Hollywood is entering its Trump era

Hollywood is quietly bowing to the new era of Trump.

As big entertainment companies have cut back on their corporate DEI efforts, creatives and their reps say there's also been a perceptible chill on liberal themes in programming.

No one is issuing diktats, but the shift has manifested in subtle ways, according to 10 writers, producers, and talent reps who spoke with Business Insider. It's taken the form of studio execs asking producers to tweak storylines and characters — or nixing them altogether — and companies backing off past directives to ensure casts were diverse.

Zoe Marshall, a feature and TV writer whose credits include CBS's "Elsbeth," said producers and studios had explicitly told her that certain storylines — such as some involving queer and social justice themes — were no longer acceptable.

"Over the course of my career, I have never felt like I had to actually consider what was going on in the administration when I was thinking about what was going on on the screen," she said. Marshall, as well as some others in this story, avoided naming associates and studios to protect job prospects.

An entertainment lawyer previously told BI some financiers were scrutinizing filmmakers for their political views before deciding to invest. This person said several of their clients received notes from streamers or networks that they felt were designed to avoid provoking Trump or his allies. One of the notes was to avoid making a prominent trans character come across as too positive.

"I've never had a president figure so much in decision-making," this person said.

Independent films usually have more artistic freedom because they're financed outside traditional studios and institutions. But there's a chill in the air in the indie space, too.

Jonathan Handel, an entertainment lawyer, said a trans-related documentary had faced delays because its subjects were "terrified" about a backlash.

"There's more transphobia in the air than three months ago," he said.

Another entertainment lawyer, Harry Finkel, said some studios that once made great efforts to spotlight minority groups are now signaling they're more focused on not offending the right.

"There is a repetitive comment appearing along the lines of, 'We're looking for something with more broad appeal,'" he said.

One producer said a major studio told them to be race-blind in casting, a "stark departure" from what they were used to hearing a couple of years ago when diverse casting was paramount.

The rightward shift is being met with distress among some who have pushed for more diversity on the screen.

But others are feeling a bit more creative freedom.

Creators are taking more liberties to pitch jokes and other material they think could appeal to people on the right, two agents told BI. Talent like Shane Gillis, who landed on Netflix last year after being dropped by "Saturday Night Live" in 2019 over racist comments, are hotter than ever.

Shane Gillis is a hotter commodity than ever in Hollywood. Jeff Kravitz/FilmMagic for Clusterfest/Getty Images

Industry insiders see a clear-cut difference between now and Trump 1.0.

Then, entertainment execs locked arms in their vocal opposition to the president's policies. Disney CEO Bob Iger called Trump's reversal of a Dreamers program "cruel and misguided" and resigned from a presidential panel in protest of the White House's withdrawal from the Paris climate agreement. Even Fox's James Murdoch criticized the president. On the screen, shows like CBS's "The Good Fight" and NBC's "Will & Grace" reboot confronted Tr ump and took on hot-button political issues. CBS set targets for its programs to meet diverse casting targets.

In his second term, Trump has revived complaints against TV networks, challenged the funding of public media, and blocked some news outlets from covering events. Studios, like many in corporate America, are overhauling DEI programs in response. TV networks that belong to media and entertainment conglomerates are on edge.

In March, Amazon announced it was bringing the Trump-starring reality show "The Apprentice" to Prime Video. It's also paying for a Melania Trump documentary that the first lady will executive produce.

Hollywood was already moving in a conservative direction before Trump's election to a second term. After long playing to the coasts, studios and streamers embraced faith-based, conservative-themed, and family-aimed entertainment.

Disney, often caught in the culture wars, had already begun to pull back on political messaging in its offerings before Trump. Netflix and Amazon both did deals for faith-based programming in 2024.

The incentives for the programming shift are economic as well as politically expedient. Studios and streamers are being conservative with their entertainment dollars as the cable business wanes and some streamers struggle for profitability. They're looking for sure things and pockets of audiences where there's opportunity. Faith-based and family-oriented shows can be made relatively cheaply, without the need for big-name stars, and can travel globally.

"I think the correction is more in the direction to more broad, less niche," one agent said. "More stuff that won't automatically turn off 50% of the country one way or the other."