Winona Ryder says last few years under Trump have been 'a mind boggling-like nightmare'
'Stranger Things' star Winona Ryder has said that living in Donald Trump's America was "a mind boggling-like nightmare" and that the past few years have been "outrageous."
Her comments came on the red carpet as Ryder attended the premiere of her upcoming show, 'The Plot Against America,' based on a 2004 fiction novel of the same name by Philip Roth, at Florence Gould Hall, on March 4.
The novel is about an alternative history in which Franklin D Roosevelt is defeated in the 1940 presidential election by legendary aviator Charles Lindbergh, who then helms a fascist regime that turns a blind eye towards rising antisemitism in the country.
Ryder said she signed on because the story is "so incredibly timely," and that it mirrored America's situation today.
"Obviously a lot has been weighing on all of our minds," she told Variety. "The whole fear of 'the other' in the eyes of fascism, what’s happening at the border, all of that is so outrageous and I think the last few years has been such a mind-boggling like nightmare in so many ways."
"When I think about this project, it makes me want to speak out and do whatever I can and the way to do that right now is to vote."
It was a view seemingly shared by the show's creator David Simon, best known for being the creator, executive producer, head writer, and showrunner for all five seasons of 'The Wire,' who said Trump's immigration policies were equivalent to those enacted during the Holocaust.
"We know what happened in WWII, we know what the Holocaust was, we know what America first meant in 1940 and what was at stake," he said. "The ‘othering’ that’s going on right now in this country quite obviously is the misuse and abuse of people of color, black and brown people, immigrants, people from Muslim countries, people who are Islamic. That’s now the cohort that is fundamentally happening in America."
Morgan Spector said he felt the way forward for America was to vote for Bernie Sanders, who would bring about the radical changes that the current times call for, and said the prospect of seeing Joe Biden in the White House was "absolutely terrifying."
"I think the problems that we’re facing are enormous and they require state scale solutions," he said. "Climate change cannot be solved by individuals recycling or driving electric cars. It has to be solved by states acting together to address what is an absolute crisis."
"When I see the Democratic Party consolidating around a candidate [Joe Biden] who basically has, I don’t think really an interest in dealing with that problem or considering it, I find it absolutely terrifying."
'The Plot Against America' will premiere on HBO on March 16.