Daughter's Film on Nancy Pelosi Shows 'It's Not an Act'

Alexandra Pelosi is a bit biased, but she believes her mother is a master at her game. Hence why she's made a documentary on Nancy Pelosi's three-decade career in politics, debuting Tuesday night on HBO. Pelosi in the House is technically "not authorized," the filmmaker and journalist tells Vanity Fair, noting her mother "never signed a release." She hadn't actually seen the film until an airing Monday at the National Archives, per Politico. Of course, she knew her daughter has been trailing her with a camera, following her election as first female Speaker of the House, through her battles with Donald Trump, to the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, and hopefully doesn't sue, Alexandra tells Vanity Fair. Because "if you want to get to know Nancy Pelosi, you just have to watch her work."

There are fascinating "candid and personal moments," per Politico. Just don't expect to see an entirely different side of Pelosi than the one granted to the public. "Even at home on the couch in her knit sweater, she's still speaking in Democratic Party talking points. It's in her soul," her daughter says. "It's hard for people to understand it's not an act. That's what I try to show—she's a true believer." That may disappoint Pelosi's many haters, which Alexandra understands. "If I watched Fox News, I would hate Nancy Pelosi, too," she says. "There's a whole billion dollar industry out there targeting my family, and it's worked successfully—even to the point that it put my father in the ICU." The October attack hangs over the film, which questions whether the "wounds" Nancy Pelosi has suffered were worth it in the end.

"She's proud of the life that she's lived" but "the families are the ones that pay the highest price for this kind of life," Alexandra tells CNN. While Paul Pelosi would back his wife's political ambitions "all over again ... I wouldn't," she tells Vanity Fair. The attack on her father "destroyed my faith in humanity ... I have nightmares; my kids have nightmares." But though "the day my mother said she was gonna step down ... was probably the best day of my life," her long career of passing bills serves as "a good civics lesson if nothing else." Indeed, Alexandra says "it would be in Kevin McCarthy and Mitch McConnell's interest to watch this, because they bring bills to the floor that don't get passed." (More Nancy Pelosi stories.)