Documentaries consist of a very small slice of total consumer entertainment. After a comment was made on the subject, Bill Hader joked about how he, Fred Armisen and Seth Meyers approached IFC, “You know those movies not a lot of people watch? We want to celebrate those.”
Truly their series Documentary Now! is an homage to documentaries across all subjects. The first season of the show recognized Grey Gardens, Vice travel documentaries and The Thin Blue Line amongst others. The second season begins with “The Bunker” a parody of The War Room while other episodes address Jiro Dreams of Sushi and The Kid Stays in the Picture.
“The Bunker” features Hader and Armisen, as modified versions of James Carville and George Stephanopoulos respectively, trying to get their candidate to win an Ohio Gubernatorial election. As in all episodes so far, this one had superb attention to detail. From the looks on faces of the girls at the lemonade stand to the campaign slogan for Herndon (“A Choice”), these alternate realities are fully fleshed out. But with each episode running less than 30 minutes long, I wanted to spend more time in the world.
At least I could enjoy the 92Y‘s discussion with Armisen, Hader and Meyers. The three could barely contain themselves at times, with Hader laughing at Armisen for merely giving a straight answer to an early question. The moderator, Janice Min, probed the trio about the origins of the show (it evolved from the Saturday Night Live “Ian Rubbish” sketches), what the writing process was like (they don’t really plan their tributes ahead of time, the ideas just come to them as they had at SNL) and what subjects wouldn’t they touch (the Holocaust, though Armisen joked “which Holocaust?”).
As “The Bunker” is a political film recreation, Min asked if they planned this episode to fit with the current election cycle (they did not). Politics remained unavoidable as, Min also probed Meyers to see if he was to blame for Trump’s candidacy (or the origin story for Bane as Meyers himself put it). Trump was roasted by Meyers at the 2011 White House Correspondents Dinner and perhaps he is running for President as some sort of retribution. [Video of that can be found below.]
The Q&A was a nearly non-stop mirth fest and an exciting way to get pumped up for the new season. Check out an archive of the stream below and a clip of Armisen and Hader in their fake-Talking Heads band on Seth Meyers’ show.
Documentary Now! Season 2 begins on IFC September 14th.