Riley: Musk woke up screaming in terror about bankruptcy

Musk’s ex-wife says that came close to a meltdown in 2008 when Tesla was haemorrhaging money and SpaceX had failed three times to launch a rocket into orbit.

He was trying to avoid bankruptcy. Every day Elon would come home and say, ‘That’s it. He was being ridiculed by the press. He would have these night terrors in the middle of the night. We’d be fast asleep and suddenly he would be screaming in his sleep, like he was trying to climb up and escape something. He gave me an out. He said, ‘This is going to be the hard part, you don’t have to stay for it’.

The actress said her ex-husband was vindicated when SpaceX finally became the first private company to launch a rocket into orbit, netting Musk a $1.5bn Nasa contract.

It was the first thing that went right. Elon was at his most joyous, incredible, wonderful. He went from being ridiculed to suddenly, his word was gospel.