You’ve seen her in one of the scariest Sci-Fi trilogies of all time, where her portrayal of Ellen Ripley in the Alien films, made you believe that her character was just a real female badass and of course Ripley was a badass.
Sigourney Weaver has other films that have showcased her considerable acting talents but I think that most of those roles will pale in comparison to the role she has undertaken in the limited series Political Animals.
Political Animals is a USA limited series that takes us behind the scenes of the fictional political family, the Barrishs. Here is a family with more than enough skeletons in their family’s closet to make the Clintons look like Bible belt scholars.
Weaver plays the role of Elaine Barrish, who in the series is the Secretary of State, as well as having been a former Governor of the great state of Illinois…as well as being a former First Lady.
Her (former) husband Bud Hammond to say it bluntly is a womanizing, philandering sleaze ball who just happened to hold the highest office that an American could hope to attain.
Yes, Bud was the president of the United States and he was cheating on his wife for better than three years, before she finally told him that she wanted a divorce, after she gave a concession speech after her loss for the presidency.
To make things all the more interesting, we have Elaine’s son T.J, who came out as being Gay, which was all the more traumatic since his family were still in the white house at the time, and on top of that he’s had recurring drug addiction issues.
Elaine’s other son is engaged to a young lady who seems to have a problem with anorexia, as we see her in a scene during the couple’s engagement dinner, going to the lady’s room and purging her meal.
And add into this twisted mix, a young woman reporter who has a story about T. J that’s she’s threatening to expose unless she gets some private time with the Secretary of State, and due to things she’s written in the past about the Barrish family, she’s really an unwanted face around the Barrish family period.
This is going to be one of those “must see” television series to watch, and trust me there were a few things that I left out of this article, because if you miss Political Animals you’ll be missing one of the best things to come to cable this summer.
