In 2025 director Gus Van Sant released a film called Dead Man’s Wire about a man who takes a hostage and demands to be interviewed live on a local radio station. It was based on the obscure, shocking real life story of Tony Kiritsis. The film came out of nowhere and disappeared just as quickly. It made very little at the box office. Now, the same story is being told as a TV series starring Jon Hamm and Giovanni Ribisi. Only this time it’s based on a popular podcast by the same name, instead of a documentary.
As a tv series, American Hostage works. It builds slowly, while giving you an inside view at how the news team develops their story. Hamm and Ribisi are phenomenal in their respective roles, so much so that you see the characters they play instead of actors. Over the years Ribisi has proven to be extremely versatile in the roles he can successfully pull off, and this one is no different. He might actually get an Emmy nomination for this one.
The series is well written as well, and has a nice mix of humour and drama, which can be hard to do because of the subject matter. The writers also do a nice job balancing the back stories of the characters, with the main plot line as well. Too many shows get caught up with one or the other. American Hostage just tells us what we need to know, without dragging things out.
- Rated: Unrated
- Genre: Drama, true crime, tv series
- Directed by: Adam Arkin
- Starring: Giovanni Ribisi, Jon Hamm, Kristoffer Polaha, Mireille Enos, William Jackson Harper
- Produced by: Jon Hamm
- Written by: Eileen Myers, Sharon Hoffman, Shawn Ryan
