The West Wing 1999-2006

 

Might this be the best television series ever?  I finished up the series the other day, forcing myself to binge to near death because Netflix is removing it from streaming on Christmas Day. Nice present Netflix. I never watched it when it ran on NBC, I’m not a network tv viewer even though I grew up on it. Something drew me to it. Was it the current politic landscape? was it the cast? I mean 7 years of Allison Janney and Stockard Channing who could ask for anything more?

The series has a style in writing closer to 1930’s and 40’s romantic comedies than to the anything goes sex and violence cable shows that are so prevalent now, and this made the series more appealing in a retro sort of way. Imagine if it had played on cable instead of NBC. Because it was on Network TV there were no nasty cuss words or nudity so the creators had to depend on subtle words and looks and fast fade outs  and because of this the series had a marvelous refreshing feel to it, as I said golden age romantic comedies with great writing and acting.

The battle of the sexes and the politic power conflicts have a Howard Hawks Preston Sturges influence with overlapping dialogue and fast and furious action in very small spaces.  The look of it can be called walking and talking in the oval office since much of the action is done literally with the cast walking and talking. Smart dialogue and snappy retorts flow and fall like an early winter snow storm and no doubt the cast had instructions on how to walk and sashay down these corridors of power.

The most noticeable and sexy sashay belongs to Bradley Whitford, who moves his hips and crouch with subtle but very noticeable moves. Sexy without being trashy the way I sometimes like it.  The story is about the eight year term of a liberal American president played with wonderful force and delight by Martin Sheen. There are crisis after crisis some of them pushed to disbelief with most if not all of them having happy endings or somewhat happy endings. Some of the political jabbing and jousting was dull and sleep inducing, and not even Janney could attract my attention over the minute details of budget deals and the cost of living bills, but one could not help me admire the chutzpah             of even attempting this on prime time t.v. 

Sheen is married to Stockard Channing who is a doctor (sounds familiar doesn’t it) who has her own windmills to battle who doesn’t appear enough for my money. They have three independent daughters, the youngest one being in an early role Elisabeth Moss. 

His power staffers are there to charm and hold the fort with the great Allsion Janney as his intelligent and sassy (there’s that adjective again) press secretary who brought me to curses for the bimbos that have been lying for Trump for the last 4 years. She is so witty and fine with those bedroom eyes and great laugh as she takes on the White House Press corps, leaving several of the male members huffing and puffing. Tall and willowy she cut some of them down to size. The cast was large and superb with so many standouts including John Spencer, Richard Schiff, Mary Louise Parker, Lily Tomlin, Anna Deavere Smith, Rob Lowe, Alan Alda and Jimmy Smits who takes control in the last season as a presidential candidate.  The large writing and directing staff also deserves attention with  the main squeeze going to Aaron Sorkin who came up with the whole idea and also wrote and directed some of the episodes.