Although the first season of VICE Does America has come to an end, the show's hosts Abdullah Saeed, Martina de Alba, and Wilbert L. Cooper are still in awe of the experience they had making it, and the fact that their insane journey across the United States in the run-up to the 2016 presidential election is an actual documentary show that aired on the VICELAND TV channel.Production of the show took the hosts from Los Angeles through Nevada, up North to Iowa, back down to Texas, then across the Southern states, hitting Louisiana and Alabama. They then headed back up north through the Carolinas, finally culminating in Washington, D.C. Along the way they met pornstars, controversial figures like Cliven Bundy, politicians like Ted Cruz, Civil War reenactors, cannabis entrepreneurs, Native American activists fighting Big Oil, black Americans living in a US-based South African village, and the White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest. Needless to say, it was a long, strange trip that touched on hot button topics like immigration, race, drugs, and sex, and taught the hosts a lot about themselves and their country.
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What you don't see when you watch the show is how much hard work went into putting it together and all of the people who helped make it happen. The photos below offer a glimpse of those responsible (certainly not all of them—shout out to the show's excellent pre- and post-production teams) for VICE Does America who don't appear on camera—the producers, the cameramen, the sound dudes, the PAs. It also shows you how the team spent their time when they weren't shooting and driving—they gambled, they smoked pot (in states where recreational use is legal), and they stuffed their faces with regional delicacies.Get an inside look at Abdullah, Martina, and Wilbert's great America road trip and tune into VICELAND to catch up on any episodes you might have missed.
