April 26, 2005
Native son forges 'West Wing'-Constitution Center ties
By Gail Shister
Philadelphia Inquirer
When Philly-born Josh Singer studied constitutional law at Harvard, he never figured he'd be writing about it for NBC's The West Wing.
"It blows my mind all the time," says Singer, 33, in his second season as a West Wing staff writer. "I'm incredibly lucky. To be able to write for this show is just crazy."
Singer, Penn grad Melissa Fitzgerald (she plays C.J. Cregg's assistant, Carol), and supervising producer John Sacret Young will be here May 5 for a panel at the National Constitution Center.
The back story: On a Singer-written episode Nov. 30, President Bartlet (Martin Sheen) donated to the center the letter in which he had invoked the 25th Amendment.
For the constitutionally impaired, that one concerns presidential disability. In the season-four cliffhanger in '03, Bartlet stepped down when his daughter was kidnapped.
Through Singer, West Wing gave the letter, the pen Sheen used to sign it, and the script from the Nov. 30 episode to the center. It's part of a special exhibition that will open May 5.
To put it mildly, Singer (Upper Dublin High Class of '90) took a circuitous route to his dream job.
After graduation from Yale and a brief stint at Children's Television Workshop, he earned law and business degrees at Harvard. ("I didn't want to practice law. I just wanted to be able to play with legal concepts.")
Internships at Nickelodeon and the Disney Channel followed. Deciding his destiny was as a writer, Singer penned mock scripts for HBO's Six Feet Under and West Wing.
Normally, the odds of such scripts reaching the top are minuscule. For Singer, however, fortune intervened.
He sublet an apartment in L.A. from a woman whose boyfriend happened to be Lew Wells, a West Wing producer and brother of series honcho John Wells. Lew got the script to John, who offered Singer his first writing job.
"People spend years trying to get their stuff into the right hands," Singer says. Wells "is the best in the business, an unbelievable storyteller."
In the fall, West Wing's Sen. Arnold Vinick (Alan Alda), a progressive Republican from California, and Rep. Matt Santos (Jimmy Smits), a liberal Democrat from Texas, will battle for the White House.
Singer, who returns to work in June, says he doesn't know which candidate will succeed Bartlet. As a writer, it's thrilling either way.
"I focus on how much story there is to be told, not so much on who wins. We've got two great guys you'd want to vote for, as opposed to the lesser of two evils."
Sheen will stick around next season as Bartlet makes the transition from president to former president. That, too, makes Singer sing.
"Before, I only had one president to write for. Now I can write for three."
April 24, 2005
Actor-friends who met on stage star in family drama
By Evan Henerson
Los Angeles Daily News
Nearly eight years ago, future "West Wing" star Allison Janney left a mark on Broadway's 1997-98 season . . . and on her scene partner's face.
During a performance of Arthur Miller's "A View From the Bridge" at the Roundabout Theatre Company, Janney -- in the role of Beatrice, the neglected wife of a longshoreman -- got a little too intense with Anthony LaPaglia's Eddie Carbone.
"On one particular night when we clashed on stage, my teeth went into his nose, and he just started bleeding," Janney recalls. "I was looking at him, trying to do the text and also tell him he's bleeding to death on stage. To this day, he still has a scar from my upper teeth. We're really powerful together."
LaPaglia and Janney -- the former an Australian, the latter a Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts-trained Ohioan, and both with much experience treading the boards in New York -- ended up with day jobs on the same Warner Bros. lot where "Without a Trace's" stoic FBI bloodhound Jack Malone tracks down missing persons, and C.J. Cregg, "The West Wing's" press-secretary-turned-chief-of-staff, has the president's ear.
"We run into each other at all the mandatory functions," LaPaglia says of Janney. "She and my wife get on really well, and her boyfriend is a big soccer stud, so he and I get on really well. I just feel like I have a friendship with her for life probably."
LaPaglia, who didn't hold a grudge over that teeth-to-nose incident, agrees that the connection during performances between himself and Janney is a force not to be ignored.
"We did the play for a year, and there would be days when I would be coming to work, I'd be on the subway, thinking, 'I just don't want to do this tonight. I'm just not in the mood. I just can't go to that place anymore,' " says LaPaglia. "The minute I would lock eyes with Allison on stage, I could see she was there. You just had to go with her."
Fast forward to spring 2003. LaPaglia, 45, and Janney, 44, reunite on the low-budget family drama "Winter Solstice" (now playing in limited release). LaPaglia -- the film's star and executive producer -- persuaded Janney to take the film's only adult female role.
The appeal this time: tackling a pair of roles with more subtext than overt, in-your-face drama. Since the death of his wife several years ago, landscape architect Jim Winters (LaPaglia) is having a rough time keeping his two sons on track. New possibilities arrive when Molly Ripkin (Janney) borrows a tool from Winters and then offers to make dinner as a gesture of gratitude.
That means the actors have graduated from playing a tormented longshoreman and his Italian wife in 1950s Brooklyn to a pair of suburban New Jerseyites so ill at ease with contemporary dating that when they end up alone together, they can barely say five words to each other.
LaPaglia won a Tony award for "A View From the Bridge," and Janney was nominated for her role. But the two are just as capable of playing smaller, more nuanced drama, says "Solstice" writer-director Josh Sternfeld.
"Allison's comfort with her emotional vulnerability is what put her on an equal plane with Anthony, and that was ultimately going to be the engine for their dynamic," says Sternfeld. "I wanted to make an adult romantic love story with 40-year-olds acting like 12-year-olds and bringing all the natural anxiety and insecurity to the first step toward romance you would have as a kid."
"When Allison agreed to do it, I thought, 'OK, I've got the ingredients now. I just have to put it together,' " he says.
"We do sort of work similarly," Janney says of LaPaglia. "I like to find the truth and the emotional reality of a scene in the doing of it rather than sitting around and talking for hours. We were sort of able to dive in together."
To hear LaPaglia tell it, the Janney-LaPaglia creative partnership might never have materialized, and the direction of a now-iconic HBO drama might have taken a different turn as well.
As he was readying himself for "A View From the Bridge," LaPaglia received a script for the pilot of "The Sopranos." LaPaglia loved the script and even met with series creator David Chase over the prospect of playing Tony Soprano.
Had he followed "The Sopranos" through to development, LaPaglia's shot at "A View From the Bridge" -- a favorite play and role he had performed in acting class -- would have fallen through.
"For whatever the reasons were, 'The Sopranos' thing didn't work out," says LaPaglia, "and of course it did work out perfectly, because the right person ended up with the role. You can't imagine that show without James Gandolfini."
Meanwhile, when "A View From the Bridge" was auditioning for the role of Beatrice, Janney found herself neck and neck with another New York stage actress, Edie Falco.
"They were both brilliant, and we just couldn't decide which way to go," says LaPaglia, who is developing a film version of the play. "We ended up going with Allison, and because of that decision, Edie was able to go on and do 'The Sopranos,' which was going on at exactly the same time. So it worked out great for everybody, I think, in the end."
And he's got the lifelong friendship -- and the teeth marks -- as proof.
April 06, 2005
`West Wing' coming west to San Jose
By Leigh Weimers
San Jose Mercury News
For its season finale Wednesday, ``The West Wing'' comes west to San Jose. Well, in looks, anyway. You'll recognize the site where the TV series' fictional Democratic National Convention is supposed to be choosing its next presidential candidate: HP Pavilion. ``Warner Bros. called last week to get permission to use exterior shots of the arena,'' reports Tom Manheim, the city's outreach manager. ``For this week's show. I guess that shows how tight their production schedule is.'' And how perfect the Shark Tank would be for a gathering of politicians.
Red or blue? 'West Wing' fans wait to see who will be next TV president
Rick Bentley
The Fresno Bee
UNIVERSAL CITY, Calif. -- Madam chairperson. The great state of confusion on television would like to cast its millions of votes for the next great television president of the United States. We the people select Jimmy Smits.
No wait.
Make that Alan Alda. He was great on "M*A*S*H." advertisement
But Smits was so good on "NYPD Blue."
Madam chairperson ... we'll get back to you.
Smits and Alda have portrayed presidential candidates throughout this season of the NBC drama "The West Wing." The Bartlet administration, played out so well under the guidance of Martin Sheen, comes to an end next season.
Yes, there will be a next season. NBC executives already have shown their confidence in "The West Wing" and renewed it for the 2005-06 television campaign.
The confusion for the show comes in the story line about the presidential race this season.
Just like the real race last year for the White House, this season of "The West Wing" has featured numerous presidential candidates. That field has been whittled down to two: Republican Sen. Arnold Vinick (Alda) and Democratic Congressman Matt Santos (Smits).
"We're hoping that by the time we get into the fall, that there will be a real question in the viewer's mind as to who would make the better president. They both have strengths and weaknesses," says John Wells, executive producer of "The West Wing," while talking with TV critics about the future of the political drama.
Wells is flanked by his two TV candidates during the interview. Wednesday night's season finale wraps up the nomination process. The election process will start the next season in the fall. Bartlet will step down in January.
Creating this run for office has meant setting up characters who will be favorites with different parts of the viewing public. That suggests that no matter which way the TV election goes, some viewers will be left disappointed that their candidate did not win.
"It's politics," says Wells. "It's what happens in this country.
"Even when we dislike what's happened with an election, I think oftentimes we find ourselves still turning on the news at night to see."
Unlike the actual election, "The West Wing" executives can make a decision on who wins based entirely on demographics.
The NBC series ranks as one of the top primetime shows with older viewers. That would suggest Alda, 69, would be the best candidate for the job.
Producers could think that since the show already has an older audience, Smits, 49, would be the better candidate to lure younger viewers to the political drama.
Alda comes to the show with some political history. He certainly has never been afraid to express his liberal points of view. Those views would be in sharp contrast to what a Republican president would bring to "The West Wing."
"Anything to turn this great country of ours around," Alda says in a mocking tone. He's a little frustrated that the world has become so "red and blue states" that an actor's viewpoints would conflict with an acting job.
' "Can you possibly play a Republican?' I was never asked that when I played a murderer."
Alda points out that the strength of "The West Wing" has been how it provides both sides of an issue. The show has certainly had a more liberal skew because of Bartlet. But a skew is far from being one-sided.
His most worthy opponent agrees. Smits likes being part of this race because the scenario gives the writers the opportunity to present two fundamentally different points of view.
"It just deepens and broadens the show in another way," Smits says.
Wells admits that because "The West Wing" has focused on a Democratic president, the Republicans on the show tend to be presented as the enemy. Having two candidates has given the writers two equal voices to discuss the same important topics.
That duality will come to an end. One of the actors will become the star of one of television's best dramas.
The other goes back to looking for work.
Neither Smits nor Alda wants to give away any clues about the eventual outcome. In fact, both actors sound like politicians when pressed about whether they have contracts to be part of the program next season.
"I'll do as many episodes as it takes to accomplish our goals," Alda says, flashing a smile that would have made President Kennedy proud.
Smits smiles at Alda and says, "Spoken like a true candidate."
Asked the same question, Smits shows he, too, can speak like a candidate.
"We're there for next season," Smits says.
Even Alison Janney, who also was talking to TV critics about her role as White House Chief of Staff C.J. Cregg on the show, gets caught up in the political banter.
When asked if she had a preference of whether Alda or Smits wins, she says, "Whichever one appreciates my talents."
Alda immediately says, "I just want to go on record in saying I really appreciate it."
Wells makes one point clear. The winner will not be determined by any kind of voting by the viewers.
Unlike a reality show that is broadcast live, episodes of "The West Wing" are produced weeks or months in advance.
There would be no way to wait for viewers to pick a winner and then produce episodes featuring the winner.
No political race, whether it be real or a television version, would be complete without some information being leaked. One of the candidates confirms he has signed a deal to star in a new series for ABC next year.
Stop reading now if you prefer to wait and see how the voting goes.
"You guys are a bunch of tattletales. What is wrong with suspense?" Smits says of his future TV deal.
It is just politics.
White House drama in need of term limits
By Robert Bianco
USA TODAY
And the winner is — oh, who cares?
Viewers weren't wild about watching President Bartlet run for office — and they liked him. Why stick around to see his successor get elected?
For those who do, NBC's The West Wing picks a Democratic presidential nominee tonight in a sixth-season finale that has the odd distinction of being both too early and too late. Early, because it's only the first week in April; late, because the show should have ended two years ago when it lost its creator, its soul and its purpose.
Granted, this season, which split focus between Alan Alda's Republican candidate and Jimmy Smits' Democrat, is an improvement on the last, which had no focus at all. But the show is still only a patch on what it was when the now-banished Aaron Sorkin created it, and the prospects ahead look even bleaker. Couple a new fictional administration with new real-life budget cuts, and you have to figure we're going to see much less of the original stars than we'd like.
Other long-running shows have gone through drastic cast changes and survived, sometimes even prospered. But The West Wing is different from most ensemble dramas in that it isn't built around a workplace or crime-solving procedures. It may be set in the White House, but it is the story of one group of occupants, all of whom are connected to the Bartlet administration. Without them, you have the West Wing but not The West Wing.
And this housecleaning is what NBC is trying to sell as a "creative revitalization"?
The truth is, under the guidance of ER producer John Wells, a show that was once TV's best drama has morphed into a second-rate White House version of ER. What made West Wing distinctive was not just Sorkin's gift for dialogue, it was also his vision. His show was a romance, a modern Three Musketeers hymn to the glory of civic service in which all the staffers were willing to sacrifice personal ambition for a common, greater good.
That vision is gone, and in its place is a perhaps more realistic but far less novel and involving story of a staff divided by internal and external politics. The show even made us endure a fight between Toby and Josh that has to rank as the last thing any fan ever wanted to see — unless that spot of dishonor is claimed by poor Leo's ludicrous weekend in Havana.
But the whole notion that people wanted to see West Wing elect a new president is simply beyond me. Viewers weren't wild about watching President Bartlet run for office — and they liked him. There was never any reason to think they'd be eager to watch his replacement be chosen.
None of this is to blame Smits or Alda, who have done their best to breathe life into roles that strain credibility. Nor is it to fault the remaining original cast members, who provide the only flashes of brilliance the show has left. But not every series is able to support an unlimited run.
West Wing began its life with an expiration date stamped on its electronic forehead: the end of the Bartlet administration. Creatively, it didn't even last that long.
For heaven's sake, NBC, stop trying to make it last longer.
Nomination Up for Grabs on 'West Wing'
By LYNN ELBER
Associated Press
Real political conventions should be this exciting. On Wednesday's season finale of "The West Wing," the Democratic gathering isn't a coronation, it's a fight.
No contender has secured enough delegates in the primaries to capture the nomination outright, leaving apparent front-runners Matt Santos (Jimmy Smits) and Bob Russell (Gary Cole) to duke it out.
The episode (9 p.m. EDT, NBC) is titled "2162 votes," a reference to the number of delegate votes required.
Russell, vice president to current President Bartlet (Martin Sheen), had invited Santos to join him in the No. 2 spot. Santos refused, despite party entreaties to present a united front.
Hovering in the background are two key figures. One is disgraced former Vice President Hoynes (Tim Matheson), whose presidential bid was derailed by yet another sex scandal but who still controls delegates.
Pennsylvania Gov. Baker (Ed O'Neill) is the other. A quiet figure who also has refused the vice presidential spot, he may have a crucial role to play in the convention's choice.
Will Santos be the first Hispanic candidate nominated for the White House by a major party or could a man nicknamed "Bingo Bob" Russell swipe the honor from him? It's also possible a surprise could be in store.
The GOP candidate already has been decided: Arnold Vinick (Alan Alda), a moderate, Republican senator from California who's both politically wily and has the stature to be president.
The big brawl over who follows Bartlet into the Oval Office won't come until next season. Should be a doozy.
___
Need more election drama? 'West Wing' creates its own
by Dane Smith
Minneapolis Star Tribune
U.S. Rep. Matthew Santos goes into the Democratic National Convention tonight with a probable majority of Minnesota DFLers' support and is likely to win the presidential nomination, say legislators who have seldom missed an episode of "The West Wing."
"I definitely support Congressman Santos," a k a Jimmy Smits, said state Rep. Tony Sertich, DFL-Chisholm, who will be among the many Minnesotans watching tonight when "The West Wing" ends its sixth season with its own version of the DNC.
"The vision he has shown in talking about health care impresses me more than anyone else in the race," Sertich said of Smits' character. "He should have a majority of Minnesota Democrats."
Rep. Gene Pelowski, DFL-Winona, also rates Santos as his favorite and the best bet to win, owing to his "practical approach to education" instead of "testing students to death."
Although NBC's edgy White House drama has slipped from its former perch among the nation's most-watched series, it appeals to an educated and prosperous audience and has been renewed for a seventh season. The imminent departure and replacement of fictional President Jed Bartlet (Martin Sheen) has the program's devoted fans watching with extra anticipation.
Most of them appear to be Democrats or independents. Republicans, prone to dismiss the show as "The Left Wing," tend to view it as liberal propaganda.
" 'West Wing' is Hollywood bias personified," said Randy Wanke, a spokesman for the Center of the American Experiment, a conservative think tank in Minneapolis. "The show consistently carries the party line, and that rubs conservatives the wrong way. Plus, it's not as good as it used to be."
But even Wanke gives it a little credit. "Its only redeeming value is that, as simplistic as it is, hopefully it gets people more interested in politics. And hopefully it gets conservatives motivated."
Judging from conversations with West Wingers at the Capitol and from fan websites, there's more curiosity about next fall than tonight's nomination. There's almost a consensus that Santos/Smits is just too hunky to lose.
The bigger question is what happens when the show resumes next fall and California Sen. Arnold Vinick (Alan Alda) squares off against the Democratic nominee. Vinick already has the Republican nomination wrapped up, and last week he delivered a devastatingly effective acceptance speech, effusively praising the ailing and fast-declining Bartlet.
Some think Santos has to beat Vinick because of Smits' relative youth and superior star power. Others think elevating the moderate Republican to the presidency would give the show some ideological balance and a whole new set of situations and perspectives to explore.
Sertich thinks that it will be close and that Vinick is "a straight-talking moderate and will play well in Minnesota ... He's kind of a John McCain character." NBC officials say the presidential race will play out all fall and the winner won't be revealed until sometime around early November, when few states will be holding actual elections because it's an odd-numbered year.
Either way, Pelowski, who teaches advanced placement courses in government at Winona High School, intends to keep using "West Wing" videos to inspire his students. He says "The West Wing" is one reason why they are excelling at events such as the Model Legislature, an exercise that gives teenagers a chance to play the roles of elected officials.
One group of girls, inspired by the dialogue in a "West Wing" episode that Pelowski showed in his class, formed into a group called the Alpha Females and has been particularly active and motivated in civic activities.
"These episodes motivate students, especially when it ties into elections," Pelowski said.
TV: Presidential campaign breathes some fresh air into 'West Wing'
by Vince Horiuchi
The Salt Lake Tribune
For many fans, this is the year that "The West Wing" bounced back.
Most of this season was focused on primary elections for a changing of the guard while the current administration, led by President Jed Bartlett (Martin Sheen), is finishing a second, and last, term.
Indeed, many of this year's episodes, at least when they concentrated on the campaign trail for both the Democratic and Republican primaries, were a step up from the leaden previous two seasons.
But I've had a heap of reservations about this season, too, and I haven't been as forgiving as other fans of a show that was among my favorites when it first aired in the fall of 1999.
Now, all of the baby-kissing and grip-and-grin photo-ops comes to a head when the series' season finale airs tonight at 8 p.m. on KSL Channel 5.
In the final episode of the Emmy-winning show's sixth season, Democratic candidates Matt Santos (Jimmy Smits) and Vice President Robert Russell (Gary Cole) go head to head at the party's national convention.
Up until now, there have been some fine episodes that concentrated on the machinations of running a presidential campaign, from trying to seduce voters in the New England primaries to the process of finding a vice-presidential candidate to join the party ticket.
But the spirit and verve of the show's early days have evaporated, although we saw a glimpse of it this year in the story line about the young, energetic and idealistic Santos. But whenever the series cut back to the White House, well, I felt like one of those people you see yawning behind President Bush during one of his speeches.
There were a number of credibility gaps this year as well. For example:
* It was difficult to believe former Vice President John Hoynes (Tim Matheson), who was ousted from the White House because of a sex scandal, could bounce back to become a viable candidate for president.
* Would the GOP really nominate such a moderate Republican presidential candidate in California Sen. Arnold Vinick (Alan Alda) who is a) pro-choice and b) doesn't attend church regularly? Uh, given today's climate in the party, that's about as likely as nominating Michael Moore.
* And how come the press and the party didn't know
that Vinick was not a churchgoer until after he secured the party nomination? Something tells me the religious right would not have let that slip by so late.
Like many have argued, I believe the show "jumped the shark" - that moment when a series begins to head south - when creator Aaron Sorkin left at the end of the fourth season.
As the creator who literally wrote or co-wrote every episode for the first four years, the soul of Sorkin could be felt in every line of dialogue. Yeah, those could be preachy years, but they also had spunk.
The show has been picked up for a seventh year, and like in real life, I welcome a new administration with fresh ideas and new characters to explore. Whether it's Santos (my money is on him) or Vinick (he would be interesting, too) - the two likely candidates to head into the final election - next year could be a bold season for a once-great series that needs resuscitating.
"West Wing" tries to become comeback kid
By Gloria Goodale
The Christian Science Monitor
LOS ANGELES — Television's long-running political drama "The West Wing" is undergoing a makeover, courtesy of the U.S. Constitution. President Josiah Bartlett, played by Martin Sheen, is nearing the end of his second term in office, so the show is preparing for a new administration. The current plotline concerns the early part of the election cycle, including party conventions.
"West Wing," a hit when it debuted in 1999, has languished in the ratings in recent years. Some observers suggest the show and its fictional liberal administration are a relic of the Clinton era. Others contend that it still has something to offer.
For their part, the producers are hoping that the spark-filled convention in tonight's season finale and the possibility that a Hispanic (played by Jimmy Smits) will be elected president will return the drama to the forefront of popular culture.
Those involved with "West Wing" also hope the suspense over who will be elected will have viewers tuning in, not just for the horse race but to hear topical debates about important issues — something that distinguished the show from the start.
"What we try to do is present the issues which our leaders are having to deal with, and show both sides of them," says producer John Wells. "You try to show both sides so that the arguments are compelling and the points of view are not ridiculed."
This is the sort of high-minded exercise that makes the show unique, says Smits, who plays a Texas congressman vying for the top of the Democratic ticket. If nominated, he will run against the Republican candidate, played by Alan Alda.
"It's been a civics lesson for me in a lot of ways," Smits says. "I love the research part of this job."
The actor also enjoys the sense of having an impact on important discussions in society at large. A recent "West Wing" story line, he recalls, dealt with the controversial issue of whether illegal immigrants should receive driver's licenses. He recently talked to a California politician who commented on the plotline.
"When you hear that, you feel that besides giving entertainment value, you could affect people in a positive way," he says.
Unabashed earnestness as well as a willingness to think big have been a part of the show's appeal from the start.
" 'West Wing' came up with a way to talk about national politics with vision and vocabulary that allowed sincerity, without any post-Watergate, post-Monica Lewinsky irony," says Robert Thompson, director of The Center for the Study of Popular TV at Syracuse University in New York. Although the show centers around a Democratic administration, its broader appeal originated in creating a fantasy world in which political leaders acted in the noble fashion portrayed on the show, he says.
Some suggest that this idealized view of politics played well to audiences when "The West Wing" debuted in the go-go 1990s, but they argue that the show is no longer relevant in today's greatly changed post-9/11 world.
"In 2005, our tolerance for points of view that represent the enemy is much lower," says Steffen Schmidt, a political scientist at Iowa State University. "Our culture has deteriorated into conflict and confrontation."
Schmidt, who has hosted a national political radio show for 16 years, feels acutely the political divide in the nation today. "I almost quit my show two weeks ago because of the level of acrimony in calls. The effort to belligerently accuse me of being a sympathizer with the enemy [has] reached a level I haven't seen in more than 16 years."
"West Wing" may never return to its former position in the popular culture, says Nancy Snow, a professor of communications. Her students at California State, Fullerton, aren't interested in watching shows that challenge their point of view, she says.
"Here's a show that you'd think could dramatize and highlight all the important issues of our day," she says, but people aren't looking for a dialogue.
"We're in a period in general of not wanting to reach across the aisle," Snow says. "We're in a very different America now than just six years ago, and I don't see how it could possibly go back to where it was."
Tonight's 'West Wing' season finale won't be grand ending
by Tom Dorsey
Louisville Courier Journal
Season finales will start popping up regularly in the next few weeks as the networks get ready for the end of the season in May.
"The West Wing" winds up tonight at 9 on NBC. The drama aired fewer reruns than other shows this season and has run out of original episodes. Networks also bench their poorer performers for the May sweeps, even though this show has been renewed for next fall.
The people who work in television's "West Wing" are just happy the audience and the network are returning them to their TV White House. Just three seasons ago the political drama was ninth in the ratings. It's 44 in the most recent weekly standings.
That's a bit of a rebound from some of the lows the show slipped to when there was a lot of talk about the series being shut down. The recent ratings uptick and a lot of buzz helped save it.
Martin Sheen's impending exit from "The West Wing" as President Bartlet is the other reason observers thought it was curtains for the political drama. But the producers and writers breathed new life into the story this year by introducing a quartet of well-known actors running to replace Sheen as chief executive.
Jimmy Smits, in particular, gave the show a shot in the arm. One poll showed the overwhelming majority of viewers thought his election as president would offer the best chance of keeping the series on the air.
Smits, however, never confuses playing an elected official with actually being one. Asked how his character would have handled the Terri Schiavo case, he told the Denver Post it was a private matter and he didn't have a position on the issue.
The addition of Alan Alda to "The West Wing" was also a stroke of genius. Interestingly enough, the good guy of "M*A*S*H" has emerged as a controversial, if not quite villainous, presidential nominee.
Gary Cole also gave the plot some added weight, as did Tim Matheson. The foursome, together with Sheen and a strong supporting staff of performers, have resurrected a series that was running on life support with scripts about Bartlet's illness.
Nobody is saying what will happen in tonight's season so-long, but there probably won't be any grand ending because all the major players will be back in the fall. Look at tonight as the end of a new beginning.
Stars, better scripts highlight 'West Wing' season
BY MIKE DUFFY
Detroit Free Press
Jimmy Smits is well aware of the special kick actors enjoy.
He isn't a cop. But he famously played one on "NYPD Blue."
He isn't a lawyer. But he sure looked like he knew his way around a courtroom on "L.A. Law."
And Smits has never been a presidential candidate either. But he has been having a blast pretending to be one on "The West Wing" this year. As the White House political drama comes to the conclusion of what has been a compelling sixth season at 9 tonight on NBC, Smits and his newest acting alter ego, Congressman Matthew Santos, is battling to become the Democratic nominee for president.
"The writing's just top notch. I consider myself so fortunate in hooking up with a show that has something to say about what's going on in the world," says Smits. "It's really been a civics lesson for me in a lot of ways."
Coming into this season, it looked as if "The West Wing" might be permanently stuck in its own policy wonk purgatory, ratings fading along with the show's once distinctive, Emmy Award-winning dramatic zing. Executive producer John Wells ("ER") had taken full control of the tales of President Josiah Bartlet (Martin Sheen) and his White House staff after the departure of series creator Aaron Sorkin in the spring of 2003.
But in their first year of running "The West Wing," Wells and his writing staff were left standing in the formidable shadow of Sorkin. They struggled to maintain "The West Wing's" creative energy. And there were negative comparisons to Sorkin, whose brilliant ear for fast, literate political repartee gave the show its unique feel.
So many were speculating that this season might be the last.
And then Wells & Co. shook everything up at President Bartlet's White House, rediscovering the show's entertaining creative mojo all over again on the campaign trail, eventually earning NBC's approval for a seventh and likely farewell season next year. No, the writing didn't all of a sudden start sounding Sorkinesque again. Only Aaron Sorkin can do that.
But the shrewd addition of Jimmy Smits and Alan Alda to the cast has worked wonders.
Both actors are big-time TV stars who have flourished in their new political environment.
Alda vividly captures Sen. Arnold Vinick, a moderate Republican in the same intelligent, forthright spirit as moderate Democrat Jed Bartlet. Last week, Vinick wrapped up the Republican nomination for president with a stirring acceptance speech that wowed even the Bartlet White House.
That leaves Smits' Matt Santos in a tight nomination competition with Vice President Bob Russell (Gary Cole) and Gov. Eric Baker (Ed O'Neill) of Pennsylvania as the Democratic National Convention heats up tonight's season finale. And since both Smits and Alda are returning this fall when the election is held, it looks like the prime time Democratic Party of "The West Wing" may have its first Latino presidential nominee.
"That's something that John Wells and I talk a lot about," says Smits, who spoke with reporters during a recent teleconference. "Is this country ready to see a minority candidate aspire to that level of office?"
The additions of Smits and Alda weren't the only big changes this season.
With his administration in its final months after two terms, President Bartlet has become increasingly concerned with his legacy, a concern fueled by chief aide Leo McGarry (John Spencer). Having recovered from a major heart attack, Leo's been serving as the Oval Office's chief legacy consultant and all-purpose scold.
Meanwhile, top White House aide Josh Lyman (Bradley Whitford) went off in search of his liberal bliss to run the Santos campaign. And Josh's former assistant, Donna Moss (Janel Moloney), teamed up with Will Bailey (Joshua Malina) on Vice President Russell's run for the presidency.
All of that has added new spice, conflict and energy.
Wells and his creative crew also infused "The West Wing" with some extra vigor by adding outspoken Republican and conservative politicians to the Beltway character mix.
"I like the fact that this season we're hearing strong voices on both sides of the aisle," says Smits. "It was a good move that John Wells made to have a character -- with an actor as appealing as Alan Alda -- that has that strong Republican voice."
So will it be President Vinick or Santos?
Stay tuned. "The West Wing" will have its presidential election fling this fall.
`West Wing' gets its second wind in finale
By Maureen Ryan
Chicago Tribune
There used to be a show on Wednesday nights with Martin Sheen . . . what was it called? "The Western Front" or something?
Ah, yes, "The West Wing" (8 p.m. Wednesday, WMAQ-Ch. 5). Forgive the confusion, but so much has changed on the show; even Sheen sometimes seems like a guest star on the political drama these days.
As President Josiah Bartlet, Sheen does still make regular appearances, but the truth is, Bartlet -- and Sheen -- are lame ducks and everybody knows it. This season, which ends Wednesday so that the new series "Revelations" can unfold in "Wing's" time slot, "The West Wing" has become much more of a Jimmy Smits and Alan Alda vehicle than a Sheen machine. And that's a good thing.
As political candidates vying to take over after Bartlet's second term ends, Alda and Smits have given the series a much-needed energy boost. Smits, in particular, was a wise casting choice; to carry such a multifaceted, and, at times, weighty show, you need an actor with both chops and charisma, and Smits, as Democrat Matthew Santos, has plenty of both.
Online polls say "Wing" viewers are more in favor of a Santos presidency next season than one headed by Alda's character, Sen. Arnold Vinick. That might be because Santos is not only charismatic, but a dyed-in-the-wool liberal in the mold that "Wing" watchers have come to expect. Vinick is a somewhat improbably liberal Republican -- he voted to raise the minimum wage and he's in favor of taking religion out of the national political discourse -- but Alda, like Vinick, is a likably crafty operator. Don't count the senator out.
"The West Wing" still has its share of faults: It tends to underutilize perfectly decent actors (Gary Cole, Dule Hill and Kristin Chenowith spring to mind); some plots are just mind-numbing ("The White House has termites"); and the show, like its characters, can tend to be glib, long-winded and awfully self-important.
But still, it's one of the few prime-time network dramas to take on the Big Issue with both heart and intelligence. For that reason alone, it's a good thing that NBC renewed the once-flagging drama for at least one more year.
