November 06, 2005
What you need to know before the 'West Wing' live debate
BY VERNE GAY
Newsday
As voters... ummm, viewers gird themselves for tonight's live debate on "The West Wing" (NBC) they almost certainly need and deserve a quick primer on where things stand. But, heaven help them, where to begin?
There's an impenetrable thicket of complexities to this season, compounded by the fact that just when you think you've got things neatly figured out, the show turns around and slaps you upside the head, as if to say: "No you don't... ."
Up is down, and white is black, while right is left, and left is right. The political middle ground most often is a no-man's land, with party positions staked out one week only to be shaded or rejected the next.
Former network newsman Forrest Sawyer will "moderate" Sunday's debate between the Republican nominee, California Sen. Arnie Vinick (Alan Alda), and his Democratic challenger, former Houston mayor Matt Santos (Jimmy Smits), but maybe someone should have reached out to see if Franz Kafka was available.
Let's start with the conclusion of the last episode, with Vinick and Santos making their way through the bowels of the Waldorf-Astoria en route to a joint speech that both rue because it will force them to retreat from their pro-choice stances, thus forsaking one vitally important political ally or two. (The speeches are before the very Catholic, very anti-abortion Al Smith Dinner). Vinick is threatening to denounce his own party's TV ad that has smeared Santos' abortion-rights advocacy because it would expose his own quasi-abortion-rights flank, which would then alienate the far right. Santos, meanwhile, figures he's been boxed into a corner as the candidate of "the abortion-without-limits party." That's a no-win place to be, too.
Then, the showstopper: Santos turns to his running mate, Leo McGarry (John Spencer) in a hallway to tell him that he has been, in fact, anti-abortion all along. "Well," quoth Leo, "ain't that a kick in the pulpit."
How this all plays out in tonight's debate may now officially enter the realm of conjecture, but consider this additional piece of shading. The producers will allow both actors to ad-lib some of their answers — a long rope that would ostensibly hang lesser luminaries than Alda or Smits.
This means both have to practice their answers like any real candidate, and as any reporter who has ever interviewed Alda well knows, he's an especially bright and eloquent fellow, while Smits uses words with all the parsimony of a miser with his stash of gold. That's why some fevered imaginations in the press have already compared this episode to the Bush-Kerry matchup: Vinick wins the debate, but Santos ultimately wins the election. (A good bet, by the way.)
"Reinvention" is a great American pursuit, but who would have guessed this great American show would have transformed itself into something like this: Long after show founder and visionary Aaron Sorkin departed following the 2002-03 season, "West Wing" is now written by a coterie of professional TV writers such as Peter Noah, Eli Attie, Alex Graves and Lawrence O'Donnell, who have managed to make it even more intricate, intelligent and exhilarating. Sadly, the campaign trail has creatively revived "The West Wing" just as ratings have crumbled. Its seventh season (averaging around 8 million viewers, down more than 4 million from last year) may well be its last.
