News that Armando Iannucci, the driving force behind ace political satire The Thick of It, has just successfully won the chance to create a series on US telly might come as a mixed blessing to fans of his UK work – but it’s true. HBO has just picked up Washington-set comedy series Veep, co-created by Iannucci and starring Julia Louis-Dreyfus.
Of course, given that Iannucci is just one of the team behind the new show, you’d have to figure that he’ll devote plenty of time to both of them. Oh, and keep plotting his next film. And oversee future Alan Partridge adventures. Essentially, he’ll learn to function without sleep or seeing his family.
Veep will find ambitious politician Selina Meyer (Louis-Dreyfus) winning the job as Vice President of the USA. But she quickly discovers that it’s nothing like she thought – and every bit as awful as everyone else predicted.
Also signing on are Anna Chlumsky (who you might recall showed up in Iannucci’s transatlantic film debut, In The Loop), Sufe Bradshaw, Matt Walsh, Tim Simons and Arrested Development veteran Tony Hale.
Plus Iannucci’s not the only one running things behind the scenes: pilot co-writer Simon Blackwell is on board to run the show with New York Times columnist Frank Rich and Chris Godsick. And since HBO generally tends to be a little less invasive with its show-runners, we doubt Iannucci will be ringing Steven Moffat up any time soon to hear his Coupling horror stories…