The networks love the far-left apocalyptic series The Handmaid's Tale because they think it reveals the world conservatives will soon create: A right-wing, theocratic nightmare. ABC’s Nightline on Tuesday was just the latest program to fawn over the show as some sort of deep expose on our current times.
Reporter Maggie Rulli cheered that pro-abortion, anti-Donald Trump activists dress up on the show’s red capes: “They’ve become a symbol of protest for global women's rights, from reproductive rights in Alabama and Georgia to equal pay and treatment in Hollywood, even protesting in London just two weeks ago during president Trump's state visit.”
Rulli explained how resonant she thinks the show is: “The Handmaid’s Tale is set in a dystopian American future where a right-wing fundamentalist religious group, Gilead, has overthrown most of the government and struck women of almost all of their rights.”
Get it? Just like Republicans and pro-lifers are doing. In case you didn’t see the agenda, Rulli talked to Bradley Whitford, an actor who joined season three of Handmaid’s Tale. Whitford detailed the threat of right-wing dictatorship:
We on the set feel there is a tremendous urgency. There is something going on in a lot of right-wing ideology that has to do with misogyny and has to do with controlling women. It's understandable that this is hit being a nerve.
This theme, about how important the show is, comes up in every media puff piece on Handmaid’s Tale. On June 5, Good Morning America co-host Michael Strahan talked to star Elisabeth Moss. He highlighted, “This isn't just a show, I mean you see for Halloween, you see for protest, people wearing the same outfits worn on the show and for solidarity. How has been it to see the impact of this in real life, though?”
On June 3, Whitford appeared on the Today show. He connected, “It's such an incredible creative experience, and obviously, unfortunately, a little too resonate culturally.”
A partial transcript of the June 18 segment is below. Click “expand” to read more.
Nightline
6/18/19 (6/19/19 in Eastern)
12:53 AM ETJUJU CHANG: It’s a fictional America where women are stripped of almost all their right. Welcome to Gilead, the world featured in The Handmaid’s Tale. The hit show inspiring protesters and legions of fans. Here’s ABC’s Maggie Rulli.
...
MAGGIE RULLI: The iconic cape. These blood red cloaks are arguably the breakout stars of Hulu's addictive hit The Handmaid's Tale. They've become a symbol of protest for global women's rights, from reproductive rights in Alabama and Georgia to equal pay and treatment in Hollywood, even protesting in London just two weeks ago during president Trump's state visit.
[Clip from show.]
RULLI: It's catapulting the show's themes of oppression against women into a cultural phenomenon.
[Clip from show.]
RULLI: Elizabeth Moss is an executive producer on the show and plays the lead character June. What is it like to know your show is sort of being used in political protests and cultural protests?
ELISABETH MOSS: Those are the women who are actually doing the work. They're the ones who are out there risking something, and I'm inspired by them, honestly.
[Clip from show.]
RULLI: Actress Ann Dowd plays Aunt Livia, a terrifying part of the show's patriarchy.
ANN DOWD: When I see women having the strength to get those costumes on and go out in the street it makes me want to weep, it makes me want to get on my hands and knees in gratitude for the strength and persistence to stand up and say no.
RULLI: The Handmaid’s Tale is set in a dystopian American future where a right-wing fundamentalist religious group, Gilead, has overthrown most of the government and struck women of almost all of their rights.
[Clip from show.]
RULLI: The show is difficult to watch. Fertile women have been rounded up and forced to breed for women of the ruling class by being raped. Author Margaret Atwood sees her book as a fictional warning.
MARGARET ATWOOD: We’re not living in Gilead yet. But there are Gilead-like symptoms going on.
RULLI: Samira Wiley plays a handmaid who has escaped the regime and fled to Canada.
SAMIRA WILEY: I’m sometimes afraid to actually examine exactly what the parallels are because I’m in a show that, to moe, is fiction.
[Clip of West Wing.]
RULLI: Actor Bradley Whitford, who starred on the politically resonant West Wing for seven years recently joined the cast of Handmaid’s. He said he was obsessed with the show.
BRADLEY WHITFORD: We on the set feel there is a tremendous urgency. There is something going on in a lot of right-wing ideology that has to do with misogyny and has to do with controlling women. It's understandable that this is hitting a nerve.
RULLI: This season, the theme is resistance.
MOSS: I think that I think people relate to is that she's not a super hero. You know, she's a heroine, but she's one of us. She's a woman. She’s a best friend. She’s a wife. She’s a mother. And I think that that is what actually ends up inspiring people.
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