On Wednesday, “The Great American Road Trip” finally landed on YouTube, in six episodes of a half hour or so each. (Technically, it should have been called “The Great American Road Trips”; as officials were keen to point out, it was filmed in installments over a period of months.) At long last, it was time to tune out the naysayers and joy haters, and judge the show on the only terms that matter for a product of the Trump Administration: whether or not it’s good TV.
During Trump’s first term, in particular, the President couldn’t pass a bowel movement without pundits declaring it “made for TV.” More often than not, I found this unbearably annoying—part of a persistent media inclination to grade the optics of the things that Trump did rather than, well, the things that Trump did. But I also felt annoyance at critics who seemed to see any mention of TV in politics as tantamount to dumbing down. TV, after all, can be very good!
Embarking on “The Great American Road Trip,” I quickly started to fear that it was not very good. The first episode—a trip to see Trump at the White House, then on to Philadelphia to learn about the Liberty Bell, meet a Benjamin Franklin impersonator, and race up the “Rocky” steps—has the feel of a promotional video that one might watch in the back of a cab. Patrick—one of the Duffys’ kids, a few of whom have clearly inherited their parents’ screen chops and brightened up the show considerably—matched my energy when a producer asked if he found it cool to visit the White House, and he replied that “it’s kind of boring, because you’re just sitting there watching your parents talk.” (“What’s so good about having cheese and steak?” Patrick asks later. “You can make that at home.”)
If Episode 1 put me to sleep, Episode 2 quickly jolted me awake. Before the Duffys even leave for their destination—Boston, this time—we learn that their daughter Paloma is applying to colleges, including Harvard, which, she says, would be hard to turn down. “Well, me and Mom can say no,” Duffy replies. Cue tense music and a disquisition on the importance of Catholicism to Duffy père and mère, who are concerned that Harvard has perfected how to take “good young girls” and “corrupt their minds.” Paloma doesn’t think that this is very open-minded, and the argument continues in the car. Eventually, both are parked—Duffy has taken the kids to see the firehouse that he once inhabited on “The Real World,” where they are welcomed in by Montana, the castmate he dry-humped. But the college plot soon recommences, and the Duffys eventually speak with a Harvard chaplain who, to some extent, is able to allay their anxieties about brainwashing. (“There is a refuge, it appears, in the Catholic Church” at Harvard, Duffy reflects. Campos-Duffy admits, “I didn’t wanna like the situation as much as I did.”) By this point, I was getting a little worried about the separation of church and state. Then I remembered, with relief, that the series was funded by corporate sponsors.
There is more drama in Episode 3 (Wyoming and Montana—the state, not the castmate): the Duffys’ eldest daughter, Evita, and her husband, Michael, who has amazing eyebrows and is currently vying for Duffy’s old congressional seat, invite an ultrasound technician to their cabin to find out the sex of their unborn child; meanwhile, Patrick has to go to the hospital after collapsing with visibly agonizing stomach pain that doctors think might be appendicitis. Happily, it turns out to be constipation, much to the amusement of the rest of the family. (“I don’t want to embarrass him,” one of his sisters says, long after that horse had bolted.) The remaining episodes—a trip to Charleston, with a detour to a Boeing plant; a trip to Texas, with a detour to a CRH subsidiary; a trip to Arizona, with a ride in a Waymo—mostly settle back into the tedium of Episode 1. Perhaps most upsetting for me, the show, as a whole, never seems to figure out whether it is primarily travel or reality, or whether the scenery or the people should be the star. The creators could have done more to bring out the gorgeous landscapes that the Duffys visited; they could, at least, have fed us some dumb challenges, with alcohol or not. Ultimately, I came away with no idea who the show is supposed to be for, although, if its paltry early view count is any guide, the answer might be “no one.”
