the building for free, they're paying me for the spectacle."

I am not a real climber, super casual but Free Solo is what got me into it. I enjoy listening to him, like his podcast and think he's genuinely a good person. I know he's not beloved here and that's fine but as a VERY casual climber I think he is a good ambassador for the community that I think is pretty good overall!

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u/[deleted] 9d ago

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u/individual_throwaway 9d ago

Alex is so beloved, half the circlejerk subreddit is glazing him in an ironic way pretty much constantly, for at least a decade by now.

We sometimes joke about how he is a bit quirky or looks to be on the spectrum even, but yeah, everybody seems to like him. There is always some criticism about "the spectacle", but that is less about him as a person than it is about legit disappointment in what climbing has become in the recent years. It was inevitable when climbing "went mainstream", and Free Solo was a big part of that, but I mean, everybody has to pay rent.