Mandatory Minimums - TWW S1E20

Original airdate: May 3, 2000

Written by: Aaron Sorkin (19)

Directed by: Robert Berlinger  (1)

Synopsis

• President Bartlet and his staff continue their rejuvenated outlook, with Bartlet naming his reform candidates to the FEC in the face of Senate opposition. The administration is working on major changes in drug policy, calling in Al Kiefer and Joey Lucas to get ideas from a polling standpoint. Also brought in to provide advice and insight: Toby's Congresswoman ex-wife. Mandy and Danny get the deep freeze treatment as fallout from Mandy's memo continues.

"Hi, Senator. Why don't you take your legislative agenda and shove it up your ass?"

More like "Mandy-tory" Minimums, am I right? Huh? Okay, enough of that. In my opinion, this is one of the weaker episodes of Season One - there's very little plot or policy movement here, as the episode serves only to build on the momentum and change in direction from Let Bartlet Be Bartlet. Sure, we're discussing changes in drug policy, emphasizing treatment over punishment, studying public polling on those issues, maybe even thinking about throwing out the mandatory minimum sentences that remove discretion from judges and treat those caught with crack cocaine (more often African-Americans) with much harsher sentences than those caught with powder cocaine (usually whites). But none of it is very engaging, and in the end, it doesn't feel like it means very much.

What is interesting? Well, we find out Toby has an ex-wife, and she's a member of the House. Leo and Josh set Toby up with a meeting with Rep. Andrea Wyatt, to relay some information about campaign finance reform as well as check on the temperature of the House regarding possible drug policy changes. She's a pistol, she is - played by Kathleen York, Andy will be an ongoing character we'll see from time to time throughout the series. She also likes pie and long walks along the Tidal Basin.

We also find out that the President is going ahead with the unusual approach of naming his own reform-minded candidates to the Federal Election Commission, John Bacon and Patricia Calhoun. This does not go over well with the Senate leadership, who customarily choose the members of the FEC, but the emboldened and energized White House is spoiling for a fight (hence the "shove it up your ass" comment from Josh to the Senator). This move brings Steve Onorato to Sam's office, to try to get him to trade the FEC candidates for more support on drugs and other issues, but the meeting doesn't go all that well:

Onorato: "And you, Sam, can go back to writing speeches for when the President meets the Girl Scout who sold the most cupcakes."

Cathy (entering): "Sam -"

Sam: "Cookies."

Onorato: "Huh?"

Sam: "Girl Scouts sell cookies, not cupcakes. And it was a pretty good speech I wrote, it was about volunteerism."

Josh and Toby later reveal to Sam that Onorato's gambit of going to him instead of Josh means the Republicans on the Hill are aware of Sam's relationship with Laurie (remember her? She hasn't been around for a while), with the plan being to get Sam out front publicly on the drug issue so that the Republicans can attack him with call girl scandal. I guess this also means Laurie's character is going to reappear before the end of the season.

What else? Mandy's memo from the previous episode is still having repercussions, as CJ is freezing Danny out of the usual briefings for the senior White House correspondent, and Mandy is being chased out of Oval Office meetings on Leo's orders. Even though at the end of the episode Jed tells the staff to let them both out of their doghouses, I can't feel a lot of sympathy for Mandy. I probably shouldn't be so hard on her, but she just makes it so darn easy. Again, she had no excuse for not telling anyone about this memo the instant she hired on with the administration back in episode two. And take note - she was entirely absent from two back-to-back episodes recently, and all she's done since then is try to convince Toby to help get pandas from China and then get hammered for writing this (apparently accurate) opposition memo with ideas to help defeat Bartlet's renomination. She's just ... there, so when CJ tells her (after ushering her out of the Oval Office meeting) "There's plenty for you to do" we are left wondering, what is that, exactly?

CJ's anger at Danny is, just as he calls it, "bush league." The memo was a valid news story; the information in it would have been helpful to the administration if Mandy had let them in on it when she was hired; he was simply doing his job by procuring the memo and publishing the story. CJ was, apparently, expecting preferential treatment because of the feelings Danny has expressed for her - you can see why that's all sorts of wrong in the ethics field, as is a lot of the Danny/CJ relationship, but it's a TV show and not a documentary...

Leo shows he's playing hardball on the drug policy issue (almost literally, as he tells one congressional staffer they play the whole nine innings at this level), bringing in aides for seven different legislators to explain to them the President will brook no hypocritical calls of "soft on crime" for pushing treatment over punishment - particularly when each of these seven officials has friends or family members who got off easy on drug charges themselves. Leo is concerned about being the front man on the issue, considering his past drug abuse himself, but that's hardly touched on during the episode, either (except for a touch of humor when Jed nearly falls asleep while Leo is trying to tell him about his concerns).

Then there's Joey Lucas. She's back, with her transition from campaign manager for a doomed House hopeful to pollster-expert-on-California pretty much complete. She arrives along with Al Kiefer to advise the White House on how various approaches toward drug policy might play with the public. Kiefer, just as he was in 20 Hours In L.A., is only around to serve as an antagonist towards anything the Bartlet administration might want to do (he even gets left alone in the Oval Office at one point, which frankly is something that would never happen in real life, I imagine):

Lucas, though, continues to play the role as possible love interest for Josh. Donna gives him a hard time at breakfast for how he's prepared for her arrival:

Donna: "You should notice that Josh has on a nice suit."

Margaret: "That is a nice suit."

Josh: "Donna -"

Donna: "We'll call it his Joey Lucas suit."

Josh: "Donna!"

Donna: "You know, from now on."

Margaret: "Joey Lucas is coming?"

Josh: "We need a California expert, and this is my regular Tuesday suit."

Margaret: "You assign your clothes days of the week?"

Brad Whitford and Marlee Matlin are great together (and don't forget Kenny!). It's a touching moment when Josh stops in Joey's newly set-up office to give her a little present (with the idea coming from Charlie - "She's a fine looking woman") - even if it is just a White House coffee mug (Kenny's face is hilarious in this scene):

In general, this episode just kind of happens. It does connect with Let Bartlet Be Bartlet as the President and his staff continue to be fired up, throwing their caps over the wall and going for broke, damn the responses from Congress - but that's undermined a bit by the pettiness of how Mandy and Danny are treated, not to mention the reluctance to push repeal of mandatory minimums even when everyone agrees it's the right thing to do. I thought we were all done with being cautious and keeping to the middle of the road, weren't we? Jed does get to sum things up nicely at the end, though, which is supposed to continue our feeling of driving ahead and doing the right thing, no matter the cost:

President: "And when I sleep, I dream about a great discussion with experts and ideas and diction and energy and ... honesty. And when I wake up I think, 'I can sell that.'"

 Tales Of Interest!

- In the opening scene we get to hear one of Aaron Sorkin's favorite writing gimmicks. He's got plenty of them, every writer does, but this particular construction always catches my ear as just a little off. He will sometimes have a character pose a question; when another character starts to answer, the first character tells them they're right by finishing the answer - before the second person actually gives it. Here's the example from this episode, in the scene with the Senate Majority Leader and his aides:

Senator: "Problem is, this is brandy and not cognac. Anyone know the difference?"

Aide: "Cognac is supposed to come from -"

Senator: "The Cognac region of France, that's right."

She might have been about to say, "Cognac is supposed to come from Kentucky" or "from brown cows instead of black cows" or literally anything else, but Sorkin - to come up with a dramatic shorthand in his dialogue - lets the Senator assume she had the correct answer. It's just a tad arrogant, isn't it?

- This is definitely one of the brightest episodes of The West Wing you're ever going to see. So much of the series is shot with dramatic shadows and darkness (and wait until Season 5, you can hardly see anything), but director Robert Berlinger seems to pair the generally optimistic and energetic tone of the episode with plenty of light. These scenes in Sam's office and in the foyer are so much lighter than we usually see them:

- I don't know about you, but CJ's misstatement about the President not being "legally obligated" to name a Democrat and a Republican to the FEC just doesn't seem like the big deal Leo makes it out to be. I know he emphasizes they can't make any mistakes this week, but - the President did name both a Democrat and a Republican, so whether or not there's a legal requirement, it doesn't seem to matter. Having CJ correct her statement in the next briefing, as she did, seems like it should be the end of the story, but instead we get Leo yelling at her about "amateur mistakes" and making CJ mad so she yells at Danny:

CJ: "Don't talk to me like that in front of people."

Danny: "Look -"

CJ: "No! I just got called an amateur twice in ten seconds. The White House Chief of Staff can do it to me wherever he wants. You don't do it in front of people."

- The final scene is almost reminiscent of the Marx Brothers, with people piling into the President's bedroom. First Leo, waking up Jed to talk about his concerns over leading the drug policy fight (and nearly putting the President back to sleep); then CJ, apologizing for her "legally obligated" gaffe; followed by Sam and Toby; and finally Josh, in a grand mood after gifting Joey the mug:

President: "Guys, let me tell you what I would like to have happen right now."

Josh (happily bursting into the room): "Good evening, Mr. President."

President: "Josh walking in the doorway wasn't even close." 

Quotes    

(As Sam is madly typing away on his laptop keyboard, Toby looking over his shoulder)

Toby: "That's good ... Good ... Okay ... Sam?"

Sam: "Yeah?"

Toby: "Sam, you're going to come to a verb soon, right?"

Sam: "Okay. You know what this is called?"

Toby: "Bad writing?"

Sam: "Imagery."

Toby: "Well, you say potato --"

-----

Leo: "Margaret!"

Margaret: "Yes?"

Leo: "The list of names I gave you before."

Margaret: "Dalton, Dawson, Foxworthy, Greer, Morgenthau, Stackhouse, Sugarbaker."

Leo: "You didn't need to memorize them."

Margaret: "I couldn't help it."

Leo: "Okay."

Margaret: "My mind works that way."

-----

Toby: "I met with Congresswoman Wyatt today."

President: "When you were married to her did you call her Congresswoman Wyatt?"

Toby: "No, sir."

President: "Sometimes I call my wife Dr. Bartlet."

Story threads, callbacks, and familiar faces (Hey, it's that guy!)

• CATCHING UP - I forgot to mention in the last recap, John Spencer was nominated for a Supporting Actor in a Drama Emmy, with both Five Votes Down and the previous episode, Let Bartlet Be Bartlet, submitted. Spencer's castmate Richard Schiff won that Emmy instead.

• Also, a bit of a continuity error I missed in the last episode: CJ says Mandy worked on the Bartlet campaign for a year and a half. In "Post Hoc, Ergo Propter Hoc" we were told Mandy spent two and a half years on the campaign.

• The Senate Majority Leader (we know that's his title because we found out last episode that's who Onorato works for) is played by Bruce Weitz (most famously known for Hill Street Blues).

• One of the seven legislator's names listed (whose family members got lenient treatment over drug arrests) is Stackhouse. A Senator Stackhouse will pop up in storylines in Season Two and beyond.

• Eagle-eyed viewers have probably noticed that Toby has been wearing a wedding band since the start of the series. Toby's marital status wasn't anything created by the writers or producers - Richard Schiff had decided on his own that his character was married, or at least had been married in the past. In his development of Toby's character, he came up with the backstory that Toby was a widower, still wearing the ring because he couldn't quite let his late wife go, and that helped explain why he was sad a lot of the time. Now, it took the production staff about eight episodes before they even realized Schiff was wearing a ring, and then Sorkin decided it might make better storylines if Toby had an ex-wife who happened to be a Congresswoman.

DC location shots    

• The early scene with Toby and Sam walking to breakfast was filmed on N Street Northwest in Washington, DC. The statue in the background is of General Winfield Scott, located where N Street and 16th Street cross. They are walking in the 1700 block. (I'm actually kind of amazed I was able to luck into figuring this one out, but Google Street View did the trick and verified I had it correct.)

And how the street looks today (the TV show camera lens compressed the distance between the statue and where the actors were walking - it's actually a couple of blocks):

Here are Sam and Toby in front of 1718 N Street NW:

 And that same address in Google Street View:

• The actual cafe scene, on the other hand, almost certainly wasn't in DC (for one, I doubt they would have flown NiCole Robinson and Janel Maloney out for location shooting). The menus say it's the Iron Gate Inn - there is no Iron Gate Inn in Washington, but there is an Iron Gate Restaurant, which does have patio seating and happens to be on the same block of N Street Northwest as the location shoot above. Add to that the Tabard Inn hotel right across the street, and there's your cafe name.

• Toby meets Andy along the west side of the Tidal Basin, with the Jefferson Memorial in the background.

References to real people    

• The press corps talks about the President eating his Wheaties during his fiery speech that opens the episode. Time and Newsweek magazines also get mentioned.

• During the meeting with Andy along the Tidal Basin, Toby is clearly holding a Starbucks cup.

• Sam and Onorato are drinking Naya brand water out of bottles - even though stickers are used to cover up a letter, it doesn't fool anybody.

• Josh brings up The Godfather, as well as Al Pacino and James Caan, after Sam goes ballistic when he finds out Onorato was trying to play him into getting into a position where Laurie could be used to embarrass him:

Josh: "This is like The Godfather, when Pacino tells James Caan he's going to kill the cop. It's a lot like that scene, only not really. [...] It is like that scene. I'm James Caan, you're Al Pacino."

Toby: "Let's go."

Josh: "Toby, you're the guy who shows Pacino how to make tomato sauce." 

• President Bartlet again promotes his alma mater, wearing a Notre Dame T-shirt to bed. 

End credits freeze frame: The meeting with Kiefer and staff in the Oval Office.