After Gleeson initially turned it down, Ray said other lead actors rejected it too. Then, finally, Gleeson was approached again and said yes. “What we got were people who passed without reading,” Ray said. “They just didn’t want to be anywhere near it for reasons that I understand. Because if you are a private person, like Brendan, boy, this is inviting a lot of rancor from someone who’s not shy about letting you know if he’s unhappy with something you’ve done, right?”
The Comey Rule will air on Showtime over two nights starting September 27, which itself was a source of controversy. Comey’s announcement about reopening the Clinton email probe 11 days before the last election, and his subsequent pronouncement clearing her two days before voters went to the polls, was blamed by many, including Clinton herself, for her narrow loss in key swing states. Executives at Showtime’s parent company, ViacomCBS, initially wanted to hold off on airing the miniseries until after the 2020 election, according to Ray, who publicly objected to such a delay, leading ViacomCBS to relent.
“Of course, I wanted this series to air before the 2020 elections,” Ray said. “I think our democracy is on the line right now. And I wanted this series to be part of that conversation.”
What Was He Thinking?
For everyone who wondered that about Comey in the buildup to the 2016 election, this miniseries tries to present an answer. “That’s exactly the approach I took with it,” Daniels said. “We will show you what he was thinking, moment to moment. One of the options, to do nothing, is a decision, but it’s not an option for him. As a dramatic character, basic story structure, you want to put your hero between a rock and a hard place, write the hero into a corner, and then he has to overcome the obstacles to come out of it, one way or another. And Comey, what he went through was a rock and hard place.”