Why Veep won’t address Donald Trump

Because of the current upheaval across the western world there has arguably never been a more important time for political satire and comedy.

But while ‘Saturday Night Live’ has been reenergised by its attacks on Donald Trump and his team, it has now confirmed that ‘Veep’ won’t be tackling the current President Of The United States in its upcoming sixth season.

Julia Louis-Dreyfus, who stars as Selina Meyers in the hit show, explained during a ‘Veep’ panel at South by Southwest that it doesn’t actually make sense for them to bring up either Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton because they weren’t candidates in their reality.

“I think that we set up this premise for our show – this alternate political universe – we don’t have any real-life celebrities on the show, we don’t have real journalists,” she remarked (via Mashable). “And in terms of actual political history, we don’t reference anyone after Reagan.”

David Mandel, ‘Veep’s’ show-runner since season five, added that since it “was basically written and put together” in the summer “way before he won, Hillary lost” that there was no real chance to reflect on Donald Trump, other than the “occasional joke” that nods towards him.

Mandel continued, “We’re not ‘Saturday Night Live’. If we try to make a joke about what Trump did yesterday, it will seem stale by the time the show airs.” And since ‘Veep’ continues to be the funniest show on television, there was no point in breaking its winning formula. UK viewers will get to see what ‘Veep’ has in store for its sixth season when it premieres shortly after it does in the US on April 16.