Julia Louis-Dreyfus is willing to admit her Veep character bears some similarities to a real-life presidential nominee.
Amid the show’s election year resurgence, the Golden Globe winner reasoned that her morally bankrupt politician character Selina Meyer is more like Donald Trump than his opponent Kamala Harris.
“In Veep, I play a very unhappy vice president, and at a certain point in a run of the show, I have the opportunity to run for president,” she explained on MSNBC.
“Now, I do want to say one thing about the character I play on Veep. I do want to say I play a very, shall we say, almost narcissistic, sociopathic, mega-maniacal type of person,” added Louis-Dreyfus. “I am not a Kamala Harris type. I am possibly much more like someone from the other party whose name I shall not even utter.”
She starred as Vice President (and eventually President) Meyer in the satirical HBO series created by Armando Iannucci, which ran for seven seasons from 2012 to 2019. The actress won nine Emmy Awards as star and producer of the show.
Louis-Dreyfus’ interview came ahead of her Veep reunion on Sunday for a table read benefitting the Democratic Party of Wisconsin as Harris campaigns in the battleground state. The virtual event will also feature co-stars Tony Hale, Anna Chlumsky, Reid Scott, Timothy Simons, Sam Richardson, Matt Walsh, Gary Cole, Sarah Sutherland, Clea DuVall and Sufe Bradshaw. Hosted by Stephen Colbert with special guests Larry David, Jason Alexander and Kevin Smith, tickets are available online for the event, which streams live at 7pm CT.
Anna Chlumsky, Timothy Simons, Matt Walsh, Tony Hale, Reid Scott and Julia Louis-Dreyfus in Veep.
HBO
After President Joe Biden announced in July he was dropping out of the race and endorsing Vice President Harris, plenty of fans took to social media with memes pointing out the parallels to Louis-Dreyfus’ titular character in the hit comedy series. The comparisons even drove a surge in viewership for the show, five years after it ended.
In August, Louis-Dreyfus admitted she plans to be “extra-involved” in the election, including an appearance at last month’s Democratic National Convention in Chicago.
