New documentary 'Running with Beto' chronicles 2020 candidate’s rise
New documentary takes intimate look at O'Rourke's senate bid
“Alright now I'm getting behind the wheel, watch out! Let's see if I can make this sucker work,” says former Rep. Beto O’Rourke to his selfie dashcam.
His kids in the backseat chime in: “What’s a sucker?”
“Uh, a sucker is…this thing,” O’Rourke says in a moment of dad-blush.
So opens "Running with Beto" a new film following his near-miss 2018 senate campaign. An advance screener given to ABC News aims at unflinching intimacy consonant with the former congressman-turned presidential hopeful's vintage: sweat showing through the back of his blue button-down, shaking countless hands; the appearance of disarming honesty.
The film chronicles his longshot bid to unseat Republican incumbent Sen.Ted Cruz in Texas, a deeply red state. The highly public midterm race foreshadowed the former congressman-turned-presidential candidate's bid for the Oval Office and director David Modigliani sought to capture the candidate's rise every step of the way.
“We set out to make a film about a man, his close-knit family, his team of political newcomers, in the midst of this grassroots reawakening in Texas,” Modigliani told ABC News. “People were feeling so hungover with politics - we wanted to represent all walks of life, and this energy in the state just waiting for a match to light it on fire. And when I met Beto – it was clear that was him.”
Modigliani’s small crew shot over 700 hours of footage across all 254 counties in the Lone Star state, fueled by frenetic enthusiasm and scarfed-down tacos. The crew filmed the candidate doing everything from getting a haircut, to getting hangry, to going for a run through the D.C. Mall.
The people who co-executive produced the film know a thing or two about harnessing that feeling of "hope" and political stars on the rise: Jon Favreau, Jon Lovett, and Tommy Vietor (who produce "Pod Save America") are former President Barack Obama staffers – Favreau was his director of speechwriting. Modigliani and Vietor knew each other in high school and, as the team learned more about O’Rourke and the project, they came on board.
They are but several top creatives in an exponentially growing troupe of former Obama heavy-hitters supporting O'Rourke – from his recently appointed campaign manager to his superdelegate guru.
“We wanted to capture a moment in time, a reawakening in Texas and in politics that felt exciting and refreshing, and try to deliver that story in the runup to 2020, in the context of a local election,” Modigliani said. “But it became so much bigger - people come to this - and the happy surprise - it’s about all of us.”
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