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April 23, 2006
'The West Wing' turned dark horse into a champion
From the start, "The West Wing" challenged viewers with brainy fare. Now, after a triumphant term, it's time to bid farewell.
by Neal Justin
Minneapolis Star Tribune
The Bartlet administration, which moves out of the White House next month, always operated outside the scope of reality.
The team was too ideological, too fair-minded, too optimistic, too witty and too gorgeous to exist anywhere beyond the small screen. But the most outrageous legacy these Pollyanna politicians leave behind is that audiences accepted them, turning a dark horse into a historic champion, one of the most critically acclaimed series and addictive soap operas of our time.
"The West Wing," just four weeks from its final episode, hit some bumps along the way, first creatively when creator/writer Aaron Sorkin departed after four seasons, and then in the ratings when it moved from Wednesdays to Sundays two years ago. But after 24 Emmys, including four for best series, no one can dispute that this was one of the airwaves' most impressive, and unexpected, success stories.
There were serious doubts that viewers would be interested in a show that asked us to care about Washington wonks in the same way we embrace hard-boiled detectives. Plots about census taking and foreign diplomacy? That sounds as inviting as "The Jim Lehrer Variety Hour." Even cast members were skeptical in the fall of 1999.
"We all felt going in that we had something special, but we didn't know whether or not it would work on network television," said Martin Sheen, who played President Josiah (Jed) Bartlet as a cameo for the pilot and wound up being the drama's primary star. "There were no car chases or fires or special effects. The action was in the words. We were public servants and we wondered if an audience would support us and if sponsors would sell their products with us."
Co-producer Lawrence O'Don-nell Jr., who came to the show with a political background, knew enough about TV to figure the series had as much chance as a Gary Coleman gubernatorial campaign.
"I was absolutely convinced that it didn't have a chance. No chance," he said. "As far I could tell, in TV terms, nothing happened. It was a bunch of guys in neckties and some nicely dressed women who were arguing and nothing happened."
"I was guaranteed 13 episodes of employment and my lifetime budget was based on that at the time."
Despite its long-shot status, the show became an instant hit, maintaining a longtime residence in the Nielsen ratings' top 15 and attracting more viewers than any other show in the much-coveted demographic of those pulling down more than $75,000 a year.
But the fans who most amused the cast and crew were their real-life counterparts.
Politicos in Ohio tried to recruit Sheen to run for public office. Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan told series regular Bradley Whitford that he was disappointed in an episode in which the show's Fed guy died because no one seemed to care. At a dinner last year, former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, D-S.D., and Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor begged cast member Kristin Chenoweth to tell them who would win the show's pivotal election.
"When I worked in Washington, nobody watched any TV shows at all," said O'Donnell, who was chief adviser to Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, D-N.Y., and Democratic chief of staff for the Senate Finance Committee. "I was very surprised that they latched onto this thing as quickly as they did."
Antidote to Clinton?
It's possible that those in the nation's capital were watching in hopes of getting a shout-out or at least a Sorkin one-liner they could steal for their next congressional hearing.
But what about the rest of Americans? What excuse did they have for watching a show that demanded more than 15 percent of one's brain?
As they say, timing is everything.
When "Wing" debuted in 1999, President Bill Clinton was dealing with Monicagate and impeachment for lying under oath. Bartlet, on the other hand, never, ever considered cheating on his First Lady. He came across as so true and honest that no one would have blinked if he had grown a long beard and starting wearing a stovepipe hat.
The faux commander-in-chief offered an equally attractive alternative to President Bush. Bartlet's intellectual credentials were never in question -- a former economist, he liked to grill his subordinates with trivia about world capitals and national parks -- and he could get through an entire speech without a single grammatical stumble.
Yes, this was a liberal administration, but it also offered smart, thoughtful opponents, not the least of which was presidential candidate Arnie Vinick, played the last two seasons by Alan Alda with the same charm that made Hawkeye Pierce our favorite Korean War surgeon. Bartlet even hired a political adviser from the other side, nominated an arch-conservative to the Supreme Court and turned over his office temporarily to the Republican Speaker of the House.
As the country's two parties grew farther apart in real life, Bartlet's sense of even-handedness had its appeal.
"We felt we were dead in the center and that we would give everyone a fair shot," Sheen said. "We wanted to reflect a hope that this was possible and we should always aspire to it."
Allison Janney, who won four Emmys for her role as C.J. Cregg, said it was clear from very early on that this alternative universe was extremely inviting to fans.
"People were coming up to me, telling me how important it was to them and how much they hung onto Bartlet," she said. "They would say how great it was to look at these people in public service who you could admire and love and respect."
You'd think audiences were ready for more political fare, and more public officials as TV protagonists. But subsequent attempts -- "The Court,"Mister Sterling,"Jack & Bobby,"First Monday" -- never caught on. "Commander in Chief," which debuted last fall to mandate-like numbers, has nose-dived in the ratings and become less about politics and more about family squabbles.
"Wing" defied the odds, if only because it was so smart, so funny, so well acted, that it couldn't be ignored.
Don't expect another "West Wing" around the corner. Sorkin and Thomas Schlamme, who directed the "Wing" pilot, are developing a series for next season, but "Studio 60" is about the yuks behind the scenes of a late-night comedy show -- a more audience-friendly setting than, say, the office of the deputy White House communications director.
More and more, shows are being tailor-made with specific audiences in mind, said "Wing" executive producer John Wells. While "Wing" attracts a choice demographic, it's not large enough for the network to put a lot of money behind it.
"If we were redoing 'West Wing' right now, we'd have to do it far less expensively," he said. "I don't want to sound arrogant about this, but I think the show will be missed. It will be a very long time before anything similar to this will be on the air."
Posted by Jo at April 23, 2006 09:05 AM