Jon Hamm says American Hostage's feels relevant to today's politics

Jon Hamm believes his new series American Hostage, though based on a 50-year-old true story, speaks directly to present-day political tensions.

Speaking at The Hollywood Reporter's Studio at TIFF, Hamm explained why the show's title carries deliberate double meaning. 

"I think that's why the story, for whatever reason, feels, even though it's a 50-year-old true story, it feels very relevant, given the current political climate," Hamm said. 

"I think that there's some thematic devices that resonate in the culture politically now... I think the idea of a certain segment of the population being overlooked, or feeling overlooked or feeling under-addressed, in their wants and needs and desires. The show is called American Hostage. We fought very hard for that title because we thought it really spoke to the story on several occasions. This man obviously takes a person hostage, but is he in fact hostage to his American Dream?"

The series dramatises the real 1977 Tony Kiritsis hostage crisis in Indianapolis, in which Kiritsis, played by Giovanni Ribisi, took mortgage broker Dick Hall hostage using a shotgun rigged with a "dead man's wire," demanding to air his grievances live on the radio. 

Hamm stars as Fred Heckman, the respected local news director who becomes an unwitting go-between throughout the 63-hour standoff. 

Co-showrunner Rachel Ryan noted that Hamm's character occupies a particularly precarious position in the story, caught between his decades of work building a reputation for truthful reporting and the sudden, unexpected demand that he also become a hostage negotiator responsible for two lives.

The project originated as a scripted podcast that Hamm starred in back in 2022, which went on to win Best Scripted Podcast at the 2023 Signal Awards before being developed into this eight-episode television adaptation, produced by Sony Pictures Television. 

Hamm also serves as an executive producer on the series, which premieres September 20 on MGM+.