OTH: The West Wing- "Celestial Navigation" / "20 Hours in L.A."
"I had ROOT CANAL."
Season 1, Episode 15
Aired February 16, 2000
Directed by Christopher Misiano
Teleplay by Aaron Sorkin, Story by Dee Dee Myers & Lawrence O’Donnell, Jr.
Synopsis: Roberto Mendoza, the President’s Supreme Court candidate, has been arrested on a DUI charge in Connecticut. Which sounds suspicious, given that Mendoza reportedly does not drink. Sam and Toby are on their way to his jail cell, but Josh can’t join them, as he’s committed to a presentation for the Marjorie Dupont series, where he’s asked to describe a typical day at the White House. According to the Deputy Chief of Staff, however, there is no typical day; a typical 9 to 5 can go to hell right at 9:30. To use an example, Josh recalls the previous two days, which starts with the staff hoping to promote their new education bill, which they expect to become a big news day, but there’s something else that takes over the news day, as HUD secretary Deborah O’Leary (CCH Pounder) is on the record calling prominent Republican candidate Jack Wooden, one that the White House hopes to work with across the hall, a racist. Not just him, but the entire Republican party. It’s not a great look for someone who the President thinks highly of, nor is it a great look for Bartlet when he briefly takes questions from the press and suggests that it would be good if O’Leary apologizes, which Leo convinces her to do one-on-one. C.J. is out at a dental appointment and wasn’t able to fend off these hard questions, nor can she fend a later press statement, as she had an emergency root canal. This is an important statement, though, so Josh volunteers to take her place, a decision that most don’t love, given his history of belligerent answers to the press. Still, he persists, and despite a good start with smoothing over O’Leary’s statements, but things take a turn when he’s asked questions, first about the President’s plan to fight smoking, as he’s reportedly still a smoker. Josh evades the question, but then puts his foot in his mouth when Danny Concannon asks if the President has any plans to fight inflation, noting that the record drop in unemployment that the White House has occurred will cause inflation. Josh makes a joke about the President’s “secret plan to fight inflation”, which the press takes seriously and won’t let him back off from. Oh no. Josh looks like an ass, and no one’s going to let him down for the next few days, although now we have a new dilemma- Mendoza has stated that he thinks it’s a bad move from the President to make O’Leary apologize for her remarks, so Leo wants to meet with their Supreme Court nominee. However, instead of coming over immediately, Mendoza is driving from his vacation house in Nova Scotia to Connecticut first, to go antiquing. Ideally, he will arrive in D.C. the next day, but we know what happens next.
As they’re driving before GPSes were common, and well before smart phones were a thing, Sam is relying on celestial navigation to find the police station, and that doesn’t go well. They do eventually find it, though, and while it takes some time for the Communications Director and his deputy to prove who they are, luckily the sheriff has a newspaper with Toby next to President Bartlet and lets him in to meet with Mendoza. When the two meet, Toby asks why he rejected the breathalyzer, which Mendoza states that he did because he had no reason to fear arrest and that he suspected that he was stopped and detained due to the color of his skin, which is hard to dispute. Even though he was driving loopily, it turns out that Mendoza has a medical condition that prevents him from drinking, so he should be clear. Despite being given the clear from the officer who arrested him, Mendoza intends to stay in his jail cell until Monday, where he can prove his innocence in a court of law, not wanting this to be the image his son sees of his father. Toby convinces him that things will improve if he receives the Supreme Court seat. Mendoza accepts, and before Toby takes him back to his wife and son’s motel, convinces the sheriff to apologize to both Mendoza and his son.
When I watch these episodes, I try to take as many notes as possible for when I do my write-ups. With “Celestial Navigation”, my eyes were glued to the television for almost the entirety. You know you’ve hit a winner when this happens.
For one thing, this is the funniest episode of the series, and actually funny at that. Given Sorkin’s mixed attempts at comedic relief, this is no small feat, but Sorkin and co succeed at adding farce into a standard West Wing episode while being able to deliver the gravitas needed for its heavier subject matter.
And before we get to that, let’s appreciate the brilliant cast. Bradley Whitford has been doing a lot of heavy lifting this season, as his Josh Lyman tends to get the matiest stories (“Celestial Navigation” is no exception, as he’s the wraparound subject matter that everything returns to), and he’s often excellently anchored by Jenna Maloney’s Donna, who is able to pull off nearly any emotion with a perfectly-timed pout. Richard Schiff and Rob Lowe have their own strong material getting to the jail cell, but the other MVP has to be Allison Janey, who once again reminds us of her unbelievable gift for comedy, making something as overdone as a root canal seem like the funniest predicament on earth, complete with Elmer Fudd-esq pronunciation. And of course, they’re rounded out by John Spencer’s delightfully no-nonsense Leo, along with Martin Sheen’s respectful levels of nonsense as President Bartlet, who have to deal with the monkeys in the service. Give or take the other players, like Dulé Hill’s Charlie, and we really have something special here.
A special kind of show that can allow its crew to get a little off-kilter while returning to the heavy questions it focuses on without feeling out of place at all. Which is why we’re returning to Mendoza and his self-determined jail cell. His subplot is added to discuss profiling, which has always been an issue that people of color like the Supreme Court-elect congressman has faced all of his life. While it’s implied that he could have been released earlier if he made a different call, Mendoza knew what he was doing by calling the White House (to be fair, part of why would be to explain why he wasn’t going to make his meeting with the President), and only used the power that Toby and Sam’s names have to prove that this Hispanic man is no threat.
I like how the episode frames both Mendoza and Toby right, that Mendoza was wise to use this opportunity to prove a point, while Toby is accurate in saying that using his power to get out and reclaim his dignity, rather than waiting until Monday to prove his case, is the right thing to do for Mendoza and his family. Both are wise, well-meaning men and we get a whopper of a scene with just Schiff and Edward James Olmos debating in a particularly dimly lit jail cell*.
Still, the fact that Toby and Mendoza’s discussion may not even crack my top 5 favorite moments in the episode speaks magnitudes to how well the cast and crew were handling thins in “Celestial Navigation”. Nothing can top the secret plan to fight inflation, which we’re still waiting on an answer for.
And that’s what a typical day, or series of days at the White House looks like. At this point, we know that The West Wing will keep its characters and audience on their feet throughout, and with episodes like this, it’s fun to see how and why they’re making this happen.
Season 1, Episode 16
Aired February 23, 2000
Directed by Alan Taylor
Written by Aaron Sorkin
Synopsis: At 3 am, President Bartlet arrives at Air Force One to meet with most of his staff (as well as his daughter, Zoey and her new secret service agent Gina Torano) to fly over to Los Angeles for a single, very busy day. Leo joins him at the aircraft, but has volunteered to stay at D.C. to handle a potentially significant ethanol vote, which is stuck with a 50-50 split in the senate. As we see the staff land, Josh and Donna stop by in their(?) hotel room, where he receives a note from Joey Lucas, the deaf consultant he had a meet-cute with in “Take This Sabbath Day”. Donna insists that he calls her, but she also finds a note from Hollywood bigwig Ted Marcus, which is more urgent. Marcus was supposed to hold a get-together for the President’s arrival, but he’s considering putting it on hold due to an impending bill banning gay people from the military, which the White House has stayed quiet on. Josh states that the President doesn’t stand by the bill, but at the same time won’t stand up to oppose it, which is the real problem. He eventually wins Marcus over by guaranteeing him ten minutes of alone time with the President. Speaking of which, President Bartlet is at a townhall meeting discussing flag desecration, which he very visibly doesn’t want to be a part of. As soon as he can, he excuses himself and asks to find the restaurant Zoey is dining at with Charlie. Even though he does want to spend time with his daughter, there is an ulterior motive here- she’s been receiving threats by white supremacists for her relationship with the Black Charlie Young, and he wants to ensure that no one will bother them. He had a conversation with Gina earlier on the flight, who has promised to stay vigilant for anyone suspicious, and later does her best to hide Zoey from a group of potential skinheads. At the party that evening, the staff mingles with various bigwigs in both the movie and political industry, which includes David Hasselhoff and Jay Leno, the former a very drunk Donna flirts with. In between her schmoozing with the Hoff and Matthew Perry, Josh runs into Joey Lucas, who spends a while talking with him and eventually lets them in on a secret- prominent pollster Al Kiefer very strongly wants the President to sign on for a bill against flag burning, but only a small percentage of voters in California truly care, a statistic Joey can prove by sharing voter intel with him. This is just the news Toby and C.J. were hoping to hear, and further impresses Joey with the staff, although Josh was already convinced. However, it turns out that she came to the party with someone, cutting short their potential together. At the hotel that evening, Donna convinces Josh that “being with someone” is code for “try harder” and encourages him to go to her hotel room to say goodbye, even though it’s 1 am. He listens, and opens the door to Kiefer, and you can guess what’s going on.
Back in D.C., Leo’s attempts to coerce any of the voters against the bill he’s able to switch teams falls flat, so he has no choice but to ask Vice President Hoynes to follow his duty to be their tiebreaker, a task he is not interested in. Partly since he doesn’t think that the ethanol switch will give the results the White House want, and partly because he knows this will eat him when he takes over the Oval Office. Basically, he really wants to be off the hook, and the staff decides to let him have his way by convincing three on the fence senators to vote nay. On the flight home, Bartlet calls Hoynes and congratulates him on standing his ground, confessing that he ultimately agrees with the V.P.’s stance. While the rest of the staff has fallen asleep, the President cannot.
Did anyone else notice that Mandy, the President’s media consultant who has been suggesting for a while that the White House staff make a trip to California, was absent this episode? Additionally, it feels like her screentime is only starting to diminish and she’s seldom receiving active stories, and instead is being forced into other character’s dilemmas for one scene at a time. I think it’s around this point that the show has realized the truth, that Moira Kelly’s turn as Mandy Hampton wasn’t quite working out, although she’ll still make it to the end of the season. I’ll save my thoughts for her duty on the series a little later, but I couldn’t help but notice the irony.
Although I can’t help but note, is the reason that Mandy’s character has fizzled out because Kelly and Bradley Whitford’s chemistry was never that ecstatic? He fares much better with both Jenna Maloney’s Donna and Marlee Matlin’s Joey Lucas, and with the latter’s return here, it’s clear that the crew can easily agree. While the revelation that Joey is seeing Al Kiefer, you’d think that would be it, but they don’t look very serious and it would be unlikely if we saw Lucas for a second time to end on this particular note. Without saying what happens next (because I know), I’ll just say that this would be a weird call.
Before I go back to the episode itself, I do want to talk a little more about Joey Lucas. I didn’t spend much time talking about this in “Take This Sabbath Day”, but it made for a smart change of expectations for when we met Lucas in the episode, as neither the White House nor the audience were expecting an able-bodied Joseph Lucas, not a deaf Josephine. Between her gender and disability, Joey has two major strikes against her in the political landscape, which is why she’s had to latch onto who the President referred to as an “empty shirt” just to stay in the game. From what we’ve seen of Joey in her two appearances, this really shouldn’t be the case. She’s as clever and intuitive as any of her contemporaries, but there’s an understandable gap holding her back, which Josh appears to have crossed. Whether this means that a romantic partnership is applicable or that the show wants to, once again, remind us that Josh is a good person remains to be seen, but so far I’m a fan of the Joey Lucas character if only because she’s one of the few women on the show with her own agenda and goals that aren’t totally defined by the men in the series. And like I said last week, who doesn’t love Marlee Matlin?
Additionally, I made more than a couple of notes about the looming threat of white supremacists watching over the President’s daughter and her boyfriend. Considering the increasing rise in Nazi, Klan, and general bigotry violence that’s occurring recently, this feels all too precedent, but works best to remind us that this has been a concern well before Trump or even Obama stepped into office. Racism didn’t end with the Civil Rights Movement, hatred still exists, and no attempt to cover that up with different names will remove the ulterior motives of a disturbingly high number of evil people.
And while I can relate to Zoey, who just wants some time to be a normal young adult, that’s just not going to happen. It’s unfortunate for her, but has to be even worse for Charlie, who is going to have a target on his back for possibly the rest of his life due to his relationship. Even if they break up, he won’t be forgotten by certain people.
So anyway, I had fun with “20 Hours in L.A.”, which offered a welcome change of pace as we switched coasts and kept the material active, switching from beat to beat pretty quickly. Some storylines clicked more than others- I didn’t have much use for Leo’s subplot back in D.C. with the Vice President, for instance- but it is nice to get out and change the scenery every once in a while. Not only does it make things look a little more fresh, but it’s fun to see the insanely stacked cast react to different worlds than their own. Even though some of the staff get more things to do than others (I don’t recall Sam or Toby having as much fun as, say, Donna or C.J.), this is still a well-crafted hour of television, Sorkin’s first solo teleplay in a while and handsomely shot by Alan Taylor, that I can’t help but appreciate it.
The show gets on my nerves sometimes, but when it’s good, I understand why The West Wing blew up the way it did.
Presidential Records:
C.C.H. Pounder was nearly casted as C.J., but I think that Allison Janney was the right call. As much as I love Pounder, she’s a little too commanding for the character as we know her, while Janney is able to find the perfect balance between respect and pity that I think she requires. Plus, if Pounder took on the role, she wouldn’t have done The Shield. Imagine.
“You shouldn’t say that, you have a great body.” I don’t know why that second part is necessary, but Josh said it.
*Personally, I thought the lighting in the jail cell was a little extra and heavy-handed, but I understand the purpose and can admit that this scene must have looked impressive on network TV back in 2000.
I like that C.J. has no clue as to what film development is. Good for her, stay in your lane.
Also, it’s funny that Matthew Perry was namedropped, since we’ll be seeing him in the series eventually.
Next Week: The President has to make a tough choice about a particular candidate, and then a busy day is thrown for a loop when Zoey gets arrested.