Now Amazon Has Its Own Political 'TV' Series

Greenlights Garry Trudeau's 'Alpha House' for online series
By Evann Gastaldo,  Newser Staff
Posted May 30, 2013 2:47 PM CDT
Now Amazon Has Its Own Political 'TV' Series
John Goodman is one of the stars of the Amazon show.   (Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP)

Amazon is ramping up its competition with Netflix: The latter has House of Cards, and now Amazon has its own original series set in DC ... with "House" in the title. Alpha House was created by Doonesbury cartoonist Garry Trudeau, who also writes the series about four Republican senators living together. The pilot (which features cameos by Bill Murray and Stephen Colbert) went online a month ago, along with 13 others, and Amazon looked at customer feedback to determine which to pick up for a full season. Alpha House was one of just two comedy pilots to make the cut.

The Washington Post describes Alpha House as "political satire" in which the senators, played by John Goodman, Mark Consuelos, Clark Johnson, and Matt Malloy "live like frat brothers." It was inspired by a real Capitol Hill property in which Democratic senators have lived over the years, and it's been kicking around in Trudeau's brain since 2008. Notes the director of Amazon Studios, "When it comes to Washington and its foibles and what makes it unique, few people have been more insightful and more knowledgeable than Garry Trudeau." (More Garry Trudeau stories.)

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