Former 30 Rock star Alec Baldwin has always proven a fickle fish to fry, at least when it comes to predicting his next move. There won’t be a run for office, or half-hearted retirement public life this time, however, as Baldwin will combine his aspirations for a new HBO House of Cards-style HBO drama as the Mayor of New York City.

Per Deadline, Baldwin will both star in and executive produce a new untitled HBO put pilot as a “billionaire real estate developer philanthropist” (no genius playboy?) who ends up unexpectedly thrust into office as New York City’s Mayor following an incumbent’s tragedy. Adding that both he and producer Cary Brokaw had considered the idea nine years prior to 30 Rock, Baldwin made both Sopranos and a “dark but not as pitch black as” House of Cards comparison (beware of Season 2 spoilers!) in describing the new series:

The character is a philanthropist, a big businessman and well-known tabloid fixture in New York. He’s Trump without the baggage, Bloomberg but a Democrat, George Soros if he was in real estate, a left-leaning Democrat who is also a businessman who understands the reality of how the city has to be run to create the right climate for the business community.

He’s drafted for this run because the alternative would be catastrophe. We’ve seen from shows like Kevin Spacey’s House Of Cards that you can go anywhere creatively. He throws Kate Mara’s character in front of a subway train and you think, what the hell is going on? You can create these Shakespearean character arcs, and pull the curtain back on how New York City is actually run and how political careers are made and lost in the city.

Likely shooting in New York this December, no director has yet been determined for the untitled series, for which Baldwin’s character will also have “an appetite for women and a dark past,” because television. Could you see Alec Baldwin’s next big TV role as HBO’s New York City Mayor?

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