Where does the legitimate history of America end in Zero Day? Eric Newman’s six-episode miniseries tells the tale of a cyberattack on the United States, a one-minute power grid shutdown that claims thousands of lives, and chronicles the government’s immediate response. The show’s depiction of the United States power hierarchy mirrors that of the real US government but substitutes in fictional politicians, like Robert De Niro’s George Mullen.

That said, our real-world history books are a large part of Zero Day‘s canon. References to Ronald Reagan are made, and the 9/11 terrorist attack is an event that is confirmed to have taken place in Zero Day‘s past. Still, questions arise when a photograph of a large crowd dated to Summer 2020 is shown, and not a single mask is in sight. Does this mean that the COVID-19 pandemic did not happen in Zero Day‘s world?

ScreenRant spoke with Zero Day director Lesli Linka Glatter and star Matthew Modine to decipher where the show’s legitimate American history ends and where its fictional branch begins, as well as how Modine’s Speaker of the House feels about De Niro’s Mullen being appointed back to power after the cyberattack.

Zero Day’s Canonization Of American History Explained

“In my mind, all of those things did happen…”

Despite uncertainties surrounding certain pieces of American history, Zero Day director Lesli Linka Glatter sees it all as being canon to her show.

“In my mind, all of those things did happen,” Glatter told ScreenRant‘s Liam Crowley. “This is a paranoid conspiracy thriller. It is within that genre, but we are also creating a realistically real world. It is not a fantasy world, though. We are extending. I read everything written about this before jumping into this, because when you’re dealing with a realistically real world, you want the best advisors, you want the most information.”

Glatter added that where the fiction gets sprinkled in comes in the sheer power of the cyberattack.

“When you break into questions about what reality is, you’re very aware of that and what the Zero Day event can do, the flaw in software that can be hacked is, at this point, it cannot bring down all industries at the same time,” Glatter continued. “We’ve taken artistic liberty to look at how we as humans would behave in a world that is now a post-truth world. We’re really looking at what is truth in a post-truth world. But in my mind, all of that did happen.”

Star Matthew Modine, who plays Speaker of the House Richard Dreyer, also chimed in, pointing out how world events like the COVID-19 pandemic have different impacts on different generations.

“I’m so shook by that question because, of course, the impact of COVID and masks for me is so much different than you because you were probably in high school,” Modine added. “That’s a very interesting detail [to notice]. Thank you for that.”

Matthew Modine’s Speaker Wars With Robert De Niro’s Former POTUS

“I Don’t Think That Dreyer Trusts Anyone…”

Another big element that Zero Day mirrors from the real world is the power struggle that occurs within political systems. This is evident with Matthew Modine’s Richard Dreyer, the Speaker of the House who takes issue with Robert De Niro’s George Mullen returning to power to head up the Zero Day Committee.
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“He’s very Machiavellian. I don’t think that Dreyer trusts anyone. He trusts himself, but I think that he sees people, some people, as useful idiots,” Modine said. “He sees some people who have positions of power that, if life were a chess game, ‘How can I position them to appear to be winning where I’m actually setting them up to defeat them?'”

Modine added that he envisions Dreyer’s personal life as being largely dormant, as all he cares about is seizing power.

“I don’t think he really cares about anybody but himself,” Modine continued. “I was really happy because there was going to be a scene in my apartment or my house, and I wondered would had Richard have had a wife, would he have had a dog. Part of me wanted to be sleeping in my office and just eating takeout all the time because he was just a political animal, and all he wanted was power. We ended up [having a scene at Dreyer’s home], but I am alone in bed.”

Check out our other Zero Day interviews with:

Robert De Niro & Eric Newman
Joan Allen
Lizzy Caplan

Zero Day is now streaming on Netflix.