The 37th President of the United States, Richard Nixon, is synonymous with the infamous Watergate scandal. A domestic espionage operation that was ultimately unraveled and broadcasted nationwide, over 69 people were indicted for their participation, with 48 of them being officially convicted for bugging the Democratic National Committee headquarters. The whole situation would’ve led to the eventual impeachment of Nixon had he not resigned in 1974, with a pardon by his successor, Gerald Ford, absolving him of his crimes. As a result, the scandal led to years of parodies, cultural references, and one of the better reoccurring characters on Futurama.

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It’ll also lead to the premiere of the HBO historical miniseries, White House Plumbers, based on the real events of the Watergate scandal. Originally announced in 2019, the miniseries has been in development ever since, with its release finally coming later this year. With a high-profile cast and the involvement of Veep showrunner David Mandel, we can expect thoroughly entertaining — and informative — miniseries.

This is everything we know about HBO’s White House Plumbers.

White House Plumbers: The Plot

The official plot synopsis provided by HBO is as follows.

For those who aren’t aware, the White House Plumbers were a special government unit established by Richard Nixon only one week after the leak of the Pentagon Papers — a set of government documents that provided a detailed account of the true motivations for the war in Vietnam, alongside contradictions to public records that the White House provided regarding the war. The “plumbers” were established specifically to “plug leaks” that could otherwise lead to more classified information being released to the public. Before the plumbers would be involved with Watergate, they would attempt to discredit the individual who leaked the Pentagon Papers, Daniel Ellsberg, as well as conducting their own individual investigations for the “Chappaquiddick Incident” involving Ted Kennedy and the assassination of Ngo Dinh Diem, the then-current President of South Vietnam.

“White House Plumbers tells the story of how Nixon’s own political saboteurs and Watergate masterminds, E. Howard Hunt and G. Gordon Liddy, accidentally toppled the presidency they were zealously trying to protect.”

The trailer for the series looks to give a more humorous take on the events of Watergate, with light breaks for jokes strewn throughout the plotting and scheming. There’s a self-awareness of the illegal nature of what needs to be done, highlighted by the chuckling of Hunt when he’s told to not get caught. The end of the trailer even features a funny conversation between Hunt and Liddy. When asked about who really killed John F. Kennedy by Liddy, all Hunt can muster is a hushed exasperation, “Oh, Christ.”

Being a miniseries, we can safely expect White House Plumbers to end conclusively over the course of five episodes. Assuming each episode runs for around 40 minutes, we can expect a relatively fast-paced series with little downtime or filler. Because of this short length and the focus on the Watergate scandal, the previous exploits of the plumbers may just be mentioned in passing. A short scene involving a break-in of an office, with a safe being drilled into and documents being rifled through, may or may not be the break-in related to Daniel Ellsberg.

White House Plumbers: The Cast & Crew

     HBO

The lead roles of E. Howard Hunt and G. Gordon Liddy will be played by Woody Harrelson and Justin Theroux, respectively. The duo will also be accompanied by a thorough extended cast, including Lena Headey (Dorothy Hunt), Domhnall Gleeson (John Dean), Ike Barinholtz (Jeb Magruder), Kiernan Shipka (Kevan Hunt), and Kathleen Turner (Dita Beard).

Other actors that will appear in the series are Corbin Bernsen, Rich Sommer, Toby Huss, Liam James, Zoe Levin, Tre Ryder, Nelson Ascencio, and Ashley Brooke.

White House Plumbers was created and written by Alex Gregory and Peter Huyck, whose prior writing credits include multiple episodes of Mike Judge’s King of the Hill, Veep, What Men Want, more than one hundred episodes of The Late Show with David Letterman, and Frasier. David Mandel will be directing the series, having previously directed episodes of Veep and Curb Your Enthusiasm.

Release Date

White House Plumbers is currently set to air on HBO in March.

Everything Else We Know

Production for White House Plumbers was temporarily halted in 2021 due to “alleged unprofessional behavior” on set. Allegedly, an on-set altercation between David Mandel and the prop department for White House Plumbers prompted a walk-off on set, with threats of never receiving work again being exchanged between the two entities. While production was thankfully able to come to a peaceful conclusion, it’s something worth noting regarding further collaborations between Mandel and HBO as a whole. A recording of the incident was made, with the implication that it wasn’t necessarily an isolated incident.