The West Wing

3. Politics of the Televisual Form: Aesthetics and Sounds of Power

Chapter 3 Politics of the Televisual Form Aesthetics and Sounds of Power 59 When Aaron Sorkin quit The West Wing in 2003 so did the man responsible for the distinctive look and visual style of the series, Thomas Schlamme. Sorkin wrote of him: [In the “Pilot” Schlamme] just mapped out what would be the first big camera move of the series, the shot that would take us inside the West Wing of the White House. We started on the bronze Seal of the President that’s embedded in the floor and flowed effortlessly through the Northwest Lobby and past security and down corridors and into offices and out of offices and we got teased by the biggest office of them all before settling in and the whole thing was gonna last five minutes but seems like five seconds and it would stamp a visual style that the show would adhere to forever. Tommy hadn’t just directed the pilot, he’d just written the series in directors’ language. (2003a, 8; emphasis added) Schlamme collected the Emmy for Outstanding Direction for this episode. It was one of five technical prizes awarded to The West Wing that night in September 2000. Others included 01 McCabe text.indd 59 9/12/12 9:22 AM 60 Chapter 3 Thomas Del Ruth for Outstanding Cinematography for a Single Camera Series, and Jon Hutman (production designer), Tony Fanning (art director), and Ellen Totleben (set decorator) won for Outstanding Art Direction for a Single Camera Series for the pilot episode. Whereas television has long depended on simple shot-reverse-shot talking heads as the basis for its storytelling, the aesthetic choices made on The West Wing not only distinguished its distinct televisual style from that of the competition on network and cable but also gave an idealistic, ambient, and kinetic energy to a scripted political drama dealing with weighty issues and the principles and idealism behind them. “In this show you have to listen to hear everything. You also have to look to see everything,” says Schlamme (quoted in Oppenheimer 2000, 74). Prolonged Steadicam shots were a key formal element of The West Wing, as were the chiaroscuro shafts of contrasting light and shadow. These aesthetic principles heightened the sense of drama as characters spoke briskly while striding through the labyrinthine halls of political power. This “walk-and-talk” (also referred to as “peda-conference”) established the visual signature of the show. Its use, along with a carefully crafted romantic visual quality, later becoming much darker, more sepia in tone, created a mise-en-scène of what presidential power looked and “felt” like. Yet given its privileged institutional position, The West Wing did not so much break with tradition as become a showcase for state-of-the-art image-making technologies and technical aestheticism that best represented the finest in U.S. television creativity. As Michael Mayers, the show’s director of photography from 2004 to 2006, put it: “We work under the same production standards as the best Hollywood features” (2005). Nothing could be more tightly structured, more diligently planned and budgeted for, than The West Wing—but the quality of the production relied on the most up-to-date studio resources and latest technical equipment, as well as the most highly skilled creative personnel 01 McCabe text.indd 60 9/12/12 9:22 AM 61 Politics of the Televisual Form and technical operators working in American television at that time. Like other U.S. network shows, The West Wing was essentially an interior piece. Filming took place on the Warner Bros. lot, and its permanently built set, covering twenty-five thousand square feet, was the biggest ever constructed for a pilot. Of this substantial investment, John Wells said: “This is the most expensive show I’ve ever been involved in. . . . There is a pomp and opulence surrounding our presidency which is expensive” (quoted in Waxman 2001, B3). With other parts of the set salvaged from presidential movies Nixon (Oliver Stone, 1995) and The American President, initial investment may have been high, but studio-based dramas streamline costs and rationalize production . Library pictures of the actual 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue were extensively used as iconic establishing shots, with a second unit dispatched to Washington, D.C., to film additional location scenes of Capitol Hill and beside the Tidal Basin of the Potomac—recognizable sights of the nation’s capital. Schlamme talked of...