We may always be chasing the high of Jon Stewart's Daily Show days. No, he's not coming back to television screens as a comedic political pundit, but if that craving for his particular style of commentary is stronger than ever, a treat is coming your way. Focus Features announced this week that the Jon Stewart-written and directed Irresistible has an official release date of May 29 in the US, which means it will be landing in the UK around the same time. If you're growing weary of the abysmal, real-life political climate, you can escape by going to see a nice summer movie featuring fictional political satire.
The film is set to star Steve Carell alongside Chris Cooper, Rose Byrne, Mackenzie Davis, Topher Grace, Natasha Lyonne, and Debra Messing, and the plot is exactly what The Daily Show super fans would expect. Here's everything we know about Stewart's upcoming film.
What Will It Be About?
Focus Features, the film's distributor, hasn't made a ton of information available. Initially announced in October 2018, details around the plot and casting have been limited, to say the least. The first trailer features a vest-clad Carell and a hysterically wicked Rose Byrne going head to head.
Carell will play a Democratic strategist named Gary who sees potential in a retired Marine Colonel (Chris Cooper) after a video of him standing up for undocumented workers in Wisconsin goes viral. But the Republican party has a weapon of its own in Faith (Rose Byrne), a strategist with her own agenda, poised to topple the plans that Gary has in place. The small-town race quickly spirals out of control. Rumours suggest that Topher Grace could play the part of the Republican candidate, but no details about that character are available at this time. Lyonne and Messing's roles are also undisclosed at this time. If the trailer is any indication, expect a lot of cable news-style split screens, and at least a bit of face licking. That's not a euphemism.
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Who's Behind It?
The fact that Stewart wrote and directed the film is already pretty great, but when you factor in that it's being produced by Brad Pitt's production company, Plan B Entertainment, that makes it even better. (In case you're not a production buff, Plan B was also behind Moonlight, Moneyball, and Carell's Beautiful Boy.) This is also the second time that Stewart has directed a film, following his 2014 film Rosewater.
So Jon Stewart Isn't In It?
No. But the added bonus of having him as writer and director is that he's certainly going to be back in the spotlight doing interviews for the film. And because the film is a political satire, think of the next few months as the comedic-political snack that we've been devoid of since Stewart left The Daily Show in 2015. Give us that snarky edge on Vice President Biden, Jon. It's time.
Justin Kirkland is a Brooklyn-based writer who covers culture, food, and the South. Along with Esquire, his work has appeared in NYLON, Vulture, and USA Today.
