'Veep' Season 4 Takes Inspiration from Bill Clinton, Show Renewed for Season 5
"Veep" Season 4 premieres with "Joint Session" with Selina Meyer (Julia Louis Dreyfus) as the newly promoted President. Ironically, the series premiere coincided with Hillary Clinton's announcement of her presidential run.
"Joint Session"
"Veep" opens with Selina arriving at the congress clad in a red dress. While her dress speaks power, trouble begins early for US' first female president as her teleprompter dies and shows an emoticon instead of her speech.
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In 1993, the same incident (minus the emoticon) happened to former President Bill Clinton. Clinton continued to address the joint session of Congress and presented his health care plan. In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, creator Armando Iannucci shared:
"That part of the episode was based on a story about Bill Clinton's first State of the Union address. They put the wrong draft of the speech and when it came up on the teleprompter, he improvised for 10 minutes, and it was the best 10 minutes of the whole evening."
Selina, however, was not as good in improvising. The new president ad-libbed – to the horror of her staff.
The episode tries to show the blunders and challenges of being the president. In one scene, Selina was briefed by her presidential chief of staff about the United States warship that collided with a Greek fishing boat. Having to issue a statement, she says, "Yeah, because, I'm the president … see, everything's my fault now."
As to what fans can expect for the rest of the season, Iannucci shares "There's a trip to Iran! Also, little things that happen in the first three episodes will come back to dominate the second half of the season."
Great news for fans of "Veep," as HBO confirmed that the comedy series is renewed for another season. The announcement was made a day after the series' season 4 premiered on HBO. The political satire show debuted in 2012 and has since established itself as one of the more successful series that departs from the gore and sex in "Game of Thrones."
"Veep" airs every Sunday, 9 p.m. on HBO.
