Editorial Staff
Emmy Award-winner Brendan Gleeson has been cast as President Donald Trump in a new four-hour CBS Studios event miniseries based on former FBI Director James Comey’s New York Times #1 bestselling book, ”A Higher Loyalty”. As reported earlier today, Multiple Emmy-winner Jeff Daniels will play Comey.
Oscar-nominated screenwriter Billy Ray (“Captain Phillips,” “Shattered Glass,” and the upcoming “Richard Jewell,” directed by Clint Eastwood) adapted the book and will be directing the miniseries, which is executive produced by Alex Kurtzman, Shane Salerno and Heather Kadin. The drama is slated to begin production in November with an airdate to be announced at a later date.
According to Ray, “It’s hard to imagine a bigger acting challenge than playing Donald Trump. You have to have presence, and a singular kind of dynamism. You also have to have the courage and the will to play Trump’s psychology from the inside out. Oh, and you have to be spectacularly talented and watchable. Not many actors check all those boxes. Brendan does. I’m ecstatic about this.”
The Dublin-born Gleeson is best-known for his performance as Alastor Moody in the “Harry Potter” films and for outstanding films such as “Braveheart,” “Michael Collins,” “Gangs of New York” and “Cold Mountain,” as well as his Golden Globe nominated performance in “In Bruges.” He won an Emmy Award in 2009 for his remarkable portrayal of Winston Churchill in “Into the Storm” and has just completed three seasons on his award-winning role as Bill Hodges in the “Mr. Mercedes” TV series.
Ray researched the project for over a year in order to make the drama a fair, responsible and comprehensively documented account of real-life events. He traveled to Washington, D.C. and several other cities to meet with Comey, his family, and many other key players, including prominent journalists, FBI agents, government officials from both political parties and others.
A Higher Loyalty debuted on top of the New York Times bestseller list and has already sold over two million copies across all platforms. It was recently released in paperback and again vaulted to #1 around the world. The story is the reminiscence of Director Comey, who served as the seventh director of the FBI from 2013 to 2017. From helping change the Bush administration’s policies on torture and electronic surveillance to overseeing the Hillary Clinton email investigation, as well as possible ties between the Trump campaign and Russia, Comey has been involved in some of the most consequential cases and policies of recent history.
The miniseries will be produced by Secret Hideout, The Story Factory and Home Run Productions in association with CBS Television Studios.
