Bartlet4America News Archive

Saunders: NBC to 'Wing' it 2 more years

By Dusty Saunders
Rocky Mountain News

April 30, 2003

President Josiah Bartlet was "re-elected" to a two-year term in February.

But it could be a rocky TV administration for Bartlet (Martin Sheen) and his cabinet, even though NBC has given the green light for two more full seasons.

Audience ratings for The West Wing, three-time Emmy winner as best TV drama, have been down this season for a variety of reasons, both external and internal.

While a definitive survey has not been published, NBC must be aware that Sheen's vigorous antiwar stance is partially responsible for some viewer tune-out.

Even if Sheen hadn't vehemently protested the Iraqi war, the series' popularity probably would have diminished because of a comparison to the real world.

As President Bartlet was attempting to avoid conflicts with fictional countries, the real White House was dealing with Baghdad.

Also, the overall mood of the country has changed considerably since The West Wing premiered in 1999 and the fictional liberal Democratic president began working to cure the ills of the world in a peaceful manner.

The events of Sept. 11 jolted many out of make-believe politics.

The West Wing never has been the darling of conservatives. Talk-show hosts bashed it at its inception, even though the series has been one of the most compelling, well-written programs on network television.

One research analyst noted two seasons ago that while conservatives listened to Rush Limbaugh because of his politics, some watched The West Wing in prime time simply to be entertained.

Before Iraqi war coverage began, NBC's Wednesday lineup of Ed, The West Wing and Law & Order had the most upscale prime-time audience in network television.

The West Wing also has been hurt this season by more intense competition, mainly ABC's The Bachelor. Some younger viewers, initially intrigued by the political story line and characters, have moved to the world of "reality" dating programming.

Internally, The West Wing has gone through a problematic season, starting with the announcement last summer that Rob Lowe would leave in March after his widely publicized salary dispute with producers Warner Bros. Television.

Then the fall election story arc fell flat dramatically as Bartlet defeated a strawman Republican candidate portrayed by James Brolin - the husband of the very liberal Barbra Streisand.

The episodes would have been much more intriguing if Brolin's character had featured some combative substance.

The West Wing always has been a "pay-attention" series. You can't watch while thumbing through a magazine, paying bills or arguing with a spouse.

Creator Aaron Sorkin's scripts, while erudite and witty, are extremely talky. And too often the dialogue is difficult to understand as characters stroll along in the West Wing's halls.

In January, I mentioned this problem to co-producer Tommy Schlamme, who admitted other viewers had voiced similar complaints.

Like all network series, The West Wing is caught up in May sweeps fever, partially relying on guest star Matthew Perry of Friends fame to help draw viewers.

Perry's character, assistant White House counsel Joe Quincy, arrived last Wednesday, along with a story line that featured a sniper outside the White House.

During tonight's hour (not previewed) Quincy finds some unsettling information that leads to a scandal. A print ad promoting the show blares: "Vice president resigns."

Politics aside, The West Wing remains a superior drama, even when subpar.

Still, I'm left with the feeling the production trio of Sorkin, Schlamme and Denver's John Wells will feel relief when this season ends.

The West Wing might never return to its glory days because of the ongoing blurring of the lines between fact and fiction and news and entertainment.

Still, the acting, writing and production talents should be able to recapture some of the dramatic magic that made the series a favorite of many - even conservative viewers.

Incidentally, KTVD-Channel 20, the local UPN outlet, will air The West Wing repeats on a syndicated basis, beginning in September.

General manager Greg Armstrong says the schedule has not been set. He assumes the episodes will be sent in chronological order.

Lauderdale alum flies on West Wing

By Tom Jicha
South Florida Sun-Sentinel

Graduates of Fort Lauderdale High School's Class of '89 will probably be thrilled to see one of their own, Kris Murphy, at a White House press briefing tonight. Given America's obsession with celebrity, some might be even more excited that it's a faux briefing, a scene from The West Wing.

Murphy -- she was Kristy Zlock growing up in Broward County -- has appeared in 45 episodes (15 this season) of the hit NBC series as Katie Witt, one of the reporters who pepper Allison Janney's C.J. Craig with questions. Most of her appearances have been limited to quick hits as a voice in the crowd. Tonight Murphy is more prominent as Katie and C.J., the White House press secretary, engage in a heated exchange.

It isn't just former Fort Lauderdale High students who might recognize Murphy as a classmate. She can't remember ever wanting to be anything other than an actress, so to prepare herself, she split her school day between Fort Lauderdale High and Dillard School for the Performing Arts.

"I was born wanting to do this," she said. "The first time I saw kids in a commercial on TV, I asked my mother, 'How do you get to do that?'"

She was barely school age when she got to do her first commercial, a Barbie Doll spot. "My brother Bill still bugs me about that," she said. "It's not a family dinner unless I cry."

Not that she would think about doing it. But making a federal case of emotional distress would not be a prudent move. Bill is an Assistant U.S. Attorney and her father, William J. Zlock, is a federal judge in Fort Lauderdale. Her parents -- her mother Nancy is an elementary school teacher in Broward -- would have liked to have seen Kris follow her father and brother into the law, but they appreciated her heart was set on show business. She jokes that she convinced them with the argument, "Why do I want to be a lawyer, when I can play one on TV?" Perhaps if they knew she would wind up playing a journalist, they might have tried harder to change her mind.

Kris struck a compromise. As long as she wasn't going to follow her father into law, she would at least emulate him in going to Notre Dame, where he was the starting quarterback on the football team during his college days. Even though she planned to concentrate on communications and theater, "My father begrudgingly went along," she said with a laugh.

After college, Kris experienced the whole aspiring-actress ordeal, including waiting on tables in New York while she pursued work on the stage. She moved to Hollywood in 1998 and has worked in television fairly steadily since. "I make a great living," she said.

In addition to the semi-regular role on The West Wing, she had a recurring part as a flight nurse on three episodes of ER and a meaty role on JAG as Capt. Sheila Grantham, "a massive troublemaker for chauvinist men." She also did a national commercial for Budweiser.

Her limited responsibilities on The West Wing afford her the opportunity to pursue almost unlimited outside work. Even when she is in an episode, she only has to be on the set one or two days. In a couple of weeks, the show will be on its annual summer hiatus.

Like most performers, however, she laments what the hottest trend in TV is doing to the job market. "Reality is taking a huge chunk of TV."

There's one potentially promising avenue she would rather not go down. Her husband, Mark Murphy, is a partner in Milestone Films, which has produced such movies as The Score with Robert De Niro, Edward Norton and Marlon Brando, and Serving Sara, starring Matthew Perry and Elizabeth Hurley. Kris would prefer not to pursue a role in one of her husband's films. "He would do it," she said, "but I think he has enough drama in his life."

Perry Mulls West Wing Return

by Michael Ausiello
TV Guide

Wednesday, April 23, 2003


Does Matthew Perry have a future in politics? The Friends actor — who kicks off his two-episode stint on The West Wing this evening (9 pm/ET) — admits he'd be open to another term in NBC's faux White House. "We haven't really talked about it, but I had a really great experience doing the show," he tells TV Guide Online. "So, we'll have to see."

Plot-wise, Perry says WW producers have left the door ajar for his character — Republican lawyer John Quincy — to return. With Friends coming to a close next season, might Perry consider a full-time gig on Aaron Sorkin's Emmy-winning drama?

"[Friends] is going to end a 10-year chapter in my life," he says, "and I like to think that when one door closes, God puts another door somewhere in your life and it's your job to go find it. So, I'm not sure what I'm going to do. I know this West Wing experience has been great. The degree of difficulty was high. It was a really great challenge, and [I had] a very good, tired feeling driving home, which we all kind of like.

"I certainly would like to do more dramatic stuff in the next chapter of my life," he adds. "And Aaron Sorkin's a brilliant writer, so who knows?"

A WW comeback would allow Perry's character to explore a possible romantic entanglement with Oval Office babe Donna (Janel Moloney), who seems to have an affinity for big-name guest stars. For his part, Perry says Quincy doesn't cozy up to any one particular West Winger during his brief stay. "I made sure I flirted with everyone," he cracks. "I left all of my options open."

TV Talk: Aaron Sorkin worried about effect on writing of getting off drugs

by Jim Longworth
Winston-Salem Journal

Fri, April 11, 2003

History is replete with painters and authors who have done some of their best work while under the influence of drink or drug.

But for Aaron Sorkin, the award-winning creator of television's The West Wing and scribe of such films as A Few Good Men and The American President, a long-time addiction to cocaine has been both a blessing and a curse to the creative process.

Sorkin: I wrote The American President high, and A Few Good Men, I was getting there. I was living at the Four Seasons Hotel in Los Angeles for about two years, and I would lock the door and close the curtains where nobody could find me for a couple of days. One night I was having a drink downstairs with Warren Beatty, and, in the middle of a conversation, he very casually said, "When you feel like it's time for you to get help with the coke thing, let me know." And it knocked me out (because) I had never talked with Warren about drugs.

Soon after that encounter, Sorkin checked himself into a rehab facility in Minnesota, but he was concerned about how the recovery process would affect his craft.

Sorkin: On the eve of going to Hazelden, I was worried that without cocaine I couldn't write. I got a really nice call from Carrie Fisher, who had had a similar problem. She said, "Listen, I know what you're thinking, that you can't write without the coke. It's simply not true. You're really going to enjoy writing without it." Then, Warren called me every day while I was at Hazelden, and made it clear to me that, far from being unemployable when I got out of rehab, that he wanted to be the first in line to use me. I don't know how to thank him for that.

With a little help from his friends, Sorkin rebounded with work on both the small and large screens. His battle with drugs suffered a setback in April of 2001 during a hiatus from filming The West Wing, but his recovery is on-going. Given Sorkin's struggle with and understanding of addiction, and with a reputation for putting something of himself into every character he writes, it is not surprising that Sorkin created Leo McGarry, the fictional White House chief of staff, who is a recovering alcoholic. In the series, Leo attends secret Alcoholics Anonymous meetings for high-level politicos.

Sorkin: There are AA meetings going on all over the world, 24 hours a day. I guarantee you that within five miles of you there's one happening right now. And you don't need a ticket ... nobody checks your I.D. There are a few exceptions. Commercial-airline pilots have private AA meetings, so do judges and surgeons. So it occurred to me that somewhere, deep in the basement of government, late at night in Washington, D.C., is an AA meeting for government officials so high-profile that they couldn't possibly go to a regular meeting.

Longworth: Do you know if your assumption was correct?

Sorkin: I have no idea, (but) I would be very surprised if there weren't. I have to believe that with 545 congressmen and senators, agency directors and White House staff, there have got to be a bunch of people there who are recovering alcoholics, and it wouldn't shock me at all if there were such a meeting.

Sorkin's roots are in the theater, where he formed his remarkable talent for writing dialogue. He once told me that, upon seeing his first Broadway musical as a child, he thought that the performers were "magical people from a magical land." Many years later, and despite a rocky road to recovery, Sorkin still feels a sense of excitement in his work.

Sorkin: There's still a tremendous amount of magic, and the magic never went away for me.

West Wing Rocked by Chandlergate!

Michael Ausiello
TV Guide

Matthew Perry will never forget where he was when war in Iraq broke out. "I was sitting in a replica of the Oval Office," marvels the Friends cut-up, who was taping his two-episode West Wing stint (airing April 23 and 30) at the time. "It was very surreal. Things got very quiet and tense, and it [became] difficult to work."

Just when Perry needed a Friend most, his witty, downwardly-mobile sitcom alter ego, Chandler, was MIA. As the 33-year-old actor points out, his WW character — up-and-coming legal eagle Joe Quincy — shares no traits with Monica's better half "other than that we kind of look alike. [Joe]'s a brilliant lawyer with every option at his feet; he's not Chandler."

And Perry couldn't be any happier about it. With the Friends cast going their separate ways next season — "We're done," he insists — he was eager to show Hollywood his range. After viewing WW tapes earlier this year in his trailer on the set of The Whole 10 Yards, the recently-wrapped sequel to his 2001 hit, he knew he'd found the perfect showcase. "It was the kind of dramatic writing I've been looking for," he says.

Wary of revealing too many plot twists, Perry does admit that Quincy "finds out something pretty huge" while pursuing an associate-council position in the White House. Meanwhile at his other job, something big may also be in the offing. The Bing babymaking effort heats up during May sweeps, a Friends rep reveals. Adds Perry: "I certainly like the [idea] of these two neurotic people wanting to have a child."

After Friends wraps for the season, Perry heads to London to begin rehearsals for his professional stage debut, a revival of David Mamet's Sexual Perversity in Chicago. The play — which will run for 13 weeks beginning May 12 — co-stars Hank Azaria and Minnie Driver. "It's going to be another new experience for me," he says. "I haven't done theater since high school." — Michael Ausiello

Lowe cops role in crime pic

New York Daily News
By DONNA PETROZZELLO
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

Rob Lowe makes no apologies to viewers still bewildered by his decision to leave NBC's "West Wing" earlier this season.
Since leaving the role of White House adviser Sam Seaborn - a part many considered the best of his 24-year career - he's been happy with the work that has come his way.

"Between the show's well-documented problems and how quickly I was snatched up to do things that are every bit as interesting as anything I did on 'West Wing,' I feel completely vindicated," Lowe told The News.

Two of Lowe's new projects are at TNT. In the film "Framed," airing Sunday at 8 p.m., he plays a New York City detective sent to interrogate a money launderer played by Sam Neill ("Jurassic Park"). The other is a four-hour miniseries, "Salem's Lot," based on the Stephen King novel.

Meanwhile, Lowe is keeping an eye on the broadcast networks' prime-time lineups.

He recently starred in "Lyon's Den," an NBC pilot (produced with 20th Century Fox and Brad Grey Television), in which he plays an idealistic attorney who, unlike Seaborn, will have a love life.

"I think [Sam Seaborn] was the most well-known eunuch in prime time," Lowe said.

But that wasn't the actor's only complaint about his "West Wing" role. He decided to leave last summer after quibbling with producers at Warner Bros. about his salary and stature on the drama.

"If Sam Seaborn had been as critical to the show in seasons three and four as he was in seasons one and two, I'd still be there," he said.

Lowe, 39, became famous two decades ago after starring in such films as "St. Elmo's Fire" and "About Last Night."

Critics questioned his decision to leave the widely praised show for unknown waters. Before "West Wing," he was another moderately successful actor in search of a part. Yet observers feel Lowe is notable enough to draw a crowd.

"The TV audience always wants to see good actors again, and Rob Lowe is an actor viewers are attracted to," said Tim Spengler, director of national broadcasting at ad buyer Initiative Media. "And stepping out from a traditional role helps actors demonstrate their range."

Having spent much of his career in film, Lowe is becoming more appreciative of TV.

"I've fallen in love with television," said Lowe. "I love its intimacy. It's a landscape where vision and uniqueness are valued, and frankly, I don't see that in the movie industry."

Originally published on April 11, 2003

'West Wing' Diggs Taye

Associated Press

Thu, Apr 10, 2003 02:59 PM PDT

LOS ANGELES - Hard working leading man Taye Diggs will do a guest spot on "The West Wing" in two episodes that will air during May sweeps.

Diggs will first appear in the episode "Commencement" and will play a secret service agent assigned to watch over First Daughter Zoey (Elisabeth Moss) at her college graduation and subsequent trip to Europe. The last high-profile actor to play a "West Wing" body guard was Mark Harmon, whose character briefly flirted with press secretary CJ Cregg (Allison Janney) before getting killed in a convenience store robbery last season.

This spring, Diggs will appear on the big screen in "Basic" and "Malibu's Most Wanted." Last year, his seeming movie-a-week pace included "Brown Sugar," "Equilibrium" and a co-starring role in "Chicago." His big breaks came opposite Angela Bassett in "How Stella Got Her Groove Back" and on-stage in the original cast of "Rent."

His television credits include a sting on "The Guiding Life" and a guest spot on "Ally McBeal."

Making history

By Tim Ryan
Honolulu Star-Bulletin

'Twilight' melds social commentary
and theater into a new art form

As an actor, playwright and teacher, Anna Deavere Smith sees her mission not so much to challenge the status quo, but to seductively embrace it to a point of trust to listen to societal problems.

One only has to view her body of work to see that Smith -- who appears tonight at the University of Hawaii to present the film adaptation of her solo show "Twilight: Los Angeles, 1992" -- embraces challenges.

Most people know her through her work in the now canceled TV series "Presidio Med," Aaron Sorkin's film "The American President" (and a recurring role as the national security adviser in Sorkin's "The West Wing") along with "Philadelphia" and "Dave."

But it's Smith's solo shows, including "Twilight" and "Fires in the Mirror: Crown Heights, Brooklyn and Other Identities," that has provided her notoriety among the intelligentsia, personal satisfaction and accolades in the form of a MacArthur Foundation genius grant, two Obie awards and a double Tony award nominee.

The MacArthur Foundation said Smith "has created a new form of theater -- a blend of theatrical art, social commentary, journalism and intimate reverie," referring to her exploration of the American character and our multifaceted national identity.

"I like to look at controversial events from multiple points of view," she said in a telephone interview from Los Angeles.

Her work combines the journalistic technique of interviewing her subjects with the art of interpreting their words through her performance.

"Twilight" depicts the riot that followed the acquittal of police officers accused of beating Rodney King. Smith interviewed more than 200 people, and in the final version of her solo show, she portrays 26 characters spanning all ages, races and genders, using, she says, the subjects' own words to weave "a multifaceted texture of varied perspectives on complex issues."

"It took a big part of my life," she said of creating "Twilight."

Smith created the work in Los Angeles, where it premiered in 1993, followed by off-Broadway, Broadway and touring engagements. She last performed the show in Washington, D.C., in 1997, then had it filmed for PBS in 2000, airing in 2001.

Traveling from South Central L.A. to Beverly Hills, gathering in-depth interviews and heartfelt testimonies, Smith interviews diverse personalities, then cuts between their edited comments, channeled through her physical and vocal mimicry, mixing documentary, interview and other materials with the performance segments.

The focus clearly is on the L.A. riots, including the key incidents that led up to them -- Rodney King's video-recorded beating, the indicted police officers' subsequent acquittal and the merciless attack on white trucker Reginald Denny.

"My work has to do with the many faces of American culture," Smith said.

Lectures and sessions following the film provide Smith an opportunity "to share some of the characters I've collected over the years and learn from audiences their impressions."

One reason Smith said she wrote "Twilight" is simple.

"It's a part of the American history of civil unrest and something we can continue to learn from," she said.

Compared to "Fires," "Twilight" is an opera in its complexity and wide-reaching consequences, Smith said. But neither incident has any simple, immediate resolutions.

"Race issues are much more complicated than being just black-and-white," she said. "I went into it knowing I would have to stretch my own understanding of race relations, that there was a much larger story to tell than the riots."

Part of that story was the miserable state of the justice system and, in particular, the Los Angeles Police Department, she said.

"The riot provided an opportunity to look at the justice system," she said. "One reason it happened was, many African Americans didn't think they could get justice in the courts.

"Rodney King was an emblem of what was happening in their lives already," she said.

Promises to improve the LAPD race relations and South Central's impoverished schools have not been kept, Smith said.

"It's amazing that anyone living there lands anywhere but jail," she said.

Absolute power

Martin Sheen talks about death, fighting for peace, and why Dubya is "out of his depth".

The Age

April 3 2003

We are in a vast reception room on Constitution Avenue, just down the road from the White House. The room has a parquet floor, huge Doric columns and a 50ft ceiling heavy with gilded cornicing. American flags and banners hang everywhere, and enormous sashes of red, white and blue swathe every surface. There are gigantic flower arrangements in red, white and blue pinned to the walls. A circular sign on the podium announces, Inauguration of the President and Vice-President of the United States of America.

This is not, of course, the real thing. We are on location for The West Wing, the hugely successful television series, written by Aaron Sorkin, about life behind the scenes in the White House. (Normally the show is shot on sets in Los Angeles.)

The West Wing is a well-acted and finely written show, but it is exhausting to watch. Every week there is a fresh threat to world security and another crop of vital issues of state hang in the balance while the very busy, super-smart, highly principled workaholics that make up the president's staff stride briskly from office to office talking at speed in slick, informative gobbits. No one in The West Wing ever says, "I dunno", or scratches their crotch, or fails to come up with a witty rejoinder. No one ever sleeps.

American audiences love The West Wing and the series, which is now entering its fourth year and has won 22 Emmy awards. It is, after all, is a pure American product. And so, too, is its star - 62-year-old Martin Sheen, who plays the thoroughly good Democrat President Josiah Bartlet.

A short, compact man, he looks the picture of health and good cheer: shiny eyes, light suntan, nicely capped front teeth. He has a very straight profile: a straight chin and upper lip, and a high forehead accentuated by the fact that his hair rises straight up continuing the same line.

In Terrence Malick's Badlands (1973) or Francis Ford Coppola's Apocalypse Now (1979), the two famous films where Sheen, then in his 30s, played strange, sociopathic outsiders, his eyes were troubled and his hair an unruly mop. Nowadays he has broadened out. His eyes are twinkly, as if he is always just about to smile. And his coiffure couldn't be neater - the glossy hair swept up and back in a perfect dome.

Along with the twinkliness comes very good, slightly laborious manners. He is most affable, asking everyone's name and where they are from and how their journey was, and when they got in to Washington. As he speaks he fixes his gaze fully on each person in turn. However he is still a little distracted and, it is clear from some of his follow-up questions, he isn't quite taking in the replies.

We go upstairs to a quiet hallway, followed by Sheen's retinue - a publicity woman, a harassed-looking make-up assistant with a zip-up plastic bag of combs and lotions and a silent, dark-haired youth called Taylor who is one of Sheen's grandchildren and works as his personal assistant. Sheen checks his face out in a mirror. The dome of hair is still glossy and perfect, but Sheen exclaims, "What a ragamuffin!" Behind him a red, white and blue flag flutters out on the balcony.

The West Wing has provided Sheen's career with a second wind. After decades of playing relatively obscure parts, the actor has re-emerged as a superstar. He has been feted by Democrat politicians and been the recipient of a vast salary estimated at around $6,600,000 (over $A11 million) a year - 16 times more than the salary of the real President. Highlights of the series - such as the assassination attempt on President Bartlet or his confession that he suffers from multiple sclerosis - have become public talking points.

At first, Sheen says, he tried playing the part with a certain presidential grandeur. "I sort of started with pomposity and self-importance and (Aaron Sorkin) said, 'No, no, no, this president is whoever you are.' So now I never have to play the president. They (the rest of the cast) treat me like one and that is what sells it."

Originally Bartlet wasn't going to be such a big part in The West Wing. Sheen was brought in as an afterthought after James Earl Jones and Sidney Poitier had turned the role down. But Sheen stole the show, his character combining moral probity and high-mindedness with great personal charm. So his part became bigger. And President Bartlet became somewhat Sheen-like, adopting many of his beliefs and foibles. Bartlet is a practising Catholic, like Sheen. Bartlet is obsessed with the large, big-brush moral questions, as is Sheen. Bartlet is irascible and Sheen says he, too, is easily exasperated. Bartlet loses things, as does Sheen. Bartlet is forgetful, Sheen says he is terrible at learning lines.

He guffaws, "I am infamous. Infamous! Aaron Sorkin doesn't write normal dialogue. It's very complex stuff. There are lots of references and words that I can't pronounce, let alone know what they mean." At the end of the interview, the actor embraces me affectionately. Then he asks, "What's your name again?"

Sheen sees his President Bartlet as an amalgam - the very best elements of Presidents Kennedy, Carter and Clinton brought together and poured into one man. Yet his Bartlet is far more reminiscent of the folksy fireside charm of George W Bush. This comparison would probably mortify Sheen, who is far to the left of any Democrat president, let alone Bush whom he describes as a "man out of his depth". Sheen is a pacifist and vehemently opposed to war against Iraq. "This war is so heinous!" he exclaims. "All wars are heinous, but this is so obviously a political manoeuvre." The actor's political radicalism feels like an offshoot of his religious faith. He doesn't discuss power shifts, or the rise of Islamic fundamentalism, or the price of oil. Instead, he talks in slow, measured tones about the human cost: the men, women and children. "This war will result in horrible death and destruction of the Iraqi people who are the most innocent of all. Many women and children will die, many more will be traumatised. And then the effect on our own soldiers in the American military..."

Sheen is an active campaigner, supporting poor and disenfranchised groups and demonstrating at anti-nuclear rallies and against the death penalty. He has been arrested more than 70 times and is still on probation after demonstrating against the Star Wars missile defence system in 2000.

The actor was born Ramon Estevez, one of 10 children of an Irish mother and a Spanish immigrant factory worker in the Midwest industrial town of Dayton, Ohio.

It was an inauspicious beginning. "My mother had a very difficult birth with me. They had to use forceps and in the emergency they crushed my left shoulder and I was not breathing very much, and they kind of threw me aside to work on my mother, who was dying. They baptised me there because they thought I was finished."

His mother died young, and Sheen started work, caddying at an exclusive local country club, when he was nine.

"It had such a profound impact on me. I could never to this day belong to a private club ... That would limit me to people like me - overprivileged." Sheen stretches out his arms in a great, expansive gesture: "I want to be exposed to all of humanity. I want all of humanity to be reflected in me. I want to know what it is like to be human."

Sheen's father struggled to keep the family together. He instituted rotas for chores and cleaning the little three-bedroom house, and sent the children to a strict Catholic high school. Sheen laughs nostalgically, "My poor Dad! It was a real trial for him."

Nine of the 10 children were boys, and they mostly went into the services. But this wasn't an option for young Ramon, because of his misshapen shoulder. (Sheen still has restricted movement in the left arm, and it is three inches shorter than the right arm.) His father had saved up for him to go to college, but Sheen was an inattentive scholar.

So at 18 he went to New York to become an actor?

"No," Sheen corrects me, "I didn't go to New York to become an actor. I was an actor already." He shrugs as if stating the obvious, "I never was not an actor. There was something inside of me. I don't know what it was but when I was six or seven and I started to go to the movies and eventually it occurred to me, 'Oh I am one of them. I can do what those people up on the screen do. I can do that,' and I didn't know why or why not."

Sheen is settling in. He has now swivelled round in his chair, removed a moccasin and has stretched one foot out against the wall. His voice has taken a faraway tone. "Then as a teenager James Dean happened and that changed everything. Oh my God! One of us got through! And that guy wasn't acting. All of us wanted to be James Dean. Everybody loved him because he was like everybody. He transcended cinema acting like no one before him - with the possible exception of Marlon Brando - because he no longer acted. Or at least the image, and the perception was that he wasn't acting. It was behaviour."

Sheen soon started working with an avant-garde performance group of committed pacifists. He also took on his new name, Martin, from the casting director Dale Martin, and Sheen after Fulton J Sheen, an evangelising bishop on television whom he very much admired. He never officially changed his name - it's just a stage name. It's another of his slightly eccentric points of principle, like not joining private clubs. He brings out his driving licence to prove his case.

In 1961, when he was 21, Sheen married Janet Templeton, an art student, and, over the next six years, the couple had four children: Emilio, Ramon, Charlie and Renee. By 1970 he had gravitated to Los Angeles, buying the house in Malibu where he and Janet still live.

Sheen starred with Sissy Spacek in Badlands, Terrence Malick's 1973 film based on the true story of an adolescent who went on a killing spree. At 32, Sheen was technically too old for the part of the deluded and desperate Kit Carruthers. But he looked much younger than his years, and his portrayal of repressed turbulence and then the increasing madness of his character is completely convincing.

Badlands is now acknowledged to be a masterpiece, but at the time the film went virtually unnoticed. Instead Sheen got his big break three years later, in 1976, when Francis Ford Coppola cast him as the lead in Apocalypse Now, his Vietnam epic based on Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness.

Sheen played Captain Willard, a tormented military assassin and the narrator of the film. The shoot, in equatorial swamps in the Philippines, was long, hellish and increasingly crazy. Sheen was smoking three packets of cigarettes a day and drinking heavily, eventually descending into a state of desperate inner turmoil. On his 36th birthday Coppola asked him to improvise the opening sequence of the film, where Willard wakes up in a hotel room. During filming, Sheen, who was so drunk that he could barely stand up, lost himself completely in the part and gave an extraordinarily intimate and exposing performance. At one point the actor smashed the mirror in front of him with his fist, cut his hand open and painted his face with his own blood. At the end of the shoot he passed out.

A year later, when he was still filming in the Philippines, Sheen had a major heart attack. He nearly died. He had given surely everything to the part.

Sheen grins. "Not quite. I didn't give my life." Then, with a chortle, adds, "Damn near!"

So does he feel now that when he acts he keeps more of himself back?

"On the contrary, I give more, but I don't give more in the same way. I am more committed to my craft than I ever was ... I'm infinitely more mature than I was then. I didn't know how to use myself and so I abused myself ... All of my self-loathing and self-destructive behaviour was happening on camera."

After Apocalypse Now Sheen went through four more hard years of alcoholism and self-abuse. Finally, in 1981, Sheen seems to have found himself. He cut back on the drinking, returned to the Catholic Church and took up politics. He kept a relatively low profile. "I wasn't focused on a career. I was trying to focus on staying alive."

For 30 years he has worked prodigiously, and has been in constant demand. Until The West Wing came along, he hasn't done work that has brought him acclaim, or been of anything like the same stature as Badlands or Apocalypse Now.

Sheen needed someone as a big-hearted and sentimental as himself. He needed the part of a great romantic, an idealist. Someone to whom Big Things Happen. And who could be better than President Bartlet?

Like him Sheen is poor on detail, and maddeningly vague. But he feels. And when he feels, he glows. After the interview Sheen still wants to talk. The camera lights are now blazing, and the hall below is crowded with about 200 film extras in ball gowns and evening dress.

Sheen looks down. He says, "It's nothing to do with me. It just all happens around me." Then we go downstairs, and Sheen makes his way to his dressing room.

For the next couple of hours the extras practise. They are exhorted to imagine that this is the president's inauguration ball and they have all had a couple of drinks and are really enjoying themselves.

Eventually the actors start to arrive.

And then, here comes Sheen himself. Fully made-up now and in immaculate evening dress, he looks even more happy and shiny. There is a spring to his step.

As he walks straight past us and out into the middle of the ballroom, he is met with a ripple of excited chatter and clapping. Sheen smiles enchantedly at the crowd and lifts one arm up into the air as if he is gathering up the applause. He grins, swivels on his heel, bows down and departs.

A minute later it is time for the shot. The music starts up again, the extras dance around the room in crowded swirls. Then huge double doors open.

And Martin Sheen and his retinue walk briskly in.

President Sheen, a man of grandeur from the tip of his shiny black shoes to the crown of his glossy hair, never has to slacken his pace. The dancing couples part before him and he strides across the crowded ballroom like a knife through butter.

- Telegraph Magazine

The West Wing screens on Tuesdays at 10.30pm on Channel Nine.

This story was found at: http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/04/03/1048962868698.html