Movies

A nasty Thanksgiving feud inspired ‘The Oath’

The booze started flowing after that Thanksgiving dinner at Ike Barinholtz’s house. It was 2016, and he, his brother and his mom began arguing about the presidential election Donald Trump had won just weeks before.

“The crazy thing is that we were all on the same side,” Barinholtz tells The Post. “But we were still so confused and shocked, and just kind of throwing s–t at each other. It made me think, ‘Man, if we are all so aligned, and we’re fighting, what is going on at other holiday tables around the country?’”

And thus, “The Oath” — which Barinholtz directed, wrote, produced and starred in, opening Friday — was born.

Barinholtz, 41, plays Chris, a bleeding-heart liberal who, with his wife, Kai (Tiffany Haddish), host Thanksgiving for their politically divided family. Looming over them is the approaching deadline for a loyalty pledge the president has asked citizens to sign. The family’s civil arguments soon escalate into absolute chaos.

“The old maxim ‘Don’t talk politics at the table’ has basically blown up,” Barinholtz says. “So I knew that this would be a fun kind of war zone to explore.”

Born and raised in Chicago, Barinholtz kicked off his career as a cast member of the sketch series “MADtv” from 2002 to 2007. Wider recognition came in 2012 when he began a six-season run as the daffy nurse Morgan on “The Mindy Project,” and he’s since popped up in hit comedy films such as “Neighbors,” “Sisters” and “Blockers.”

‘The old maxim ‘Don’t talk politics at the table’ has basically blown up.’

He also keeps busy as the father to three daughters with wife Erica Hanson: Foster, 5; Payton, 2, and Eleanor, the 6-month-old the couple named for Mrs. Roosevelt. One of Eleanor’s favorite play pals is Katherine, the 10-month-old daughter of Barinholtz’s sitcom co-star, Mindy Kaling.

“Mindy and I became friends when we started working on the show, and those first five years, we were just there constantly so late [with] the stress of the show and getting it up every week,” Barinholtz says. “Now, years later, for us to go to her house and just watch our kids suck each other’s faces [is] really is one of the highlights of my life.”

Family life also inspired him to be a little less like his “Oath” character, Chris, a news junkie who’s tuned in 24/7. Barinholtz got a wake-up call one morning from his wife, who was nursing their newborn while he fumed over yet another troubling article.

“I turn to her and I’m like, ‘America is lost,’” he recalls. “And she was like, ‘Hey, dude! Too heavy for 6:25 a.m. I’m breastfeeding in bed … so just save it!’”

Nowadays, he makes a point to spend less time perusing headlines on social media, though he believes it’s important to stay engaged.

“I try to think of it like coffee, where it’s like, hey, have a cup of coffee when you get up. Have a cup of coffee at 10:30, and maybe have a cup of decaf around 5,” he says. “But if you drink coffee all day, your heart will explode. And if you read Twitter and watch the news all day, your brain will break.”