A Genius Brain For Satire: In Praise of Armando Iannucci

by Rebecca Jane Parke

As the US Presidential election draws ever closer, it is only natural that in an attempt to find comfort or at least meaning in the uncertainty, many have turned to television. In this quest, I have found myself seeking out Armando Iannucci and his wonderful body of television satire. In doing so, I found a genius mind for satire.

Of course, I am in no way unique in this discovery. A recent article from Zach Vasquez in The Guardian, explained how many have turned to Iannucci’s satire, Veep, since Kamala Harris replaced Joe Biden on the Democratic ticket. Airing from 2012 to 2019, Veep follows the first female Vice-President of the United States, Selena Meyer (played by Julia Louis-Dreyfuss), documenting her rise, and occasional fall, whilst exposing the absolute moral bankruptcy of the US government. The fact that the scene where Meyer finds out the President is resigning became such a popular meme following Biden’s decision, speaks to the prophetic nature of Iannucci’s writing.

This is not the first time Iannucci’s work has foreshadowed later events. His BBC satire of the UK’s New Labour governments, The Thick of It, has often been compared to the chaos of the Tory governments in succeeding years, almost to the point of lazy cliché. Still, it speaks to the staying power of Iannuci’s satire, something that is quite rare. Comedies broadly, and satires especially, tend to age poorly and have the shortest shelf lives of any media.

In another Guardian article, by Nadia Khomani, in which he is dubbed “the Nostradamus of Western politics”, Iannucci attributes his gift to the “cyclical nature of news”, explaining that if “you look at early episodes of [the 80s British sitcom] Yes Minister, it’s all about Europe, cuts, the NHS. These themes don’t go away.” Iannucci is also known for the copious amounts of research that goes into his projects. This may be true, but it does not exactly account for Iannucci’s longevity where others have failed.

For me, Iannucci’s genius lies in his gift for understanding systems, both ones laid out in official rules and constitutions, and ones dictated by the press and interest groups. His satire is so exacting because his understanding of how day-to-day politics works in all its complexity is so clear. All Iannucci needs to do is make his characters and their situations ever-so-slightly larger-than-life, then the satire writes itself. His writing feels prophetic because political actors themselves have become larger than life whilst still operating under those same systems.

As a film student, I find Iannucci’s playing with structures echoed in one of the films that has influenced him. In a 2022 Sight and Sound article, Iannucci cites Festen, Thomas Vinterberg’s 1998 black comedy, as one of his favourite films. Although the mobile camera work of Veep and The Thick of It is often described as cinema verité style, for me their style is reminiscent of the Danish Dogme 95 movement, of which Festen is an essential part. An obsession with the rules and structures that govern society, and what happens when they are broken, is the driving force behind Dogme 95. That Iannucci is able to mix these principles with political satire only cements his genius.

In short, when historians look back at this terrifying, chaotic period of politics, they will be grateful to have satirists like Iannucci. He is a spectacular brain, able to deliver an understanding of the chaos in a way that elicits more than a few chuckles.