Joseph Gordon-Levitt is pumped. In fact, he’s super pumped, taking on the role of former Uber CEO Travis Kalanick in a limited series from Showtime that debuts February 27th, 2022 and will chart the chaotic rise of the transportation startup.
The show is titled Super Pumped after the best-selling non-fiction book of the same name from New York Times journalist Mike Isaac. It’s been developed by Brian Koppelman and David Levien, co-creators of Billions, a series which revels in the pugnacious behavior of the super-rich. There’ll be lots of familiar material for Koppelman and Levien in Kalanick’s story, then, with the former CEO described aptly in the trailer as “the notorious bad boy of tech” (those words spoken by Uma Thurman, who’s playing Arianna Huffington, co-founder of The Huffington Post, in the show).
“The story of Uber is rich in plot twists, one-of-a-kind personalities and important implications for corporate America,” Jana Winograde, president of entertainment at Showtime said in 2019 when plans for the series were announced. “It is a case study of ingenuity and insanity, and there are no writers better suited than Brian and David to explore this business and the people who drive it, literally and metaphorically.”
Each season of Super Pumped will chart a different story from the world of business, with the first season, Super Pumped: The Battle For Uber, focusing on Uber and Kalanick.
