The West Wing Revisited: Bob Balaban brings box office boffo!
Welcome back to Kheiro’s recaps of The West Wing, where we see how much you liberals REALLY hate plutocracy
Possibly THE issue of our time is campaign finance reform. I think it got shortchanged in the news cycle because it has such an unsexy name. Maybe we should rebrand it as “getting the Koch brothers out of politics,” or just “Eat the Rich,” I don’t know. But this episode of The West Wing (S1E16, “20 Hours in LA”) portrays the only instance I can recall of a donor swinging his financial dick around on the right side of an issue. Buying influence is usually portrayed as a bad thing, because it is. Our country was founded on one sacred principle: one white landowning man, one vote. It was far from perfect, but even a racist, sexist, classist attempt at egalitarianism beats one dollar, one vote.
Ted Baxter (who I will be referring to as Bob Balaban from here on out, because that’s who plays him) does a bad thing for a good(ish) cause. He tries to use his $3 million donation to force the president to publicly swear that he will never sign a bill banning gays from the military. The viewer has to decide if they are a pragmatist or a deontologist, which is always a fun water cooler discussion.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. Air Force One hasn’t even taken off yet. We haven’t even met Bob Balaban and his eerily-on-trend-for-2018 sunglasses. At the start of this episode all we know is that the gang is going to LA and Zoey is coming along to have some real Los Angeles experiences. Which if it’s anything like my LA experience, will mostly be paying out the nose for improv classes and gaining a new appreciation for tequila and the fried chicken sandwich. Since Zoey is going to LA, so is her new Secret Service bodyguard: that one lady from CSI who had a poorly written late series romance with Grissom!
On this show, her name is Gina.
Bartlet: You know Zoey’s dating my body man, Charlie Young, right?
Gina: Yes, sir.
Bartlet: You know about the letters?
Gina: Of course, sir.
Bartlet: Are they white supremacists?
Gina: I can’t tell you for sure, Mr. President. We’ve been working fairly closely with the Southern Poverty Law Center and their database.
Bartlet: You don’t have an artist’s sketch, or psychological profiles, or anything?
Gina: Not much of either one, Mr. President, but I know what I’m looking for in a crowd if that’s what you’re asking me, sir.
Bartlet: It is.
Gina: Yes, sir.
OK, some things to unpack here. First off, we don’t know if they’re white supremacists? Really? If they’re sending threatening anti-miscegenation letters to the WHITE HOUSE, they’re white supremacists. Secondly, Zoey still doesn’t know about these letters. That’s fucked up. When a woman jumped the fence and tried to kill Zoey, the prez didn’t tell her. When she was menaced by racists at a bar, Pres. Dad basically asked her if she was asking for it. The president has threatened to throw his daughter into a dungeon on multiple occasions. If that is your reaction when she dates a guy you like, Jed, how do you expect her to take her Secret Service detail seriously?
The gang has barely checked into their hotel when Josh gets a summons from Bob Balaban. He was going to respond to the message Joey Lucas left him (the 90’s equivalent of a “u up” text), but instead he has to go see Balaban’s Jaden Smith cosplay and assuage his fears about conservatives running roughshod over the government, completely unchecked by the Democratic party. HAHAHA LIKE THAT WILL EVER HAPPEN.
Balaban threatens to cancel his big fundraising party if Bartlet doesn’t come through with the pro-gay content. Again, what kind of a Democratic party would endlessly fundraise and never, ever lift a finger for their minority constituents?
Josh rejoins Bartlet & Co. at some sort of function where people drone on endlessly about the flag. They love Flag. Flag is America, Flag is Soldiers, Flag is Freedom. They want to make it illegal to burn the flag, but legal to marry the flag. So the flag can’t testify against them in court. They really, really love Flag. Bartlet …likes Flag fine. Bartlet would invite Flag to brunch if it was a big group, but would feel awkward hanging out one-on-one. He ends the Flag Love Recitation Ceremony early and brusquely: “This is a debate that is obviously going to continue in town halls, city halls, state Legislatures, and the U.S. House of Representatives,” he says. “There is a population in this country that seems to focus so much time and energy into this conversation, so much so that I am forced to ask this question: is there an epidemic of flag burning going on that I’m not aware of?”
People don’t love it.
Bartlet decides to join Zoey for lunch — without asking Zoey — at a restaurant where they make the guacamole right in front of you. I know they make the guacamole in front of you because like four people mention it, like seven times. So often Sorkin mistakes repeating a phrase with a joke. His witty banter is half repetition. The other half is vagaries. I feel like I could write a spec of The West Wing where no actual issue or specifics are ever mentioned.
Zoey chafes at Jed’s intrusion. When the president dines, the restaurant gets cleared of normal-ass Angelenos. “What, is someone after me in California?” she asks.
Also at this lunch in the abandoned guacamole factory: Q from Star Trek: The Next Generation! This time Q has taken the form of a sleazy political operative who wants the president to come out in favor of the flag-burning ban. Not because he believes in it (because Q believes in nothing), but because he thinks it will hand Bartlet the election. Apparently a large percentage of Americans favor a flag-burning ban amendment. Toby isn’t having it. But Bartlet wants to hear him out for some unthinkable reason.
Josh somehow placates Bob Balaban, and the party happens. David Hasselhoff is there, and Jay Leno. It bums me out these were the only celeb cameos Sorkin could wrangle. Sabrina: The Teenage Witch was airing at approximately the same time, and they got Rupaul AND the Violent Femmes AND some guy from the Baltimore Ravens. And Raquel Welch. And the cast of Laugh-In except for Goldie Hawn. Sabrina was a good show.
One celeb Sorkin could get was Marlee Matlin. Joey Lucas is back, with her interpreter Kenny. Joey and Josh talk throughout the party, flirty and fun. Kenny does a really, really good job of flirting with Josh and expressing sadness that Joey came here “with someone.” I’d be very interested in a movie about the dynamic between deaf person and interpreter, how sublimating your own speech so someone else can be heard is both noble and an erasure of self. I would like Stanley Tucci to play the interpreter. Joey-via-Kenny also flirts a little with Toby, explaining that while people care about flag burning, they only care a teeny-tiny bit. Like me with people watching videos on their phones in public spaces. Should there be a constitutional amendment banning it? Absolutely. Am I going to vote about it? No.
(PS: The person Joey’s “with,” and later presumably sleeps with is …Q! Who saw that coming?)
In the swanky library of this swanky house, the President is meeting with Bob Balaban. Bob is saying “please just say some nice stuff about gay people” and Pres. Dad is saying, “I can’t and you wouldn’t understand why!”
It’s an odd scene. The president yells, “I live in the world of professional politics, and you live in the world of adolescent tantrum!” at the beginning of an adolescent tantrum. He only stops yelling when the target of his tantrum says that not only does he trust Bartlet, he likes him. Balaban immediately caves on his position, then soothes the raging beast that is our president. I have been watching some reality TV shows as of late, and none of those drunken yelling matches has ever ended in a “heavy wears the crown” speech. And Lisa Vanderpump’s crown is pretty fucking heavy. If Sorkin really wants people to believe in his beautiful words and his beautiful president, he has to write more worthy opponents. Or cast Lisa Rinna.
What’s Next: Zoey finally finds out about all those threats on her life!
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