The Creator ‘In the Thick of It’ and ‘Veep’ Has a Trump Project…But Can’t Get it Funded

He’s scared of pushback from Trump.

Photo by Cathy Poland on Unsplash

Armando Iannucci isn’t really clear what the project would like, if it would be a movie or a show, he just wants to base the whole thing on Trump’s speeches.

Unfortunately though, he can’t get funding, all the journalists he speaks to say thing like “If you’re on the list, your life is made miserable” and “the inland revenue will come calling, you better lawyer up.”

That Trump would just keep weighing him down with legal issues.

We know this from what happened to Jimmy Kimmel.

And yeah, he came back but Stephen Colbert hasn’t.

Part of that is because their respective companies had big mergers planned that Trump could fuck with and they just thought it best to give Trump what he wants, and cancel a show rather than defy him.

Disney reversed course because millions of people unsubscribed to their Disney+ service in protest.

But then Kimmel’s been on the air since 2003. The idea that Trump would after someone that big just scared people.

Not sure Iannucci will get the same defense so it may not be worth it.

Still more, with the way Trump is going, if you really make a spoof of his presidency there may be a lot better material to work with soon.

Just taking this government shutdown for example, the guy said on air that he might cut people’s medical benefits.

He kept saying on the campaign trail he wouldn’t, people keep saying he didn’t know the Big Beautiful Bill cut Medicaid, but here is explicitly saying he will.

There’s so much more you know you can use in the future.

But then again, I just finished In the Thick of It and I watched all of VEEP. I haven’t seen him take a bit swing at the Right before. It feels like he tries to kinda go after both sides so I don’t quite know what his take on Trump would end up being.

He’d probably focus on Dems’ response to it, talking about how people see Dems as inept in their handling of Trump’s actions.

That feels more like his style but then…a show specifically about Trump must be too tempting to pass up.

It is interesting to think about his take though.

I mean, I hear ‘In the Thick of It’ was like a sort of sequel to ‘Yes, Minster’ but ‘Yes, Minster’ was about the growing influence of civil servants, ‘In the Thick of It’ was about the influence of spin doctors and the media.

A project about Trump might be about how that need for spin has turned into the market for anger and reactionary politics that Dems just aren’t able to compete with.

Or it might be a bit less heavy than that.

We’ll probably see it sooner or later though.