In this second part of Northern Slant’s summer series, we take a look at how political drama and comedy played out on the small screen, both in the US and the UK. But while we’ll look at politics on television, this isn’t the place for a discussion of the other side of the equation; the impact of television on politics.

Neil Postman wrote in “Amusing Ourselves To Death” 33 years ago that our culture, including our politics, had “descended into a vast triviality.” Postman reached even farther back, quoting Aldous Huxley, who in 1958’s “Brave New World Revisited” spoke of man’s “almost infinite appetite for distraction.”

That’s even more true today – Richard Wolffe in The Guardian wrote that the 2016 presidential election was “the most trivial ever.” But even without the daily reality show produced by the White House, politics can still make for great television, even if the truth is frequently stranger than fiction.

So, here’s our list of some favourite political-themed TV shows, drama and comedy, and please excuse the channel-hopping – in more ways than one – as we make our way through it in no particular order; but with a single thread that we think they’re all worth seeing if you haven’t, and revisiting if you have.

The modern daddy of them all in this genre is probably The West Wing, which ran for seven series from 1999 and featured Martin Sheen as Jed Bartlet, the plain-spoken but smart and, above all, human president TV viewers would have elected if they could.

Creator and writer Aaron Sorkin has undoubtedly been a huge influence on modern TV drama (and we’ll come back to him again next time to talk about The Newsroom); but as well as the perfectly-pitched insider scripts, it was the interaction between the tremendous ensemble cast that set TWW apart – both among the core players and later guests like Alan Alda and Jimmy Smits as they contested the election after President Bartlet’s tenure.

There’s often been speculation about a “reboot” or some kind of reunion, while devotees can get their regular fix on The West Wing Weekly podcast, co-hosted by Joshua Malina, who played speechwriter Will Bailey.

It’s impossible to pick a single clip or episode that sums up the show, so many come to mind, like Leo McGarry’s funeral; Toby’s Arlington Cemetery scene; the walk to the Hill; the “Isaac and Ishmael” script in the wake of September 11; but one that will probably always stand out, in part because of its perfect choice of soundtrack, is ‘Two Cathedrals’, featuring Bartlet’s monologue and the “Brothers in Arms” sequence that followed, ending that season on a brilliant cliffhanger.

So maybe we should just enjoy this instead…

At the other end of the seriousness spectrum, but just as popular among its fans is Veep; an outstanding piece of American political satire created by a Scotsman – the brilliant Armando Iannucci. Julia Louis-Dreyfus plays Vice-President (and subsequently President) Selena Meyer and the show follows her and her staffers as they put the fun in dysfunction while trying to make the Veep look as good as she can.

Here’s a catch-up (with a heads-up on some strong language, as you might expect…)

 

Meanwhile, Iannucci’s previous UK show, to which Veep owes a significant debt, is The Thick of It, which reflects the often chaotic flux of British politics swirling around the perpetually frustrated and foulmouthed director of communications Malcolm Tucker, played by Peter Capaldi and modeled on a figure not a million miles from Alastair Campbell at the height of his Blairite powers. The dialogue is often like a brilliant slow-motion train wreck: you can’t take your eyes off it, even if you know where it ends up. (That language thing applies here too…)

The Thick of It, in its turn, is descended from the BBC’s classic 1980’s series Yes, Minister and the sequel Yes, Prime Minister, written by Antony Jay and Jonathan Lynn, which explored the relationship between government ministers and their civil servants – the malleable and the Machiavellian. No need for a language warning, unless you’re triggered by Etonians.

Another late ‘80s series, The New Statesman, featured the self-enriching, self-promoting MP Alan B’Stard, played wonderfully by Rik Mayall. The show, written by Laurence Marks and Maurice Gran has many of the elements of classic British situation comedy, mixed with a healthy ridicule of the political classes and an embrace of thrusting Thatcherite ambition and entitlement.

Around the same time, but on the grittier, more substantive side of TV portrayals of politicians, A Very British Coup was a 1988 Channel 4 mini-series based on a book by Labour MP Chris Mullin, in which a Labour prime minister and former Sheffield steelworker, played by Ray MacAnally, is elected with a landslide and wants to remove US nuclear weapons from Britain.

 

A similar theme of a conspiratorial “special relationship” was also the subject of a 1985 BBC mini-series, Edge of Darkness, which was later turned into a Boston-based movie with Mel Gibson. Nearly two decades on, the BBC produced another six-part mini-series based on a narrative of political intrigue, State of Play, which in turn became a movie starring Russell Crowe as the crusading journalist investigating homeland security contracts.

 

But of course, certainly the most successful crossover political drama has been House of Cards. The US version, which has run since 2013 has its Kevin Spacey-less final season on Netflix this year. It’s based on a British series from 1990, and adapted from a book by Michael Dobbs. The British version had two sequels – To Play The King and in 1995, The Final Cut – all of which revolve around the relationship between the Francis Urquhart/Underwood character and his wife, and their pursuit of power. James Fallows, writing at The Atlantic in 2014 after the first US series, said: “The comparison between the U.S. and U.K. versions of this program shows something about why I feel so profoundly American (rather than British), but also why the Brits excel at just this kind of thing.”

Decide for yourself:

 

 

And that brings us back across the Atlantic again, where there’s an interesting race going on at the moment for the Democratic nomination for Governor of New York, between incumbent Andrew Cuomo and actress and activist Cynthia Nixon. While Nixon is best-known as one of the stars of ‘Sex and The City’ she also played candidate Michael Murphy’s daughter in Tanner ‘88 – a “mockumentary” mini-series created by director Robert Altman and Doonesbury cartoonist Garry Trudeau. Some of the real-life politicians in the 1988 Democratic race show up, doubtless thinking that Murphy makes a more photogenic candidate than they do.

 

Also on a New York state theme, David Simon, creator of The Wire (next time) made the six-parter Show Me A Hero in 2015 about the true story of racial tensions around the issue of public housing in Yonkers, NY, in the late 1980s and early 1990, and the impact of the city’s aspiring mayor, played by Oscar Isaac, alongside a wonderful cast.

 

Narrowing things down to New York City and an altogether lighter touch, Spin City, a comedy show about life in the Mayor’s office, starred Michael J Fox from 1996 to 2000, when Fox left due to his illness, to be replaced by Charlie Sheen. The show, which also featured Barry Bostwick as the Mayor, was cancelled in 2002.

 

For another comedic treatment of politics, Alina Utrata makes the case for Parks and Recreation here

 

Despite an unlikely basic premise, Madam Secretary, is entertaining and has a good foreign policy storyboard. Even if the parallels with Hillary Clinton were inevitable, it’s actually probably more about Madeleine Albright (that was the title of her autobiography, after all, and the former Secretary of State appeared in a 2015 cameo).

Madam Secretary probably has more of a connection to – and, again, not because of the 2016 campaign – Commander in Chief – an ABC drama starring Geena Davis as the first female President, which lasted just one season.

The Good Wife, one of the most popular political dramas of recent years, ran from 2009 to 2016 and explored the personal and public storylines around sexual misconduct. One of the series’ creators, Michelle King pointed specifically to Bill and Hillary Clinton, as well as the stories surrounding Sen John Edwards and New York Governor Eliot Spitzer, as having an influence on the direction of the show. And now it has morphed into The Good Fight reflecting the concerns of the Trump era. (and hey, that language heads-up is back)..

 

I’d guess there’s been plenty of language thrown around watching Designated Survivor, yet another unlikely – if initially interesting – premise that doesn’t look to have survived (sorry) beyond a second season. The show’s ratings sank amid what Variety called “creative twists and turns” in its political direction.

 

As dystopian scenarios go, they don’t come much more haunting than the current adaptation of Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, a brilliant, gripping story of fundamentalism and human nature. The imagery is striking and brutal and the (no spoilers) scenes at Fenway Park and at the offices of what was the Boston Globe are heart-wrenching.

 

Finally, some people might argue that the most fundamentally political series on television at the moment might be Game of Thrones, and certainly in terms of intrigue, forging strategic alliances and the struggle for power, there’s probably nothing as compelling for framing a political narrative; as plenty of academics appear to have realized.

Here’s some context from a couple of elections ago, featuring the real Jon Snow.

 

Previously on Northern Slant…

The first part of our summer series featured some of our favourite movies about American politics – and while we deliberately didn’t include documentaries – and maybe that’s a list for another time – we’ll give some quick mentions now for some classics like The War Room, (and the relationship between James Carville and Mary Matalin was a real-life script in itself), The Times of Harvey Milk, the 1984 film about the murder of California’s first openly-gay public official; through Adam Curtis’s 2004 excellent series of documentaries for the BBC, The Power of Nightmares, right up to Showtime’s current political reality series The Circus.

There were also plenty of movies we left out last week: Derek Mooney suggested Advise and Consent, as well as the originals of All The King’s Men and The Manchurian Candidate.

Some others I didn’t include in the original list, but which you might enjoy if you haven’t seen them are The Dead Zone, where psychic Christopher Walken can stop nut-job Martin Sheen from becoming president; The Parallax View, another psychological thriller with Warren Beatty as a reporter turned potential political assassin and Three Days of the Condor, where Robert Redford tangles with the CIA hierarchy.

Power has Richard Gere as a political consultant back before the days of Cambridge Analytica; while City Hall stars Al Pacino and John Cusack as the Mayor and his deputy trying to hold New York City together.

But lastly, and swinging back to that opening notion of politics being swamped by a tide of distraction, Robin Williams stars as the Man of the Year, which was directed in 2006 by Barry Levinson (who made Wag The Dog), and offers a reflection on politics seen through the eyes of a popular comedian of the time, like Jon Stewart or Bill Maher, and the challenge their shows posed to “real” news.

But it’s not like that could happen, though, right..?

Thanks for watching.

Next up in the series it’s Movies about Journalism on 17 June, then…

* 1 July – Political movies (UK)

* 15 July – Political movies about Ireland/NI

and finishing up on 29 July with Best political protest songs/videos.

So if there’s anything you think we should include – or anything you think we’ve left out this time around – just let us know.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Also published on Medium.