In a fascinating article in The New Yorker about the pivotal role Mark Burnett played in rehabilitating Donald Trump's image, contributor Patrick Radden Keefe reveals the longtime TV producer also has pursued opportunities to work with Vladimir Putin:
For nearly two decades, Burnett has also spoken about his desire to make a television show with Vladimir Putin. In 2001, he sought to enlist Putin in a project called “Destination: Mir,” a reality competition in which the winner would be sent into space. The idea was scuttled after Russia decommissioned the Mir space station. In 2015, Burnett expressed an interest in building a reality show featuring Putin—not so much a program about politics, Burnett suggested, as a hymn to the glory of Russia, “the humans, the nature, the animals of the nation.”
Full article: How Mark Burnett Resurrected Donald Trump as an Icon of American Success