What’s it called?
The Politician
What’s it about?
Payton Hobart, a pupil at an uber-posh Californian high school whose sole ambition is to become President of the United States – an obsession which has seen him prepare for the top job since childhood by analysing the factors common to every President going back to Ronald Regan (because that’s when Presidents started being TV personalities first and foremost). It helps that Payton’s rich (very) and bound for Harvard University (very probably). What will also help, however, is becoming president of his high school, and it’s that election which series one of The Politician covers. Standing against him is first River Barkley, with whom Payton is secretly in love, and then, when River shoots himself, River’s girlfriend Astrid. She chooses Skye Leighton as her running mate, a black pupil who describes herself as “gender non-conforming” while Payton chooses the wonderfully-named Infinity Jackson, a cancer sufferer undergoing chemotherapy. It’s a crass attempt to win the sympathy vote.
Who’s in it?
Ben Platt play Payton, Zoey Deutch is Infinity and British actress Lucy Boynton is Astrid but A-list heavy hitters come in the form of Gwyneth Paltrow (as Payton’s adoptive mother Georgina) and Jessica Lange (as Dusty, Infinity’s grasping grandmother and her primary carer).
What’s so good about it?
Like the best high school-set comedy-dramas set amongst the American elite this one shines a none-too-flattering light on its subject while also managing to satirise American politics and its obsession with surface at the expense of genuine depth. Or something like that. The Netflix series is written and created by Ryan Murphy, Brad Falchuk and Ian Brennan, the team behind Glee and American Horror Story anthology series.
Fun fact …
The series is filmed Fullerton Union High School in Orange County, California, alma mater of one Richard Milhous Nixon. Ever wonder what happened to him?
For fans of ...
Heathers, Glee, Election, Rushmore.
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