Good Grief, Kate Winslet’s ‘The Regime’ Looks Absolutely Terrific

HBO is relentless. I’m not sure how they do it. A veritable parade of outstanding shows, from Succession to The White Lotus and everything in-between. The last series I saw Kate Winslet in was the excellent Mare Of Easttown, yet another HBO offering and one of the better detective series I’ve seen in recent years. Winslet gave one of her best performances of her career in that show.

Now she’s teaming up with a terrific new cast including Matthias Shoenaerts (Bullhead), Guillaume Gallienne (The French Dispatch), Andrea Riseborough (Matilda the Musical), Martha Plimpton (The Goonies) and Hugh Grant (Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves) for the upcoming HBO political dark comedy, The Regime.

In the trailer below you see Winslet’s character, the Chancellor, meeting with Plimpton’s. Plimpton plays an American diplomat visiting the palace of Winslet’s authoritarian European dictator. The whole thing looks very surreal, like a version of our world that’s just slightly changed. Plimpton’s costume looks like something plucked out of Handmaid’s Tale. Winslet’s character waxes poetic about liberty while police crack down on citizens in the streets. It looks hilarious and terrifyingly dystopian all at once.

Here’s the trailer:

I’m excited to see Martha Plimpton in this also. I’m always excited to see a Goonies alum do great things, and many of the kids from that wonderful movie have.

The creators of the show include Will Tracy, a writer on HBO’s hit series Succession and the screenwriter for The Menu starring Ralph Fiennes, Anya Taylor-Joy and Nicholas Hoult. The series’ two directors include Stephen Frears, who made his American film debut with Dangerous Liaisons back in 1988 and Jessica Hobbs, who was a director on the crime series Broadchurch. Other producers include Tracey Seaward (The Queen) and Frank Rich (Succession, Veep).

The Regime is set to release sometime in 2024 on HBO and what will then be called simply Max, the streaming service replacing HBO Max later this month.

P.S. Yes, I know HBO released this trailer a few weeks ago. I can’t help that I only just ran across it today researching another article. I can’t keep up with everything, everywhere all at once!