Trump White House to Screen Steven Spielberg’s ‘The Post’

President Donald Trump’s White House is set to screen Steven Spielberg’s Pentagon Papers drama The Post, ahead of the film’s nationwide release.

The screening, according to the Hollywood Reporter notes, was reportedly requested by the administration and is just the latest in a growing list of films sought for screening by the Trump White House.

The 1970s-era drama chronicles the legal battle The Washington Post waged with the Nixon administration, which attempted to stop the paper from publishing highly secretive documents exposing decades of government cover-ups and deceit during the Vietnam War.

The film stars two vocal critics of President Trump, Meryl Streep as the famed Washington Post publisher Katharine Graham and Tom Hanks as Post editor Ben Bradlee.

Spielberg has described the much-hyped freedom of the press drama as “a feminist movie,” thanks to Streep’s portrayal of Graham.

“It’s a feminist story. It’s a political story. It’s a kind of action news story about chasing down a story. And the courage it takes to keep the First Amendment rights preserved and to respect the free press and keep it free,” he said.

The four-time Oscar-winning director has also repeatedly argued that the film’s production and its release were perfectly timed for an era that sees President Trump in constant battle with what he calls the “fake news” media.

“The gray and the blue have become the blue and the red. And it is as vast a chasm as our nation faced before the Civil War. I’ve never seen anything like it,” the veteran director said last month of the current climate in America, adding that reading the Post script gave him a sense of “fear” and urgency that made him realize “this was the only year to make this film.”

Hanks, for his part, said he wouldn’t attend a White House showing of The Post if he were invited.

“I don’t think I would. Because I think that at some point — look, I didn’t think things were going to be this way last November. I would not have been able to imagine that we would be living in a country where neo-Nazis are doing torchlight parades in Charlottesville [Va.] and jokes about Pocahontas are being made in front of the Navajo code talkers,” Hanks said.

From a script written by Liz Hannah and Josh Singer, the film co-stars Alison Brie, Carrie Coon, David Cross, Bruce Greenwood, Tracy Letts, Bob Odenkirk, and Sarah Paulson. The Post hits theaters nationwide on Jan. 12.

Follow Jerome Hudson on Twitter @jeromeehudson