Jesse Armstrong’s ‘Mountainhead’ Gets First Teaser

HBO has unveiled the first teaser for Mountainhead, its new film marking the feature directorial debut of Succession creator Jesse Armstrong, which debuts on linear at 8:00 p.m. on Saturday, May 31st and will also be available to stream on Max. 

We were first to report on the project, which follows a group of billionaire friends who get together against the backdrop of a rolling international crisis. Steve Carell, Jason Schwartzman, Cory Michael Smith, and Ramy Youssef lead the cast, which also includes Hadley Robinson, Andy Daly, Ali Kinkade, Daniel Oreskes, David Thompson, Amie MacKenzie, and Ava Kostia.

From the trailer, we glean that the world is not in a great place, and our four billionaires aren’t doing anything to make it better. Perhaps particularly bad is Smith’s Venis, who Youssef’s Jeff says is running a “racist and sh*tty platform” — one that has “inflamed a volatile situation, circulating unfalsifiable deep fakes, massive fraud, market instability.”

“This is a serious moment,” acknowledges Carell’s Randall, one of the other “four presidents of tech, here on Mount Techmore.” Still, Randall admits to being “excited about these atrocities,” with “nations…teetering, both politically and economically,” in a world disproportionately shaped by their own choices.

A seven-time Emmy winner and Oscar nominee, Armstrong directed Mountainhead from his own script, also exec producing alongside Frank Rich, Lucy Prebble, Jon Brown, Tony Roche, Will Tracy, Mark Mylod, and Jill Footlick. The turnaround here has been remarkably fast, as production only kicked off in Park City, Utah in March and wrapped earlier this month.

Armstrong’s film comes two years after winding down Succession, another story chronicling the bad behavior of the extremely rich, which across its four seasons, cemented itself as one of the most widely impactful series in recent memory. Over the course of its run, the show garnered 75 Emmy nominations and 19 wins, including three in the category of Outstanding Drama Series.

Mountainhead sees Armstrong expand his presence in features, a space to which he’s previously contributed as a writer on films like In the Loop and Downhill. Watch the teaser for the film above and check out four new stills of the principal cast members below.