‘Idiocracy’ Director Mike Judge: Studio Nixed Our Anti-Donald Trump Ads

Mike Judge, the director and co-creator of the 2006 cult comedy Idiocracy, says a plan to release anti-Donald Trump campaign ads based on characters in the movie has been canceled by the film rights’ owner 20th Century Fox.

“It kind of fell apart,” Judge told The Daily Beast. “It was announced that they were anti-Trump, and I would’ve preferred to make them and then have the people decide.”

The idea was first hatched by Idiocracy screenwriter Etan Cohen, who took to Twitter in February and acknowledged the perceived parallels between his satirical film and the 2016 presidential election.

“I never expected #idiocracy to become a documentary.” Cohen quipped.

Idiocracy follows an “Average Joe” (Luke Wilson) who wakes up 500 years in the future to find an incredibly idiotic American society.

Actor and comedian Terry Crews — who plays the burly President Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho — “wasn’t happy” about the ads being billed as “anti-Trump,” according to Judge.

“Terry Crews had wanted to just make some funny Camacho ads, and Etan [Cohen] and I had written a few that I thought were pretty funny, and it just fell apart,” Judge told the outlet. “I wanted to put them out a little more quietly and let them go viral, rather than people announcing we’re making anti-Trump ads. Just let them be funny first.”

“Also, when Terry heard that announcement he wasn’t happy about it,” he added.

(Warning: Strong Language)

Judge suspected that 20th Century Fox, helmed by Republican donor Rupert Murchoch, would be a “roadblock” to the Trump-lampooing ads being given the green light.

“I just heard that they were put on the shelf, so it looks like they’re not going to happen,” he said.

Judge, who also wrote TV shows Beavis and Butthead and Silicon Valley and feature films including Tropic Thunder and Office Space, said it’s “surreal” how “one specific thing after another” leads him to believe that truth is stranger than fiction.

“I didn’t want Idiocracy to get popular by the world getting stupider faster,” he told the Daily Beast. “I guess I was 450 years off! But yeah, it’s a tad bit scary!”

 

Follow Jerome Hudson on Twitter: @JeromeEHudson