Bob Roberts

Bob Roberts is a 1992 film directed and written by Tim Robbins. It is a satirical faux-documentary on the rise of a right-wing candidate for the United States Senate. The main character, Bob Roberts, played by Robbins, leaves his hippie parents to enlist in a military academy. Fueled by a personal fortune he amasses on Wall Street and a strong public image from his music, which proposes a conservative vision in a rebel's persona, he embarks on a bid for the position of Senator from Pennsylvania. The film portrays the American political process in a less-than-favorable light, suggesting that shady deals, hypocrisy and deceit are mainstays of the Republican Party.

Trivia

• Gore Vidal portrays Roberts's incumbent Democratic opponent. Humorously (given Vidal's real-life sexual predilections), his character becomes enmired in a sexual scandal with a young girl. The ensemble cast includes Giancarlo Esposito, Alan Rickman, Harry J. Lennix, David Strathairn, James Spader, Helen Hunt, Peter Gallagher, a very young Jack Black, Robbins's longtime companion Susan Sarandon, Fred Ward, Fisher Stevens, John Cusack, Bob Balaban and Jeremy Piven, some in very brief cameo appearances.
• Tim Robbins also wrote a song as "Bob Roberts" for the 1988 movie Tapeheads.
• Bob Roberts was also Robbins's punk rock cover band during the Vote for Change tour in 2004. After the announcement of the tour, Robbins's band joined the bill with Pearl Jam and Death Cab for Cutie to trek across swing states. At each of these shows, a minor skit with the help of Eddie Vedder portrayed Robbins as a Republican senator. On every night of the tour, Robbins joined Pearl Jam to play a cover of "The New World" by X.
• Though a soundtrack album was never released, due to Robbin's fear of the songs being played out of context, California punk rock band "The Vandals" covered the song "Complain" on their album "Play Really Bad Original Country Tunes".