Comedy against tyranny: Why you should be watching 'The Regime'

Why you should be watching The Regime - Copyright HBO

Published on 27/03/2024 - 15:16

Witness the final days of a collapsing modern-day European autocracy – with timely echoes to the rise of nationalism, and Kate Winslet proving there isn’t much she can’t do.

If you haven’t been watching HBO’s new series The Regime, you should be.

Having premiered earlier this month and ending its 6-episode run on 7 April, this miniseries already stands alongside True Detective: Night Country (a significant return to form for the anthology series) and 3 Body Problem (a slow burn which yields so many rewards if you can get past the first two episodes) as one of the best new shows of 2024 so far.

(NB: I haven’t seen One Day yet, but considering how David Nicholls’ novel left me robbed of all eye moisture, I’m waiting to be in the right frame of mind for that particular emotional bodyslam.)

The Regime is a bleakly comedic political satire starring Kate Winslet as Chancellor Elena Vernham, the autocratic leader of a fictitious country somewhere in “Middle Europe” who is seven years into her reign.

She lives in a lavish palace reminiscent of The Grand Budapest Hotel, with all the rococo trimmings. However, she’s convinced that her castle is making her sick, quickly revealing her to be something of a paranoid hypochondriac when she isn’t addressing the nation as a poised strongwoman cooing the lines “I bless you all, and I bless our love – always.”

Oh, and when she’s not huffing oxygen from tanks or being carried in transparent cocoons like a valetudinarian Cleopatra, she’s taunting the rotting cadavre of her dead father, which she keeps in a glass coffin.

As one does.

We first meet her through the eyes of Corporal Herbert Zubak (Matthias Schoenaerts, all bulked up, growly, and sporting facial hair that would make a huffing buffalo cower with dread). He's a recently-disgraced soldier with rage issues who has earned the nickname “The Butcher” when he gunned down protestors at a cobalt mine – cobalt being the country's main resource.

Vernham hires the volatile trooper to walk in front of her armed with a hygrometer that reads moisture levels, which seems to temporarily placate the Chancellor and her moldy fears. And very quickly, after an event that shan’t be spoiled here, Zubak becomes her unlikely confidant and advisor.

However, his influence – insular nationalism, anti-protest and staunchly traditionalist characterise it best – soon rhymes with the progressive unraveling of Vernham’s authoritarian regime.

Created and written by Will Tracy (The Menu, Succession) and directed by Jessica Hobbs (The Crown) and Stephen Frears (The Queen, Philomena), there are certain influences The Regime can’t escape.

It is tempting to label it a cross between Succession and The Crown, considering the creative team includes those series veterans, as well as the fact that, like Succession, The Regime satirizes the corrupting power of ambition, power and vanity.

But if you take a trip down the creative family tree, you land on Armando Iannucci.

Succession creator Jesse Armstrong wrote for the political satire The Thick Of It and co-wrote In The Loop, both created by Iannucci; and considering Tracy honed his skills under Armstrong, the shadow of the Scottish satirist looms large over The Regime. Further adding to this is the presence of Andrea Riseborough, who stars here as Agnes, the palace manager and Vernham’s right-hand woman. The British actress also appeared in Iannucci’s glorious Soviet-era satire The Death of Stalin, and the overall Soviet aesthetic can be found in spades in The Regime’s set design.

As if that wasn’t enough, Iannucci created Veep - another HBO satire depicting the rise and fall of another powerful woman who lives in a bubble where all she cares about is herself, the power she craves, and the legacy she’ll leave behind.

However, while Vernham may seem as ineffectual as Veep’s Selina Meyer, and is certainly surrounded by the same cowering yes-men, she has something her US counterpart does not: narcissism backed by the actual means to subjugate.

It’ll come as no surprise that Winslet is fantastic. After her roles in Mare of Easttown and Mildred Pierce, she’s essentially become HBO’s go-to gal when they want a surefire hit that allows the actress to boast her diverse range.

She sells the unpredictability and quirkiness of the erratic Vernham, who can be repeatedly slapping her confident one minute and knocking out a brilliantly terrible rendition of Chicago’s ‘If You Leave me Now’ to a room of dignitaries the next.

Then there’s her voice - a plummy accent that can’t conceal a slight lisp, which physically manifests in what can only be described an Alicia Silverstone diagonal lip slant or a Drew Barrymore mouth droop that suggests the Chancellor may have had a stroke at some point.

Winslet is the show’s lynchpin, and as much as she’s proven in the past she has comic timing for days (see: that episode of Extras in which she discusses the merits of starring in Holocaust films to better bag Oscars), it’s hard to think of a role that she’s been able to inject with so much gusto and absurdist humour.

When Vernham is convinced the cure to her ailments lies in Zubak’s folk remedies, specifically fresh spuds, Winslet’s deadpan delivery of her line about unlocking "the ancient power of the potato” is magic. The same could be said for that aforementioned musical number, which sees her vanity take over as she unmelodiously sings “If you leave me now, you’ll take away the very heart of me,” before addressing the crowd with “You will – I'll be heartbroken!”

Bar that scene, there are few laugh-out-loud moments in the show (so far), as The Regime deals more with absurdity than Veep-style zingers or Malcolm Tucker rants. It is a satire, but the comedy is dark and, it has to be said, at times slightly clunky.

While Iannucci is a constant touchpoint comparison, the show doesn’t quite manage to clear the bar set by its satirical predecessors. And there are valid qualms that for all its quirkiness in dealing with the lunacy of the elite, the show doesn’t have the same razor-teethed bite as Veep, for instance, or Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove – whose war room is homaged in the architectural layout of Vernham’s situation suite.

Still, there’s more than enough to go on here, and part of the show's shrewdness resides in the vagueness of the derision - something which otherwise would have been a black mark against it.

Shot partly in Austria, this could be anywhere. France, China and the United States are namechecked, but the decision to keep The Regime’s nation unidentified handily allows it to be a heightened cypher for any country in today’s geopolitical landscape – especially those turning to nationalistic chest-thumping and populist fearmongering tactics.

In this sense, the show works as a broad but effective cautionary tale for any nation – European or otherwise - who turns to vain autocrats promoting themselves through gaudy nationalist tat and rhetoric - all while welcoming echo chambers of disinformation fuelled by sycophants and insulating themselves in bubbles of luxury and paranoia.

And if the location is kept vague, so is its leader, as Vernham could be anyone.

Her title – Chancellor – is usually associated with Germany and Austria. But it goes darker.

Like Donald Trump, she’s a germaphobe who ludicrously likens herself to the greats; her insecurity stemming from her father’s shadow echoes Marine Le Pen; there’s a touch of Giorgia Meloni in looks; a soupçon of Viktor Orbán in there too; and her paranoia-fuelled isolation and the way she arrests rivals or plots to invade her neighbours draws a direct parallel to Vladimir Putin.

She’s a ridiculous amalgamation of them all, and even if Russia’s invasion of Ukraine occurred after The Regime was written, that last real-life comparative is borderline invited.

Still, the one-size-fits-all tale of oppression allows creator Will Tracy to essentially say that authoritarianism is, at the end of the day, non-specific and all-inclusive.

Look to history. Look to current events.

Front as populist despite your contempt for the working class; Find financial backing in a global superpower you pretend to despise because of your isolationist policies but appreciate their lax stance on human-rights violations as long as they get their hands on your natural resources and you get a seat at the table; Fiddle with the media to promote your ego-driven lies; Feed on conspiratorial guff that derives from disinformation to better scaremonger; Fuel nationalistic fervor by harking back to empty traditions and glory days that never existed.

The five ‘F’s of absolutist bastardry, if you like.

Above all, what Tracy has understood is that you can choose to despair at the bleak state of things or to laugh, so as to better warn against present evils – since our farcical human nature dooms us to repeat the mistakes of the past. Just look at the US face-off for the upcoming November presidential elections, and tell me we're not incapable of learning from recent history.

In opting for the laughter-is-the-best-medicine approach, The Regime harks back to what Mel Brooks said about humour being the ultimate weapon against all forms of tyranny and would-be dictators: “Comedy can cut men like this down to size, robbing them of their power and myths.”

Add a ‘wo’ to that sentence, and you’re there.

Humour and mockery may not change the inevitable sway towards authoritarianism and oppression, but it certainly makes for damn good television.

With that, don’t forget to vote at the upcoming European elections. I bless you all, and I bless our love. Always.