Bartlet4America News Archive

Aaron Sorkin’s smart women always seem to get dumber

By JOHN LEVESQUE
Seattle Union Record

If you see me on the picket line this week, it may have nothing to do with my employment situation. Evidence is building to suggest that Aaron Sorkin is no friend of women, and it’s time we begin the protest before he goes all David E. Kelley on us.

Sorkin, the creator of “The West Wing,” whose juggernautical Emmy sweep in September has vaulted the Wednesday night series (9 p.m., KING/5) to a regular spot in the Nielsen Top 10, is systematically trashing the female characters in TV’s best ensemble, just as he did with his other critically acclaimed series, the late, lamented “Sports Night.”

Take White House press secretary C.J. Cregg, played with spectacular strength and conviction by Allison Janney. Week in and week out C.J. is a victim of belittlement at the hands of her male colleagues and, in the case of last week’s episode, President Josiah Bartlet himself. OK, it was good-natured ribbing over C.J.’s slighting of Notre Dame football, but it’s getting to the point where, just as we could always expect Lucy Ricardo to do something stupid and have Ricky fix it, we’ve been conditioned to wait for C.J.’s next gaffe and wonder along with the more experienced (read: smarter) guys if it will have a serious effect on life as we know it inside the Beltway.

True, C.J. is supposed to be the least savvy, least confident member of our favorite White House senior staff, but, her Emmy for best supporting actress notwithstanding, Sorkin isn’t doing Janney any favors. Where Sam Seaborn (Rob Lowe), Josh Lyman (Bradley Whitford) and Toby Ziegler (Richard Schiff) are also prone to humbling moments of mere-mortalism on “The West Wing,” C.J. is somehow the only one whose missteps are magnified under the lens of sexist condescension, as if a pat on the head will make everything better.

It is to Janney’s everlasting credit that she can make C.J. the most likable member of a great cast under these circumstances, but Sorkin is running a big risk. When Moira Kelly left the show after playing public relations specialist Mandy Hampton in the first season, Sorkin admitted he’d had trouble finding the right voice for Mandy, who rarely amounted to much more than corridor filler for all those dashing-through-the-halls scenes that give “The West Wing” its frenetic gestalt.

Kelly’s departure has opened up a bigger role this season for Janel Moloney, who plays Josh Lyman’s witty, willowy secretary, Donna Moss. But the more we see of Donna this season, the more her wit is becoming witless. It is so reminiscent of the path Sorkin took with Felicity Huffman on “Sports Night” that fans of “The West Wing” should be very, very wary, and should implore Sorkin to stop dumbing down his women and making them symbols of disempowerment.

In the first season of “Sports Night,” Huffman played Dana Whitaker, a smart, savvy and, yes, sexy cable-show producer. By the end of the second and final season, Dana was a simpering, whimpering gasbag who was a few sandwiches short of a picnic. Similarly, Dana’s lieutenant, Natalie Hurley (Sabrina Lloyd), took the fast train to ditzville as Sorkin clearly ran out of intelligent things to put in the mouths of the babes he had inadvertently created.

I once asked Sorkin about these alterations, and he said he didn’t think Dana and Natalie had changed at all. If that’s truly the case, then we’re in for a big letdown as the women of “The West Wing” begin to show their true selves. And if last week was an indicator, we should start picketing immediately, because Moloney’s Donna is about to become Sorkin’s next bubblehead.

Donna, who has long, blond hair, went completely stupid in a scene with the show’s newest character, deputy counsel Ainsley Hayes (Emily Procter), who also has long, blond hair. The exchange, ostensibly about Donna’s concern that she and Ainsley look too much alike, was so vapid as to make Aaron Spelling’s godawful “Titans,” which precedes “The West Wing,” seem like an installment of Masterpiece Theatre.

If Aaron Sorkin wants to be the next Aaron Spelling, fine. But he should have the guts to create dim-witted sexpots from the get-go, and not sucker us in through false advertising.