What if the 1940 presidential election had gone the other way? The Plot Against America, a 2020 American drama series from David Simon, imagines exactly that and watches the consequences land on one ordinary household in New Jersey.
What is The Plot Against America about?
History bends at a single point. Franklin Roosevelt loses the 1940 election to Charles Lindbergh, the celebrated aviator, who campaigns as a populist and carries a deep hostility toward outsiders into the White House. The series does not follow the new president through the corridors of power. It stays at street level, with a working-class Jewish family whose kitchen table, radio and neighbourhood become the lens for everything that follows. Through their eyes we watch a hero's popularity turn into political power, and the mood of the country shift around them. Step by step, as the country drifts toward fascism, the family has to decide how much of its daily life it can keep and what it is prepared to risk. The scale is domestic, but the stakes are national.
About the cast
Winona Ryder, John Turturro, Zoe Kazan and Morgan Spector lead the adult cast, with Anthony Boyle alongside them. Azhy Robertson and Caleb Malis are the younger performers in the ensemble. David Simon is the credited name behind the series.
Context & significance
The Plot Against America is alternate history, a genre that changes one real event and follows the ripple. Here the device is used for drama and slow-building suspense instead of spectacle, showing a recognisable America taking a different political road. Charles Lindbergh was a real figure, a celebrated aviator, and the story uses his fame as the hinge on which its imagined timeline turns. Episodes run about an hour each, which gives the story room to unfold at a measured pace. It was well received by critics and audiences, and it rewards viewers who enjoy political drama told through private lives.
Watching The Plot Against America on Ktime
The Plot Against America is in the K-Time catalogue. Anyone can read this page; watching the episodes requires logging in to a K-Time account. K-Time is a streaming service made for the Iranian diaspora, with a Farsi interface across television, phone and web.