A Recent White House Press Secretary Has a New Job: Film Producer (Exclusive)

She stood in front of unrelenting reporters demanding answers about a missing laptop while answering to a man who guided the fate of the world, so a cancelled location or lighting-department overage might not seem like that big a deal.Karine Jean-Pierre, the communications veteran who spent four years at Joe Biden’s side handling the best the White House press corps could throw at her, has a new gig: producing films.First up: Terroir, a thriller set in the world of wine-growing from the indie filmmaker Jesse Harris (Netflix hit Borrego).“It’s a compelling commercial film that’s going to be entertaining, suspenseful, provocative and a great theatrical experience while also have something meaningful to say, also having some big ideas for the moment we’re in,” Jean-Pierre said in an interview, already sounding the part. The role is not, the principals are eager to emphasize, a rubber stamp or vanity credit. Jean-Pierre is planning on getting her hands dirty. Already she has made a number of intros from her Rolodex — you meet a lot of big names as White House press secretary — as Harris seeks to bring on cast and collaborators, as well as raise money. Jean-Pierre’s jump highlights a perhaps unexpected overlap between politics and entertainment; with an emphasis on networking, corralling and communicating storylines, the roles of press secretary and producer may turn out to have more than a few skills in common. In a separate interview, Harris said that he sees Jean-Pierre as exactly the kind of personality an indie project needs.“Everyone want to make movies because it sounds like a cool idea, but Karine is in a great position to actually do it,” he said. “Not just because of her connections but because her whole career is communicating messages and getting people behind big ideas.” Good in the room, in the vernacular of Jean-Pierre’s new world.Harris and Jean-Pierre met through Sidney Chun, Harris’ sometime-collaborator and a political veteran who knew the former press secretary from D.C. circles. Harris was looking this summer for potential outside-the-box names to help with Terroir, and Chun suggested Jean-Pierre, aware of her connections and interest in new realms. Harris was eager to listen.Starring Lucy Hale, Borrego was a survival thriller that got the director some notice in Hollywood rep and exec circles when it came out in 2022. But like a lot of indie filmmakers, he’s looking to level up. His new film, which centers on secrets in a renowned vineyard uncovered, slow-burn-style, by a worker and wine critic, aims to land in the $3-$5 million range and potentially attract some even bigger-name talent.Harris says he sees Terroir (the name is a double entendre connoting both scares and the environment in which wine grapes are grown) as coming in the vein of The Menu and Get Out, commercially viable narratives that nonetheless slip in ideas about class and power. That the wine industry produces some of the country’s highest-end consumer products while relying on migrants and other low-income laborers, he says, make the world rife for these questions.The filmmakers hope to shoot in March in Chile, at the start of harvest season in the southern hemisphere. Jean-Pierre’s pivot to film production — and in ways that stretch beyond, say, a politics documentary — might surprise some who expect a more traditional trajectory from the public sector to private consulting.But Jean-Pierre said she’s enjoying the unexpected twists in the journey.“I think I’m just finding next stage of my career,” she said. “I’ve done politics for 20 years. There are many roads you can take [from here]. I believe being in a filmmaking producing space or a TV producing space is something I can bring a lot to.” She says she is a longtime film fan and cites, in addition to Get Out and The Menu, The Godfather and the 90’s romcom Love Jones as favorites. Jean-Pierre served as principal deputy press secretary from the start of Biden’s presidency and took over for Jen Psaki in May of 2022 when her boss left for a gig in cable news, becoming the first Black and first openly LGBTQ person to hold the job. The new press secretary was immediately thrust into some of the administration’s most difficult crucibles, including the early months of the Russia-Ukraine war. She would later navigate the war in Gaza, the border and migrant crisis, that doomed 2024 presidential debate and, of course throughout her tenure, Hunter Biden questions.Her new gig suggests a kind of reverse route for what has been until now a largely one-way train of people moving from entertainment to politics, not the other way around. There is, however, some precedent for such a commingling at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue: The first Trump White House had its share of filmmaking professionals, from financier Steve Mnuchin to director Stephen Bannon. (When reminded of those staffers’ other careers and the similarity to her own transition, Jean-Pierre laughs and says “no comment on that.”)Since leaving the White House with Biden in early 2025, Jean-Pierre says she’s done some consulting in addition to publishing a memoir, made speaking appearances and contributed to a host of media outlets, including writing about Donald Trump’s economic messaging in a New York Times op-ed earlier this month. She also says she is now an independent, believing that both parties suffer from severe flaws.Asked about cup-of-coffee Trump press secretary Katie Zacharia and what Jean-Pierre made of her ill-fated five-day stint earlier this month, the former Biden advisor answered, “Some would say it’s the hardest job in DC and some would say it’s the hardest job in the country. I prepped for four hours every day before a press briefing with a team of 12 and then talked to them again for a debriefing. And it’s not just reporters in the room [at a briefing]. Heads of states watch, and you can’t mess with the stock market, and you can’t something say something that might start at a war; there’s just so much pressure in the job. And at the same time you have to go into the Oval Office and talk to the most powerful person in the world,” she noted. “I say all this to say: you cannot come in off the street and do the job.”Producing certainly comes with its own learning curve, but Jean-Pierre says she is ready. “I am not a producer, and there’s going to be a lot for me to learn,” she said. “But I’m excited to learn how these stories get done.”