HBO Films to Chronicle 2016 Election in New Miniseries
HBO Films has ordered a new miniseries based off the third installment of Mark Halperin and John Heilemann’s Game Change series about the 2016 presidential election. Tom Hanks will serve as the series’ executive producer.
The miniseries will chronicle Donald Trump’s strange and often controversial campaign for the presidency that led to one of America’s biggest political upsets. Halperin and Heilemann were behind two previous HBO productions on unconventional elections, including the 2008 film Recount based off the 2000 presidential election and 2012’s Game Change, which chronicled the 2008 election and starred Ed Harris and Julianne Moore as Senator John McCain and Governor Sarah Palin respectively.
No release date or title has been pegged for Halperin and Heilemann’s upcoming book. The pair appeared on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert on Wednesday night to discuss their Showtime series The Circus, which will return on March 19th. The writers had previously joined Colbert for his election night special, informing Colbert that Trump had won the election. “Outside of the Civil War, World War II, and including 9/11, this may be the most cataclysmic event the country has ever seen,” Halperin said on election night.
“I might have understated it,” he noted on Wednesday night’s interview. The writer went on to note that he did not want to “minimize the loss of life in 9/11 and in the wars” but that the results of last year’s election have “convulsed the country.”