Ukraine’s reality TV

Servant of the People is a hilarious Ukrainian situation comedy currently running on Netflix. It opens with a young high-school teacher launching into a foul-mouthed rant against the corruption and venality of his country’s political class. ‘Why are all the honest people fools and the clever ones are thieves?’ shouts nerdy but honest history master Vasyl Holoborodko to a colleague. ‘What kind of people are we, that we keep voting for these mother–fucking liars knowing that they are crooks?’

One of Holoborodko’s pupils secretly films the rant through a window. The video goes viral. Millions of Ukrainians crowdfund the honest teacher to stand in an upcoming presidential election, which he unexpectedly wins. Cue a two-season long comedy of errors wherein president Holoborodko struggles to take on entrenched corruption and break the stranglehold of shadowy oligarchs — with the help of his old schoolmates, whom he appoints as his ministers.

Like NBC’s The West Wing, Servant of the People could be written off as simply a heartwarming exercise in liberal wish-fulfilment — if the show’s plot weren’t about to actually come true.