The ‘American Auto’ comedy series focuses on those working at Payne Motors headquarters in Detroit. As they struggle to keep up with the rapidly changing industry, automotive company employees are facing new challenges after a new chief executive, Katherine Hastings (Ana Gasteyer), took over. However, the funny thing is that Hastings knows nothing about the automotive industry.
Produced by Justin Spitzer, a career drama cleverly exploits the problems that the automotive industry is facing to gain laughter. Using modern ideas related to companies and their public images, the sitcom jokingly explores the complexity of power dynamics that exist inside and outside the office space. Naturally, many viewers are curious to know that this car company and its employees are elements taken from real life. American Auto.
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Is American Auto A Real Story?
No, ‘American Auto’ is not based on fact. It is true, however, that the exhibit borrows some of its fictional elements from the truth. For example, it seems that the family-owned Payne Motors 100-year-old is freely based on Ford Motor Company; the founder, Henry Ford, built his first car in Detroit in 1896 and later introduced the assembly line. In fact, Ford is partly the reason why Detroit is known as Motor City.
So it’s no surprise that this comedy-drama involving a car company is set at Automobile Capital of the World. In particular, the sitcom focuses on Payne Motors’ business environment. “I stopped this show [‘American Auto’] back in 2013. I’ve been in the Office ‘for a long time, and I thought I would like to do a work show about the business world, “Spitzer revealed during a” virtual Television Critics Association (TCA) panel in 2021. “And, the following year, I did a’ Superstore. ‘ ‘American Auto’ was still being tested at the time, so I took the pieces and put them in the ‘Superstore.’ ”
Explaining the idea behind the show, Spitzer said, “I wanted to make a show of the business environment. It was not an automatic feature that introduced me. I felt I needed more clarity, and I wanted to change industries and I wanted it to be a very large, American, related company. ” Therefore, by using Detroit as a background, the show quickly penetrates into the general public knowledge of the automotive industry, sufficient to understand the motives and decisions of the actor.
The show, using exaggeration and humorous scenes, delves deeper into the problems facing Payne Motors. Hastings is talented but comes from the pharmaceutical industry; naturally, a series of happy situations are created as a result of his efforts to understand his new field.
The plan also affects how companies often do things when it comes to social and political issues, such as racism, and then try to rectify the situation hastily and partially. Therefore, we see Hastings and others trying to deal with white cars that could see white pedestrians and not people of color because it was used to cut only white cardboard when building a car.
All in all, ‘American Auto’ is not based on fact; however, it takes common features from our daily reality to make sure the humor comes through. Those who have worked in the business environment will quickly relate to the situations in which the mythical characters in the game find themselves, and the background of the Detroit automotive industry ensures that Hastings and others focus on the industry everyone sees, appreciates, and criticizes from time to time.