The Leadership Breakfast - TWW S2E11

Original airdate: January 10, 2001

Teleplay by: Aaron Sorkin (32)
Story by: Paul Redford (5)

Directed by: Scott Winant (1)

Synopsis

• A bipartisan meeting to kick off the new year and a new Congress finds the Bartlet administration caught by surprise when a Republican Senate staffer outmaneuvers Toby. Sam looks into moving the press out of the West Wing. Efforts to atone for Leo's comments about a journalist's shoes snowball out of control.

"The legislative session hasn't begun and we can't put a forkful of waffles in our mouth without coughing up the ball. You got beat."

The West Wing is a television drama set in the world of politics, but it's not necessarily a purely political show. We get human stories, relationships, moral dilemmas, workplace issues, even some comedy for the well-rounded viewer - but then, every so often, we do indeed get a story based on the exercise of political power, how it's wielded, who wins and who loses. What can make these stories even more interesting is the fact that our heroes don't always come out on top, despite their seemingly unbeatable smarts and cleverness. Sometimes that's due to events spinning out of control (The State Dinner is a good example. or this season's The Lame Duck Congress), but it can be more interesting when it's due to overreach, hubris, or pure miscalculation (as in Five Votes Down, or here).

Toby (and the administration) get outfoxed by some even-more-clever adversaries in Congress, with the long game of the next Presidential campaign coming into play. While in some ways it's a sort of callback to the image of the Bartlet administration's listless struggles in Season 1 leading up to Let Bartlet Be Bartlet (whether or not that powerlessness was actually earned, as I have pointed out), it's really intriguing to see these smart, calculating political minds get outplayed by the opposition.

The White House is setting up a breakfast meeting for the top folks from the Democratic administration and the Republican-led Congress to kick off the new year. On its face it's an opportunity for the two sides to work together and find common ground, but in reality it's simply a public relations show from which no one expects any real progress:

CJ: "It's a breakfast to trumpet a new spirit of bipartisanship cooperation and understanding in a new year, no one's going to be listening to each other anyway."

The entire buildup to the breakfast is about seating arrangements, which topics are off the table for discussion, and the amount of time given to the topics that are agreed upon to be talked about. In fact, CJ meets with congressional staff members a couple of days before the event even takes place to hammer out the wording of the post-breakfast press briefings.

And this is where the outmaneuvering begins. Ann Stark, chief of staff for the Senate Majority Leader, asks for the congressional briefing to be held at the Capitol instead of outside the White House. CJ flatly refuses, sticking with the traditional plan of congresspeople talking to the press outside the building where the meeting took place while she does her briefing in her own press room. Stark goes over CJ's head, directly to Toby. Those two have some kind of past political relationship (Toby later says to Ann, "Ten years ago we used to be able to sit down, we'd order a couple of bourbons, we'd talk about health care, we'd talk about the minimum wage."), and Toby has reasons of his own for going off the reservation: he's frustrated over the fact that nothing of any real relevance or meaning is going to happen as a result of this breakfast. He sees the meeting as an opportunity to make progress in areas where the administration wants to move the needle.

Toby demands some time be used to discuss the patients' bill of rights, and also throws out the threat that if a minimum-wage-hike bill is bottled up by Republicans, the Democrats will simply offer it as an amendment on every bill up for a vote. Stark agrees to the health care discussion, in exchange for moving the entire press briefing (yes, CJ, too) away from the White House to the Capitol. Toby sees this as a good trade and orders CJ to make it happen. When the briefing comes around, though, Stark's boss is nowhere to be seen and the Republican congressmen open fire on the administration for strongarm tactics in threatening them over the minimum wage, claiming Bartlet sandbagged the entire bipartisan goals of the breakfast before it even was held.

Of course this was Stark's plan all along. She wanted to use Toby's words to her to paint the administration as a bully, then keep the Senate Majority Leader out of the fray so he could come in later to smooth the waters - in essence, staking his claim as a frontrunner for the Republican nomination in the presidential contest coming up in 2002:

Toby: "When are you going to announce?"

Stark: "Announce what?"

Toby: "That he's running for President."

Stark: "I'm pretty sure we just did."

It's a pure political storyline, one we get once in a while, and nicely crafted. I particularly enjoyed the scene of the press conference held outside the Capitol: CJ and Toby are watching TV intently in their offices, CJ thinking out loud to Carol why the Senate Majority Leader is begging out with a "sore throat;" she puts it all together and realizes it's a trap just before the trap is sprung with Toby's quote; then CJ and Toby on the phone with Toby struggling to figure out a response. Add in some great dramatic underscoring music by Snuffy Walden and it's a gripping little scene.

Meanwhile, a lightweight comedic running subplot involves growing complications as staffers try to apologize to New York Times columnist Karen Cahill, who is apparently powerful enough and intimidating enough that Leo feels it necessary to make up for saying something uncomplimentary about her shoes. Not so necessary that he does it himself, though; he wants to send Josh, but Josh delegates the task to Sam, which may or may not be a good plan:

Sam: "I don't do well with Karen."

Donna: "In what way?"

Sam: "I get nervous."

Donna: "What happens?"

Sam: "I become unimpressive."

Donna: "In what way?"

Sam: "In many ways."

Donna: "You don't fall down, do you?"

Sam: "Once."

Sam does not fall down in his dinner meeting with Cahill, but when he's later reflecting on his triumphant apology for Leo, he realizes he may have mixed up Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan when talking about nuclear weapons:

Sam: "Kazakhstan is a country four times the size of Texas and has a sizable number of nuclear missile silos ... Kyrgyzstan is on the side of a hill near China and has mostly nomads and sheep."

So now Donna is told to go to an art exhibit where Cahill will be in attendance, so she can correct Sam's misstatement on former Soviet republics. Donna pulls it off with aplomb and great success ... until a package arrives addressed to Josh that contains her underwear, which apparently fell out of her pants and onto the floor in front of Cahill. The look on Donna's face as Josh holds her underwear aloft is, well ... just look:

Karen Cahill 3, White House staff 0.

There's also a small plotline about Sam wanting to move the press out of the White House and across the street to the Old Executive Office Building. Unbeknownst to CJ, who thinks it's a terrible idea, he and Josh add a question about the topic to the monthly DNC telephone poll - and when a member of the White House press pool actually is one of the people called as part of the poll, CJ brings her wrath down upon those two guys:

CJ: "Fred and Ethel, would you follow me please?"

Josh (to Sam): "She's talking about us."  

I think Aaron Sorkin was pretty smart to have these two small, unimportant, comedic storylines included with the main story of Toby and the White House getting punked by a Senate staffer, showing she's every bit as smart and clever and capable as our West Wing regulars. What we're left with is the sinking realization that despite the lofty goals and proposals that might be driving the administration, the political game never ends. There's always someone jockeying for power and position, sometimes they're better than you, and you have to bring your A game and stay on your toes every day. Otherwise you'll be left playing catch up and burning more political capital and energy just to stay even.

What we're also left with, though, is the committed staff dedicated to getting things done and improving the country in the ways they think best, and if that means convincing President Bartlet to get his reelection bid underway two years ahead of the election, that's what they need to do. The final discussion between Leo and Toby actually kicks off a story arc that will lead us into Season 3:

Leo (to Toby): "Shake my hand. (They do.) We just formed it."

Toby: "Formed what?"

Leo: "The Committee to Re-elect the President." 

Tales Of Interest!

- The cold open is like a mini-play all by itself. We have Josh and Sam, bundled against the cold (with the White House heat malfunctioning), trying to start a fire in the Mural Room fireplace; CJ, Ed, and Larry (also wrapped in coats) trying to work out the complicated seating arrangements for the breakfast, and a stocking-capped Donna shuttling back and forth between the two groups. It's tightly written, with some good comic dialogue between Sam and Josh (the discussion of spruce versus hardwood and drying out the wet wood in the fire is a hoot), and it all leads up perfectly to Charlie's final line:

Charlie: "Mr. President, you know how you told me not to wake you up unless the building was on fire?"

Speaking of that fire-building scene, take a look at this image from Six Meetings Before Lunch, which aired nine months before this episode:

That shows a fire merrily burning in the Mural Room fireplace, which appears to be the exact same fireplace Sam and Josh are working on here:

So it doesn't seem possible, as the plaque says, that this fireplace has been welded shut since 1896. In addition, the entire interior of the White House was completely rebuilt during the Truman administration between 1949 and 1952. Here's what it looked like in 1950:

No fireplace welding from 1896 is going to survive that kind of reconstruction. (The Truman Balcony, which President Bartlet mentions in the episode, was added to the White House in 1948, just prior to this complete interior renovation.)

- It's both interesting and sad that the topics the Democrats and Republicans were fighting over in 2001 continue to be the same issues we can't find agreement on almost 20 years later: health care, the minimum wage, tax cuts. Also, the fact that the major sticking points are what words are used to describe proposals (patients' bill of rights vs. Comprehensive Access and Responsibility Act; tax cuts vs. tax relief or 'income enhancement') or the difference between a two-year or three-year phase-in of a minimum wage hike ... so much energy is expended for so little actual progress. I guess that's government in a nutshell.

- Tying in reality and The West Wing timeline: Congressman Shallick says the 107th Congress hasn't yet begun its session; the real 107th Congress actually convened January 3, 2001, or just a week before this episode aired.

- It's pretty hard to make out what's in Gail's fishbowl this time. Other websites say it's a fire engine, a nod towards the antics of Josh and Sam in the Mural Room. I guess I'll buy that; I can't really tell for certain.

- There are a couple of neat script callbacks that you may not catch unless you're like me and dig waaay too deep into things. For one, (and this may be a bit of a stretch, but it fits) I mentioned the energy expended on the semantics of what each party wanted to call certain proposals, with the differences not so much in the actual plans but just in the terms used to describe them. There's kind of a preview of this in the fire-building scene:

Josh (setting logs in the fireplace): "You want to stand them in a tripod, right?"

Sam: "Yeah, standing three sticks on an end and slanting them to a common center."

Josh: "Isn't that a tripod?"

Sam: "Yeah, but ..."

Josh: "You just thought you'd say more words." 

Sam: "Yeah."

The other script callback is clear as a bell. When Toby makes his threat to Stark about adding the minimum wage hike to "everything that moves," she replies with "Say that again?" At the press conference, when the reporter quotes Toby's words in the question to Congressman Thomas, the congressman responds with "Could you say that again, please?" While in neither case does Toby or the reporter actually "say it again," the repeated rhetorical device used by Sorkin is kind of neat.

- This is Scott Winant's first shot at directing the series, but he shows he's paid attention. He makes great use of all the windows on the set, with this clever shot in CJ's office (we see Carol out at her desk through the window, with CJ reflected in the other set of windows with the blinds closed):

- John Spencer was nominated for an Outstanding Supporting Actor Emmy for this episode (along with In The Shadow of Two Gunmen Part I). Richard Schiff was also nominated for the same award for this episode and the upcoming 17 People. Bradley Whitford ended up winning that Emmy for this season; Schiff had won the Supporting Actor Emmy the previous year. (Spencer will get his, not to worry.)


Quotes    

Donna: "To move Jankowicz, we've got to move either the House or Senate whip."

Josh and Sam (together): "House."

Donna: "Why?"

Sam: "Cause life is tough in the big cruel world, and if he doesn't like it, he can kiss me."

Donna: "So, the spirit of bipartisanship begins." 

-----

Josh: "And what stupid-ass Irish thing did you say to Karen Cahill that you now need me to apologize for at Ben and Sally's like a little girl?"

(Leo stares at Josh)

Josh (sheepishly): "Let me tell you what was surprising about that moment just then." 

-----

Ann: "I think you're going to have to start getting next to the idea that your party isn't in the majority." 

Toby: "My party's in the White House."

Ann: "A building to which the Constitution does not endow sovereign power."

-----

President: "Donna wants me to call Karen Cahill and make it clear she wasn't hitting on her when she gave her her underwear."

Leo: "Yeah, that's cause I made fun of her shoes and then Sam said there were nuclear weapons in Kyrgyzstan and Donna went to clear up the mix up and accidentally left her underwear."

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

• We get to see Ed and Larry, together again!

• Ann Stark is played by Felicity Huffman, who had previously worked with Sorkin on Sports Night. Her big fame with a role on Desperate Housewives was yet to come.

• Congressman Henry Shallick of Missouri is played by Corbin Bernsen (L.A. Law, Major League, Psych). A recognizable star at this point, his appearance only via the in-world TV screen would seem to imply Shallick as an important recurring character; however, he will appear on only one more episode. (Also, note the CND logo on the screen to the left; that's the cable news network invented for The West Wing back in Season 1.)

• A quick callback to the events of Noël and Josh's talk with therapist Dr. Keyworth, as Leo asks if he is feeling all right ("I'm going to ask you once a day, okay?").

• We get a mention of both Toby's and Leo's ex-wives, and the rules about what they could and couldn't talk about.

• Ivan Allen is back as newscaster Roger Salier. We saw him first in A Proportional Response, as an anchor for CND; then he was a reporter for the fictional local Channel 5 in The White House Pro-Am; and back as an anchor for the real NBC Channel 4 in Washington in In The Shadow of Two Gunmen Part I. Is he now with MSNBC? Or is this still WRC-TV? There's definitely the NBC peacock logo on the screen; I just can't tell if that's supposed to read MSNBC under it.

• As I mentioned, with the Leo/Toby talk at the end of the episode, we kick off a long story arc with the re-election campaign of President Bartlet. I keep saying how Season 2 is one of the best seasons of television anywhere; long overarching storylines are one of the reasons, and here's the beginning of one.

• So what happened to Steve Onorato, the aide to the Senate Majority Leader that we saw dealing with White House staffers back in Let Bartlet Be Bartlet? Now Ann Stark is doing all the work for the Majority Leader ... she does tell Toby she "just got here," but when he says her predecessor wasn't good at playing the game, she says, "Maybe that's why they gave me her job." So she doesn't mean Steve ...

DC location shots    

• The press conference after the breakfast is held with the Capitol in the background (not even close to the Capitol steps, the location Stark was insisting upon, but definitely on location). This appears to be next to the Ulysses Grant monument, pretty close to the same area where Leo and Josh met in In The Shadow of Two Gunmen Part I, when Leo asked Josh to go to New Hampshire and check out Jed's early campaign.

They Do Exist! It's The Real Person, or Thing    

• Josh compares the chilly White House to the movie Ice Station Zebra.

• We have mentions of former Presidents Benjamin Harrison (and his log cabin made of spruce); Andrew Johnson (who sat by that fireplace in the Mural Room); Harry Truman's balcony; James Monroe and his doctrine; and John Adams (as well as non-president Alexander Hamilton and their mutual dislike for political parties).

• President Bartlet says he won't have to be Officer Krupke if the breakfast finishes up and everybody leaves. Krupke is a character in the musical and movie West Side Story.

• Leo asks Josh to go to dinner at "Ben and Sally's" in order to clear up his comment about Karen Cahill's shoes. While not expressly named as such, this is an obvious reference to former Washington Post executive editor Ben Bradlee and his wife, Sally Quinn. At the time of this episode, Bradlee was retired as the Post's editor but served as the newspaper's vice president at large.

• There was a London-based military and logistics consulting firm called Global Strategies Group at the time of this episode. I'm pretty sure that's not the polling group employed by the DNC.

• We see the congressional press conference carried on C-SPAN. There's also a clear NBC peacock logo on the screen where Ann Stark is watching the news when Toby comes to see her - it might even be an MSNBC logo, it's hard to tell.

• CJ calls Sam and Josh "Fred and Ethel," a reference to the Fred and Ethel Mertz, neighbors of the Ricardos on the I Love Lucy television show.

• Product placement: Ann Stark has a Dean & DeLuca bag when she brings out the Vermont maple syrup can for Toby.

End credits freeze frame: Leo and Toby in the final scene in the Oval Office, establishing the Committee to Re-elect the President.

Noël - TWW S2E10

Original airdate: December 20, 2000

Teleplay by: Aaron Sorkin (31)
Story by: Peter Parnell (3)

Directed by: Thomas Schlamme (7)

Synopsis

• Music and lights fill the White House as Christmas approaches, but Josh's erratic behavior spurs Leo to bring in a therapist to talk with him. CJ tracks down a woman who was upset by a painting during a White House tour.

"Josh ... how did you cut your hand?"

"Long as I got a job, you got a job, you understand?"

Over the first 30 or so episodes of The West Wing, we've seen Josh Lyman become one of the most well-developed, richly detailed characters on the show. By that I don't mean Bradley Whitford's performance necessarily stands out above the others - this is an all-star team effort, with high-quality powerhouse actors like Martin Sheen, Allison Janney, Richard Schiff, John Spencer, Rob Lowe, Janel Moloney - but we've gotten to know Josh pretty well. From his near-firing over popping off at Mary Marsh (Pilot), to his long-term survivor's guilt over his sister's death and his emotional commitment to his friends and co-workers (The Crackpots and These Women), to his family's history of surviving the Holocaust and his understanding of making things right for historical wrongs (Six Meetings Before Lunch), to his complicated (and sometimes problematic) relationships with Joey Lucas and Donna, we've really dug deep into Josh's backstory. And I haven't even gotten to the way he jumped full-steam-ahead onto Jed Bartlet's campaign, or the fact he literally took a bullet while in service to the President (In The Shadow of Two Gunmen) ... which directly leads us here.

We open with a wary and almost hostile Josh, with a bandaged hand, sitting down with a therapist from the American Trauma Victims Association. Something has gone seriously wrong in the workplace with Josh, and his friends have called on Dr. Stanley Keyworth to try to get to the bottom of the problem. That kicks off a tremendous episode, another standout Christmas edition (which is getting to be a tradition), with Thomas Schlamme doing incredibly great work of directing Aaron Sorkin's finely crafted script.

We weave in and out between the present (the Christmas Eve meeting of Josh and Dr. Keyworth) and the events of the past three weeks. Josh has grown increasingly irritable and snappish, with the smallest of things setting him off. An Air Force pilot flies away from formation in his F16, eventually committing suicide by flying into a mountain, and Josh fixates on the fact he and the pilot were born on the same day. The increasing holiday cheer of decorations and music throw him deeper into a funk (although let's be honest, having bagpipers play right outside your office all day long would be enough to drive anyone crazy). The nearly final straw comes in a routine Oval Office meeting about strategies to deal with a minor issue about releasing oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, when Josh snaps and raises his voice to the President:

Josh: "You need to listen to me. You have to listen to me. I can't help you, unless you listen to me!"

What an incredible moment, with the President eyeing Josh and Leo, wanting to help but not knowing how, and Leo and Sam realizing something has broken inside Josh:

Josh (to Leo): "If this is because of what I just said in there, I wasn't at my best with ..."

Leo: "Josh, I'm not sure you were fully conscious while you were saying it."

In a tremendously intricate piece of storytelling, we discover it's music that's been triggering Josh. Once again our view flips back and forth between Josh and Dr. Keyworth, and Josh's attendance at a Yo-Yo Ma cello performance at the White House. Whitford is outstanding here, with his rising panic and fear as he relives the shooting along with the music:

and then his memory of being home after the concert with his interior pain and frustration causing him to shatter his window - and thus the bandaged hand:

Dr. Keyworth diagnoses Josh with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, stemming from his shooting and recovery. While obviously this (or any television episode) can only touch on the basics of such a complex subject, I think Stanley's description here is a pretty good summation of what PTSD does to its sufferers:

Stanley: "What we need to do is get you to remember the shooting without reliving it. You have been reliving it."

The music, from the brass quintet to the bagpipes to the woodwinds, has kicked off a flashback in Josh's brain to sirens, the sirens from the Rosslyn shooting - and that's caused him to relive the trauma and pain and fear and stress over and over again. Once he gets to this point, and admits to Dr. Keyworth that he cut his hand smashing the window instead of breaking a whiskey glass, things do wrap up a bit too tidily.

Stanley: "I'm going to recommend a therapist you'll like."

Josh: "I like you!"

Stanley: "You're too easy a case for me."

Josh: "I broke a window!"

Stanley: "Yeah. Stop doing that. I want to commend you on not hurting anybody else and not hurting yourself too badly, but nevertheless, stop doing that."

Josh: "And ... that'll do the trick?"

Stanley: "Yup."

Josh: "I .. I'm getting shortchanged here." 

But, this is television and not life, and I'll give them the quick "solution" of the episode as illustrating a true breakthrough in Josh's mind, as well as getting us to the finale and Christmas itself. This all wraps up with a touching moment between Leo and Josh. Leo, as we know, has had to deal with demons of his own in his past. He was the one who brought Josh and Dr. Keyworth together, and he's been waiting in the lobby on into the evening to see how things went. Why is he there? Why is it important to him?

Leo: "This guy's walking down a street when he falls in a hole. The walls are so steep, he can't get out. A doctor passes by, and the guy shouts up, 'Hey you! Can you help me out?'  The doctor writes him a prescription, throws it down the hole and moves on. Then a priest comes along and the guy shouts up, 'Father, I'm down in this hole, can you help me out?' The priest writes out a prayer, throws it down in the hole and moves on. Then a friend walks by. 'Hey, Joe, it's me. Can you help me out?' And the friend jumps in the hole. Our guy says, 'Are you stupid? Now we're both down here.' And the friend says, 'Yeah, but I've been down here before, and I know the way out.'" 

Leo has been there before. He has a notion of what Josh is going through, and he knows how to help him get to the other side. And, also:

Leo: "Long as I got a job, you got a job, understand?"

Connections and friendships like this just make The West Wing so much sweeter and richer than run-of-the-mill television.

I can't stress enough the outstanding work by Schlamme in directing this episode. There's so many great emotional transitions between the past and the present, with one of the most creative being a panning shot between Josh talking to Leo about the fighter pilot:

 

But as the camera pans behind Leo's head, the head becomes Stanley's, and we see Josh describing the same scene to him:

 

Just one example of that moving directing job by Schlamme. The DVD commentary reveals that the room where Josh, Stanley, and Kaytha meet was built expressly for this episode, so that there'd be a room with plenty of windows to help make the passage of time become another character in the scenes. Schlamme also talks about using different lenses to shoot Stanley and Josh, to give the viewer a different emotional feeling about each one (without really consciously knowing why), until the timelines come together and the breakthrough happens, and they are then shot with the same lens.

There is one other storyline in this episode (many West Wing episodes have B, C, even D or E storylines, but given the high stakes of Josh's A storyline here one more is all we can handle). CJ is trying to get to the bottom of a media story about a White House tour visitor making a disturbance. Eventually we find out a painting hanging outside the Blue Room, a gift from France to President Bartlet, actually was taken from a French Jew by the Nazis during World War II. The painting gradually made its way to the Musee D'Orsay, where it was then loaned to the National Gallery where President Bartlet saw it. The woman causing the disturbance on the tour was the daughter of the original owner, and became upset and surprised to see that painting hanging in the White House. CJ gets all the facts together (along with the aid of Bernard Thatch, a wonderful character played by Paxton Whitehead), and arrangements are made to transfer the painting back to the woman. We never actually see the painting, which is a clever subterfuge (since the painter and the painting don't actually exist, although there is a somewhat sideways reference to a work by Gustave Courbet).

But the real star is Josh Lyman and his journey through the ongoing effects of his shooting earlier in the year, told expertly and movingly by Sorkin and Schlamme. Bradley Whitford earned an Outstanding Supporting Actor Emmy for this episode (along with In The Shadow of Two Gunmen, Part II), and it's well-earned. It's truly another touching holiday classic in The West Wing pantheon.

Tales Of Interest!

- As Toby touts the music groups playing in the West Wing lobby he says he's been accused of not being in the proper spirit "the last two Christmases in this White House." Trouble is, this would be only the second Christmas for the Bartlet administration, as the election would have been November 1998 with Bartlet taking office in January 1999, hence Christmas 1999 (which we saw in In Excelsis Deo) and now Christmas 2000. It's possible, I suppose, Toby might have been around the White House during the transition in 1998, so maybe you could stretch that into "the last two Christmases." (By the way, the music groups we hear or are referred to include the brass quintet, the Duncan MacTavish Killarney Highland Bagpipe Regiment, the Capitol Bluegrass Banjo Brigade, and a clarinet trio.)

- Let's talk Christmas! I mentioned in last year's holiday episode how memorable TV episodes set during holidays can be, and I also remarked how all-out the set designers of this show go for the decorations. Just take a look at this:

The lobby area of the West Wing, covered in white lights:

Garlands and lights wrapped around every available column:

A technician in the briefing room with a Santa hat:

Colored lights, here outside Josh's office and also in the Communications bullpen:

Wreaths on the windows!:

This little scene, with the President talking to some advisers about the search for the Air Force plane, wasn't even written to take place in this room, but when Schlamme saw the tree, he decided to shoot it here and get a good look at this tree (it's only seen in the background down the hallways in the rest of the episode):

And check out the gingerbread White House:

- I've mentioned a couple of times since What Kind Of Day Has It Been that the Situation Room featured portraits of real-life Presidents like Clinton, Nixon, and Bush I - which made things a bit problematic, since some or all of those Presidents may not have actually existed in The West Wing universe. Here they've taken those portraits down and replaced them with less-recognizable photographs.

- Jed has reorganized things on his Oval Office desk. In past episodes, even as recently as the last one, we've seen his glass globe collection on the left side of the desk with a lamp on the right:

Here, the glass globes and the lamp have switched places:

- In what's starting to become a tradition for Sorkin-era West Wing Christmas episodes, Bradley Whitford won the Supporting Actor Emmy in part for his performance here (along with In The Shadow Of Two Gunmen Part II). Richard Schiff won the same award (in part for In Excelsis Deo) the season before.



Quotes    

Toby: "Let me tell you something, the last two Christmases in this White House I've been accused of not being in the proper spirit. I was called names. Not this year! For the next three weeks I will be filling this lobby with music in the mornings and evenings so that we may experience this season of -"

(Turning to brass quintet with annoyance)

"Would you people stop playing for one damn minute!"

(They stop)

"This season of peace and joy."

-----

Donna: "I have the personnel file for the pilot."

Josh: "How did you know I was going to ask you for that?"

Donna: "I'm tuned to you."

Josh: "Seriously."

Donna: "I anticipate your every need."

Josh: "Yeah, but to be walking by with the guy's personnel file?"

Donna: "They called me ten minutes ago, Josh, don't be a yutz." 

(Once again it's great to hear Wisconsin's own Donnatella Moss appropriating Yiddish when she's talking to Josh.)

-----

Bernard: "The President, on a visit to the gallery, and possessing even less taste in fine art than you have in accessories, announced that he liked the painting. The French government offered it as a gift to the White House, I suppose in retribution for Euro Disney. So here it hangs, like a sock on a shower rod."

CJ: "You're a snob."

Bernard: "Yes." 

-----

President: "Who are the other million?"

Charlie: "You send a Christmas card to everyone who writes a letter to the White House."

President: "I do?"

Charlie: "Yes, sir. And somewhere around a million people wrote you letters this year."

President: "Okay, but some of those were death threats."

Charlie: "They've weeded those out." 

-----

Josh: "They're pretty loud."

Toby: "The bagpipes?"

Josh: "Yeah."

Toby: "That's because the shepherds would need to call in the goats from high atop the hills -"

Josh: "Shepherds herd sheep, they don't do it in Delaware, and these guys can't play in the lobby!"

-----

President: "You look good, Charlie."

Charlie: "I didn't know people dressed like this any more, sir."

President: "I've brought it back."

Charlie: "Yes, sir."

President: "Like Woodrow Wilson and top hats."

Charlie: "We're not going to wear top hats with this, are we, sir?"

-----

CJ: "You see, you try very hard to be mean, but then you see that being nice is better."

Bernard: "You're a freakishly tall woman."

CJ: "So, that moment's over?"

Bernard: "Yes."

----- 

Josh: "You said you diagnosed me in five minutes. What was the diagnosis?"

Stanley: "You have Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder."

Josh: "Well, that doesn't really sound like something they let you have if you work for the President. Can we have it be something else?"

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

• The American Trauma Victims Association (ATVA) seems to be a fictional group. As a federal employee, Josh would actually be able to take advantage of the Employee Assistance Program, which contracts with professionals around the country to provide emotional, psychological, financial and other support to government employees free of charge. It's not very likely this sort of thing would happen in the workplace, however.

• Adam Arkin (Chicago Hope, Northern Exposure) appears as Dr. Stanley Keyworth. He's actually going to return to the White House in about a year or so ... but it won't be to talk to Josh.

• There are obvious flashbacks to the Rosslyn shooting from What Kind Of Day Has It Been. Also, the connection Josh makes between music and traumatic events in his life was earlier discussed in The Crackpots and These Women, with the link between Ave Maria and the tragic death of his sister in a house fire. Interestingly, it was established in that episode that Josh was seeing a psychiatrist - why has he not been following up with that guy since the shooting? And how weird is it that that doctor's name is also Stanley? 

• In the DVD commentary Sorkin mentions the script originally contained another storyline for Sam, but it had to be cut because there was no room for it. Rob Lowe was not happy about that, asking Sorkin if there was even a reason for him to be there at all. The scene between Josh and Sam about the Energy Department spokesperson talking out of turn about the Strategic Petroleum Reserve was filmed right after Lowe was told, and the personal emotion of losing a storyline in the episode actually plays right into his acting in the scene. Why is this in story threads? Well, the original concept of The West Wing was going to be focused on the staffers, with only occasional appearances by the President himself, and Lowe signed on with the belief he'd be the main focus (hence his being first in the listing of actors in the opening credits). The powerhouse performances by a tremendous group of actors, coupled with some fine character-building by Sorkin and the huge presence of Martin Sheen, changed that dynamic rather quickly, so - SPOILER ALERT - I'm sure some of Lowe's plotlines being written out was a part of the chain that eventually led to his leaving the series in Season 4.

• The Air Force officer played by Daniel von Bargen is back. Although Leo called him "Jack" when we first saw him back in In The Shadow Of Two Gunmen Part I, here he's called "Ken." Hmmm.

• While we do get to see (and hear) him this time, Yo-Yo Ma was mentioned before (performing for the President of Indonesia in The State Dinner.) Seeing as that was barely over a year ago, we can surmise Yo-Yo Ma must be a favorite of President Bartlet's, as he obviously is with Donna ("Yo-Yo Ma rules!").

• The recognizable character actor with the plummy accent and the haughty demeanor, Paxton Whitehead, appears here as part of the White House Visitors' Office. He'll be seen again, but not until Season 6.

• We heard President Bartlet referring to "Cashman and Berryhill" as working out something regarding the Syrian military crisis back in A Proportional Response, with the implication they had something to do with the State Department. He mentions the pair again here in dealing with the missing fighter pilot.

DC location shots    

• The final scene, with Josh and Donna leaving the White House, actually had the actors start inside the White House gate along Pennsylvania Avenue, which is a pretty big deal the producers were able to make with the Clinton administration. The scene continues outside the White House fence with the bell choir. In the DVD commentary for this scene Sorkin mentions it being shot overnight on November 18, 2000, at the very same time as the birth of his daughter.

They Do Exist! It's The Real Person, or Thing    

• The photo of the F-16 pilot in the Situation Room has real-life military bases listed in Texas (Laughlin Air Force Base), New Mexico (Cannon Air Force Base) and Germany (although the air base is misspelled in the graphic; it's actually Spangdahlem, not "Spangdahelm.").

• CJ refers to former First Lady Dolley Madison's portrait when talking to the press about the tour disturbance.

• Obviously the real-life cellist Yo-Yo Ma appears and performs. Donna also mentions the cellists Pablo Casals and Rostropovich.

• The story of the painting that is eventually given back to the Holocaust survivor is a mix of reality and fiction. There is no painter named "Gustave Cailloux." Courbet, whom Bernard says was a contemporary of Cailloux's, is indeed real (and actually named Gustave as well). Courbet painted The Etretat Cliffs after the Storm - which is probably where the writers got the name for the (never shown) Cailloux painting, The Cliffs of Etretat, and is indeed at the Musee d'Orsay in France.

• President Bartlet recalls Woodrow Wilson as a man of fashion and style. And top hats.

• And Johann Sebastian Bach exists here, with Yo-Yo Ma playing his Suite No. 1 in G Major.

End credits freeze frame: The final crane shot of the bell choir performing on Pennsylvania Avenue outside the White House. As you can see, prior to 9/11 people could get much closer to the White House fence than is now possible (and if you remember the beginning of The Crackpots and These Women, they were able to film a scene of a basketball game right here on the street).

Galileo - TWW S2E9

Original airdate: November 29, 2000

Written by: Kevin Falls (2) and Aaron Sorkin (30)

Directed by: Alex Graves (3)

Synopsis

• Crises abound as a fire breaks out in a Russian missile silo, trouble with a NASA probe headed to Mars could scuttle a live White House TV broadcast, the Icelandic ambassador is upset at being snubbed, a proposed stamp might energize the Puerto Rican statehood movement, and the President's dislike of green beans threatens to anger Oregon farmers. Plus, an embarrassed Sam has to face Mallory, and CJ talks about her sex life.

*You said it right that time."

Exploration versus safety; risk versus reward; taking the leap versus playing it safe. It's not a stretch to say that sums up a lot of this episode of The West Wing (well, and the series as a whole, to be honest - but the plots line right up here in another neat, tidy Season 2 package).

The Galileo V Mars probe, of course, is the obvious example of exploration and discovery, even in the face of huge obstacles. We also get to see that Jed is a pretty big nerd - we noticed earlier that Sam has a thing for NASA and space exploration, thanks to his computer screen savers, but here we find out the President is just as excited about the topic. He can quote facts and figures about Mars right off the top of his head while criticizing CJ for not saying "Galileo Five" with the proper energy and reverence, exasperating her to no end:

CJ: "Nobody likes a know-it-all."

President: "Yes, God forbid that while talking to 60,000 public school students, the President should appear smart."

CJ: "That's fine. Just don't show off."

President: "I don't show off."

(Later, after CJ corrects him on the temperature ranges on Mars)

President: "I converted it to Celsius in my head." 

Plus, we get the Sam/Jed doubleteam on NASA Public Affairs flack Scott Tate, who writes some of the stiffest and most redundant copy in the entire universe:

Yes, that's "very unique" and "extremely historic" right there on the teleprompter (CJ: "While we're at it, do we have to use the word 'live' twice in the first two sentences like we just cracked the technology?"). Of course, we've known all along that Sam, at least, is a top-rate word nerd in addition to the sciencey-nerdishness we're coming to love from him and the President.

(Although wordsmith Sam, in correcting Tate's cludgy copy, comes up with "You, me, and 60,000 of your fellow students ... are going to be the first to see what it sees" when that obviously should be "You, I, and 60,000 of your fellow students ...")

Anyway, the nerdish excitement of the President over the Mars mission and the upcoming live television discussion with schoolchildren spreads throughout the White House - and that builds us up to a crash of emotions when NASA loses contact with the probe before it lands. President Bartlet, who had been looking for a broader theme for the TV discussion in the first place, considers scrapping it altogether until CJ convinces him there's a golden opportunity (and that broader theme!) in going ahead with the telecast even if the mission was unsuccessful:

CJ: "We have, at our disposal, a captive audience of schoolchildren. Some of them don't go to the blackboard and raise their hand cause they think they're going to be wrong. I think you should say to those kids, you think you get it wrong sometimes, you should come down here and see how the big boys do it ... Some of them will laugh, and most of them won't care, but for some, they might honestly see that it's about going to the blackboard and raising your hand."

Nerds to the rescue!

On the foreign affairs front, intelligence reports show a fire has broken out in a Russian intercontinental ballistic missile silo. The Russian government claims it's an oil refinery, but they can't escape American spy satellite photographs (by the way, are those something Leo would actually show the Russian ambassador? For national security capability purposes?). President Bartlet wonders why the Russians won't ask for help, but when intelligence reaches him that the fire was started by deserting soldiers draining the fuel in order to sell the warhead on the black market, he's angered at the loose safety procedures in place for Russian nuclear weapons ("You guys fall asleep at the switch in Minsk, and I've got a whole hemisphere hiding under the bed."). He uses the threat of exposing the laxity of Russian control of their nuclear warheads as leverage to get NATO inspectors into the country, but he continues to question why the Russian government is holding fast in refusing all offers of help:

President: "I really don't know from where you guys get the nerve."

Ambassador: "From a long, hard winter, Mr. President." 

The President also has to deal with self-inflicted problems with Iceland. He earlier blew off a meeting with the Icelandic ambassador, which Leo points out could hurt efforts to keep the Atlantic nation from defying the international ban on whale hunting. What's the fix? Why, the Reykjavik Symphony Orchestra happens to be performing at the Kennedy Center this very evening, and if the President attends along with the Icelandic delegation, the offense will be forgiven and the whales can continue to swim in peace - even if it dashes Jed's evening plans of reading up on Mars. At least it means Jed can force CJ and Sam to come along as well, as he wants them to work on that broader theme for the Mars telecast.

And that brings us to a Mallory callback. Mallory, Leo's daughter, first met Sam back in Pilot when he hilariously spilled to her the story of how he discovered he'd spent the previous night with a call girl. They seemed to be developing kind of a thing; she invited herself along to a Georgetown bar as part of a group with Sam, Josh, Charlie, Zoey, and CJ (Mr. Willis of Ohio), they almost went on a date to the opera before Sam got deeply involved in writing a birthday message (Enemies), she kissed him after finding out he wrote a passionate defense of her father (He Shall, From Time To Time ...), and then she fiercely debated Sam's position paper on school vouchers before discovering he only wrote it as opposition research and they were actually on the same side all along (Six Meetings Before Lunch). After that she pretty much disappeared, until now. Sam is stricken when he finds out she'll also be at the symphony, since after the "scandal" broke of photographs of him with call girl Laurie (Lies, Damn Lies and Statistics) he never called or spoke to Mallory. Of course she's miffed (although she's now dating a hockey player and they're "having lots of sex"), but that magic Sam nerdiness comes to the rescue again. Much like the his writing in defense of her father or his true opinions on school vouchers, his lofty defense of space exploration as the very essence of what makes us humankind softened her attitude tremendously. She's not leaving the hockey player, though, but at least she's not quite as mad at Sam.

CJ has her own problems with the symphony trip. She recently interviewed several public affairs applicants to fill the post of deputy press secretary, which included a number of State Department staffers, and most of them are going to be at the Kennedy Center as well. She encounters Tad Whitney, one of the interviewees whom she turned down for the job, and we find out the two had a relationship about five years ago. Whitney threatens to spread a story that CJ turned him down for the job because he broke up with her (which wasn't because, he assures her, that she was bad in bed - "I'm great in bed," the self-assured CJ loudly responds). She's having none of it, and not even a stray tree branch can fluster her as she brushes off Whitney's threat like so much dust.

Meanwhile, the citizen commission tasked with determining the subjects of upcoming postage stamps has recommended Marcus Aquino, a Korean War hero and former Puerto Rico resident commissioner. Trouble is, he was also one of the strongest advocates of statehood for Puerto Rico, and Leo, Josh, and Toby are concerned that putting Aquino on a stamp might imply the administration is in favor of statehood - which is somewhere they really don't want to go at the moment. Donna and Josh hash out the subject over the course of the episode (a couple of points; Aquino is a fictional character, created for this story, and the White House actually has no control or say in what goes on postage stamps, that's all up to the Citizens' Stamp Advisory Committee).

And the green bean story - news has gotten out in the press that the President doesn't like green beans, and Toby and CJ are concerned because that could cause an electoral problem; Bartlet won Oregon by fewer than 10,000 votes in 1998, and with that state being a major producer of green beans, backlash by green bean farmers might cost them the state in the 2002 election. So CJ is working to spin that and curry favor with the farmers, perhaps a photo opportunity of the President enjoying a plate of green beans ...

But remember our theme? Risk over reward, going forward instead of playing defense? We've got that with all these storylines: The NASA telecast for the schoolchildren will go ahead even if the Galileo mission failed, because getting back up to try again after you fall is an important lesson, too; NATO inspectors are going into Russia over the government's objections, because having poorly paid and poorly led soldiers in charge of nuclear weapons endangers the entire world; the President will go ahead with sitting through an evening of "modern music" performed by the Reykjavik Symphony Orchestra, because protecting whales from hunting is an international good; Sam and CJ will face the fears of what they're going to encounter at the Kennedy Center, because their mission to advance the President's interests is more important. And in the final scene in the Oval Office, CJ covers both the postage stamp issue and GreenBeanGate with her usual aplomb and foresight:

CJ: "He doesn't enjoy them. He doesn't think they're bad for you, and he doesn't think the people who make them are evil. They're simply not his cup of tea. He doesn't care for them. Why don't we think the adults of Oregon will be okay with that if put to them just that way? And Josh, why do you think the people, adult Americans, why do you think they can't understand that we can honor a man's contribution without necessarily subscribing to his politics? They can understand a lot of things. People stopped trusting the government during Vietnam, and it was because government stopped trusting them."

So this episode actually owes a bit of a debt to Let Bartlet Be Bartlet, with the theme of making strong choices, going for the higher goals, and giving the people of the United States some credit for being rational adults who can hold more than one thought in their head at any one time. It's a solid, enjoyable entry in Season 2, with some really, really nice writing and fine direction by Alex Graves.


Tales Of Interest!

- Graves does a great job of directing this episode, with some shots we aren't that used to seeing in The West Wing. There's a wonderful shot with light and darkness at the end of Act I with Mrs. Landingham closing the Oval Office door as Jed talks with Charlie:

I love the long tracking shot (helping to show off the size of the new sets Warner Brothers has built) following Leo and CJ as they walk and talk through the set:

He does another similar long tracking shot with CJ on her phone outside the Kennedy Center. He also mixes things up with a tight closeup of President Bartlet in the Situation Room when he receives the note about losing contact with the Galileo:

The final shot as well, with Jed looking up at the sky saying "Talk to us," with the White House colonnades and the pool of light directly behind him looking like a moon or a planet or some other celestial object:

Just really great directing and photography.

-  Leo says the name of the Icelandic ambassador, Vigdis Olafsdottir, telling the President, "He's very excited to meet you." The patronymic name style of Iceland means the last name comes from the father, with -son as the suffix for boys and -dottir for girls. So Vigdis Olafsdottir means Vigdis, daughter of Olaf - and therefore would not be a "he."

- Gail's fishbowl appears to feature a space landing craft and rover on red gravel, signifying Mars (the Red Planet).

- This episode (along with In The Shadow of Two Gunmen, Part I) was submitted as part of Allison Janney's nomination for a Supporting Actress Emmy, which she won for the second year in a row. While she does some fine work in this episode ("I'm great in bed"), perhaps the Emmy voters were also swayed by this scene where she turns around with her face smacking into a tree branch:

Quotes    

Tate: "Look, I don't want to step on your toes, you don't want to step on mine. We're both writers."

Sam: "Yes, I suppose, if you broaden the definition to those who can spell." 

-----

Josh: "Oh, Leo, ask me how long a Martian day is."

Leo: "No, I don't think I will." 

-----

Leo (to Josh, who is smirking): "What are you smiling at?"

Josh: "Nothing, I just ... (chuckling) Toby got the stamp assignment."

Toby: "Leo, I might need some help."

Leo: "Take Josh." (exits)

Toby: "Thanks. (to Josh) Congratulations, you're choosing the next stamp." (exits)

Josh (to himself): "Wow, that happened fast." 

-----

Donna: "Do you want to do this or not?"

Josh: "I don't."

Donna: "I did index cards."

Josh: "How many?"

Donna: "Eighty-seven."

Josh: "Reduce it to three."

-----

CJ: "I just added a new deputy. Most of the people I interviewed were from State. The Kennedy Center is going to be packed to the Potomac with people I just rejected."

Leo: "So is the bar at the Four Seasons."

-----

Donna: "We have colonized Puerto Rico and they will rise up against us."

Josh: "I think we can take 'em."

Donna: "That's what we said about the British."

Josh (pause): "We took the British."

Donna: "You know what I'm saying."

Josh: "Hardly ever."

----- 

Josh: "We think if we hit the ground hard enough, we can make it to the center of the planet and find water?"

Toby: "Yeah."

Josh: "That's not a theory of physics pretty much disproved by Wile E. Coyote?"

-----

Whitney: "Believe me, it wasn't because you were bad in bed or anything like that."

CJ: "No, I didn't think it was, Tad."

Whitney: "I mentioned it because I know a lot of women who worry about that."

CJ: "I don't."

Whitney: "You're good in bed."

CJ: "I'm great in bed."

-----

Sam: "Yeah, she's here. She snuck up on me from behind. You'd think women would make more noise with their big high heels, but they don't. They got this stealth thing going, which I really ought to be clever enough - "

(Mallory appears in the window on the other side of the car. Sam turns and sees her.)

Sam: "Oh my god."

-----

President (to the Russian ambassador): "Your paranoia was a lot sexier back when you guys were Communists." 

-----

CJ: "Sir, that leaves us with the televised classroom, the green beans - "

Josh: "The stamp."

CJ: " - the stamp, and depending on who those people were that were standing near me, the possibility of a story about me being good in bed."

(Everyone looks oddly at CJ)

Toby: "Good in bed?"

CJ: "Yes."

Toby: "Why?"

CJ: "Because I am." 

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

• One of the briefers giving the President intelligence about the Russian missile silo fire is played by John Carroll Lynch, a familiar character actor perhaps best known as Marge Gunderson's husband in Fargo.

• Tad Whitney, CJ's former lover and current State Department spokesman snubbed by CJ for a post in the White House, is played by Colm Feore (Chicago, The Chronicles of Riddick, 24, House of Cards).

• Back in my discussion of In The Shadow Of Two Gunmen, Part II you may remember I mentioned how Warner Brothers had built a new West Wing set between seasons 1 and 2, with some things being different (like Sam's office suddenly having windows). Well, Toby's office changed, too. Here's what it looked like next to his door in Season 1:

And here's what it looks like now (he has suddenly gained a window between his office and Sam's):

The producers are rightfully proud of their new set layout, and they really show off more of it in this episode. For instance, while we saw the White House mess (cafeteria) in The Portland Trip (along with a fabulous new Air Force One set), here we get to see Leo, Toby, and Josh walk from the mess, up several flights of stairs, and into a West Wing hallway:

It also appears to me that the relationship of where offices are located (particularly CJ's and Josh's) and the general flow of hallways around the area has changed since Season 1, but I'm not going to try to figure out the floorplans.

• It's worth mentioning the entire "Previously on" segment calls back to the Season 1 storylines of Sam's relationship with Laurie, the photos of them embracing after her law school graduation (Lies, Damn Lies and Statistics), and Mallory's flirtations with Sam. Because that all comes back with Mallory also attending the symphony at the Kennedy Center and running into Sam (maybe with her dad's tickets? Remember how in Enemies she wanted to use Leo's tickets to take Sam to see the Chinese opera at, yep, the Kennedy Center?).

• In What Kind Of Day Has It Been we saw what appeared to be Presidential portraits in the Situation Room, of what seems to be real-life Presidents like Richard Nixon and George H.W. Bush (check that blog post to see what I had to say about how that doesn't fit the in-universe line of Presidents leading up to Bartlet). Well, guess what? Here we get a clear view of one of those portraits, and damned if that isn't Bill Clinton right there:

Clinton was actually the real-life President at the time this episode aired (with George W. Bush about to take office less than two months later), and it's difficult to fit him into being President in The West Wing universe. We know (from The Short List) there was a Republican administration between the 1994 election and Bartlet's election in 1998; could Clinton have been elected President in 1990 (or 1986), and be the administration Leo served as Secretary of Labor? Maybe ...

• WHAT'S NEXT MOMENT - The morning whirl of information and scheduling in the Oval Office, when the President calls in Charlie and he says, "Did you need something, sir?" The President replies, "Yes. What's next?"

• And, of course, Sam's soaring oratory to Mallory about how going to Mars is "what's next" on mankind's exploratory timeline: "Cause it's next. For we came out of the cave, and we looked over the hill, and we saw fire. And we crossed the ocean, and we pioneered the West, and we took to the sky. The history of man is hung on the timeline of exploration, and this is what's next."

DC location shots    

• The entire sequence of the President attending the Reykjavik Symphony was indeed filmed at the actual Kennedy Center. From the loading dock:

To shots inside the lobby:

To scenes outside the Kennedy Center:

(By the way, that shot of CJ on the phone as she walks out on the terrace is another great example of Graves using a long tracking shot.) 

There was a New York Times article in the fall of 2001 about The West Wing that contained this passage: "They try to never mention any president after Eisenhower, and according to a co-executive producer, Kevin Falls, who runs the writers' room [and co-wrote the script for this episode!], 'When we talk about the Kennedy Center on 'West Wing,' we're referring to George Kennedy.'" That's funny, but demonstrably false, as we've had references to "LBJ" (Lyndon Johnson), the USS Kennedy aircraft carrier, and a bust of John F. Kennedy in Leo's office. I think LBJ is the most recent real-life President that's ever mentioned in The West Wing, though.

They Do Exist! It's The Real Person, or Thing    

• The Mars probe, the Galileo V, is named for the Italian astronomer and engineer Galileo Galilei, whom President Bartlet refers to in his Oval Office discussion with Leo and Charlie. The President also mentions Aristotle. 

• EDIT: Noticed upon review, the President asks if Buddy Holly has come back, when Charlie informs him that it's apparently important for him to attend the Reykjavik Symphony concert.

• The Milwaukee Journal gets a shout-out for publishing Charlie's leak about the President's dislike of green beans (although the paper has actually been called the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel since 1995).

• Leo brings up the Four Seasons bar as a place to find a lot of CJ's rejected suitors; kind of a creepy thing for Leo to say, but Janney got her Emmy for this episode, so ...

• Speaking of CJ, she says she's wearing an Armani gown to the symphony performance at the Kennedy Center.

• There's a shot of a binder labeled "Dynachem" in the background of a Josh/Donna conversation. There's a Dynachem chemical manufacturer in Illinois; there's also Dynachem Specialty Chemicals in South Africa. Why there'd be a binder for either of those companies on The West Wing set is unclear. (Also, if that's Bartlet's official Presidential portrait, it seems they could have chosen a more flattering photo than that one).

• CJ brings up Jackson Browne as an example of modern music.

• Donna tries to use the Jewish War Veterans as precedent for her argument that a group with a point of view should get a stamp; Josh is following the real-life story when he bursts her bubble by telling her their request for a stamp was denied.

End credits freeze frame: The staffers update the President on the day's events after his return from the symphony ("This is still my office, right?").