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Post by Admin on May 5, 2003 1:04:12 GMT
From NBC:
Sam (Rob Lowe) and Toby (Richard Schiff) are dispatched to Connecticut for some damage control and to secure the secret release of President Bartlet's (Martin Sheen) choice, Roberto Mendoza (Edward James Olmos) for the Supreme Court, who has been jailed for alleged drunk driving and resisting arrest. Meanwhile, Josh (Bradley Whitford) is a guest lecturer at a college class to talk about working for the President and he recounts the previous week's flare-ups, which include: his feeble attempt to fill in as the White House spokesman at a press conference where he promises that the President has "a secret plan to fight inflation," and the media glare that engulfs the African-American HUD secretary, Debbie O'Leary (CCH Pounder) who publicly labeled a prominent Republican as a racist.
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Post by bajermajic on May 6, 2003 19:32:08 GMT
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Post by DarkHoarse on May 7, 2003 12:23:57 GMT
I second that: definitely the funniest episode ever!
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Post by Lemon Lyman on May 14, 2003 11:18:49 GMT
I agree very funny - especially the parts in the car with Toby and Sam  |
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Post by Joey Lucas on May 14, 2003 17:07:49 GMT
I also agree - I could watch this episode over and over without getting bored, I could probably quote most of it after watching it another couple of times!!
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Post by Joey Lucas on Aug 7, 2003 12:31:53 GMT
From The Official Companion:
All of the seats are filled with eager students at the third instalment of the Majorie DuPont lecture series, waiting to hear gems of wisdom from Josh Lyman’s experience in the White House. Backstage, he’s on his cell phone, seemingly oblivious to the crowd of fans and admirers in the auditorium. Sam’s telling him that within the last half hour, Roberto Mendoza was arrested for drunk driving, resisting arrest, and disorderly conduct. The odd thing is, they know Mendoza doesn’t drink.
Leo calls an emergency meeting. Toby is apoplectic, this is a disaster – he has everything riding on getting Mendoza confirmed to the Supreme Court, and now he’s being held in jail in Wesley, Connecticut, refusing to take a Breathalyser. Leo wants Sam to go to Connecticut. Toby says he’s going too. A few miles away, Josh takes the podium to tell the students what it’s like to work for the President and how things got out of hand that week.
The White House was enthusiastically gearing up for a Mural Room ceremony to sign a radical new bill on education reform. But, as they do when the air seems too clear, circumstances started to conspire. C.J. had a dental appointment, and intuitively knew that local anaesthesia and the White House Press Corps don’t go hand in hand. And HUD Secretary Deborah O’Leary (C.C.H. Pounder) had a fiery and a very public argument with Republican Jack Wooden about public housing on C-SPAN. “Are you calling me a racist?” he accused, to which O’Leary replied, “If the shoe fits.”
Josh leads the students through Presidential story hour. After the President signed the $700 million education bill with a flourish, he mistakenly offered to take questions. The first was about Secretary O’Leary. Unfortunately, C.J. wasn’t there to prevent the first PR disaster of the day, when Bartlet announced that O’Leary went too far and an apology would be appropriate. Josh’s tale is interrupted by a call from Sam, who complains that he and Toby are lost on the New England Thruway. It doesn’t help that Sam’s trying to steer by the stars. Josh reminds them that he’s sort of in the middle of something.
Guiding the students back to his story, Josh explains that O’Leary got mad at the President for insinuating she should apologize. She believed her role as the highest-ranking African American in government is to police people like Wooden. Leo set her straight; her role is to serve the President. She has to apologize.
O’LEARY: Oh, for cryin’ out loud, Leo, when are you guys gonna stop running for President.
LEO: When angels dance on pinheads, Debbie.
Josh tells his audience that with O’Leary’s apology secured, C.J. had planned to redirect media attention to the education package. But C.J.’s routine visit to the dentist turned into emergency root canal. Or “woot canow” as she put it, with her cheeks stuffed with cotton and gauze. Against C.J.’s muddled objections, Josh decides to take the “bwiefing” himself, which was asking for trouble. Josh was confident, not to say cocky. Even against the guidance of his peers, Josh preened that as a graduate of Harvard and Yale, his powers of debate could meet the Socratic wonder of the White House Press Corps.
Josh’s inaugural debut to briefing was a consummate disaster. When a reporter breached the topic of the frequency of Bartlet’s cigarette smoking, Josh asked the reporter if he wanted his one question to be “that stupid.” C.J. watching the disaster unfold on television, cringed. The reporter retorted it’s not a stupid question if the President’s going to preach from an anti-tobacco pulpit. Josh says the President quit years ago, but another reporter interrupted, offering that Bartlet just bummed a cigarette from her on Air Force One. Josh changed topics and asked for the next question. Danny, wanting to show Josh just how deep he’s waded, asked if the President was worried that lower unemployment would drive up wages and cause inflation. Josh said the President is pleased the jobless rate fell.
DANNY: And I’m sure we all join the President in his joy. But I’m wondering, does the President have a plan to fight the resulting inflation?
JOSH: The President is doing everything in his power to maintain the robust economy that’s created millions of new jobs, improved productivity, and kept a lid on inflation.
REPORTER #5 (KATIE): But he has no plan to address inflation specifically.
JOSH: Twenty-four Ph.D.s on the Council of Economic Advisors, Katie, they have a plan to fight inflation.
DANNY: Is the reason you won’t tell us about it is that it’s a secret?
JOSH: Yeah, Danny, we got a secret plan to fight inflation.
Out of Josh’s egotistical need to prove himself, the President’s secret plan to fight inflation was born. He knows it’ll take a while to live down. When he calls Toby and Sam on a break in his lecture, Sam admits they are still lost. Toby thinks the start Sam was guiding by was the Delta Shuttle out of La Guardia. He moans that he may spend the rest of his life in this car, searching for Connecticut.
After many miles and much stargazing, Toby and Sam find the sterile and un-intimidating suburban police station of Wesley. The cops don’t believe Toby and Sam are from the White House until one sees a picture of Toby on the front page of a newspaper. As he glances back and forth from the paper to the un-amused face in front of him, the blood drains from the cop’s face. Sam informs them they’ve arrested a federal judge, the President’s nominee for the Supreme Court. The cops are way out of their league.
Josh has to be honest with the students; he drug himself a pretty deep hole with his flippant and ill-considered answers.
JOSH: Tell me what you think I should do right now.
DONNA: Go into your office and come up with a secret plan to fight inflation.
He tried to play it off, vowing that he was kidding about the secret plan. With smug satisfaction and mutual frustration at the mess he’d made, C.J. told him he “compwetwey impwoded,” he was “hostiwe . . . bewidgawint.” Toby cut to the chase, asking him if he’d fallen on his head. Josh chuckled nervously, it’s not as bad as it looks, but C.J. is adamant: “A seaquit pwan to fwite infrathon??!”
For Toby, the only way that day could get any worse was if something happened with Mendoza. As Josh explains to his captive audience, in the middle of the hazardous confirmation process, Mendoza had decided to break his silence from his vacation in Nova Scotia, commenting that Bartlet was wrong to make O’Leary apologize. To the chagrin of the staff, Mendoza had also recently criticized the American Bar Association, the AFL-CIO, and the New York State Legislature, organizations that helped get Bartlet elected. They’d have to bring Mendoza in to persuade him to keep his own counsel. When summoned, Mendoza said he’d drive to D.C. from Canada, stopping off in Connecticut to do some antiquing.
Attending a labour conference in New Orleans, the President had missed the recent spate of snafus. After giving his boss only three hours’ sleep, Charlie had to wake Bartlet to prep him for the new day and new crises. Charlie told the President to dig in. it wasn’t a nightmare, Charlie, said he really is the President.
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Post by Joey Lucas on Aug 7, 2003 12:35:56 GMT
From The Official Companion (cont.):
In the Oval Office, Josh confessed to Bartlet about his blunders at the briefing.
JOSH: I was crystal clear. They said, “Do you think if the President has a plan to fight inflation that it’s right to keep it a secret?” I said, “Of course not.”
BARTLET is staring at JOSH in amazement.
BARLET: Are you telling me that not the only did you invent a secret plan to fight inflation . . . but that you don’t support it?!
Then Toby informed the President of Mendoza’s denouncement of Bartlet’s attempt to make O’Leary apologize. Throwing his hands in the air, Bartlet told C.J. to untangle the press corps while they wait for Mendoza to arrive. And if anyone asked, Josh said to Bartlet, that cigarette he bummed on Air Force One was for a friend.
Josh’s candour with his student audience stops short of telling them that at that moment Roberto Mendoza is sitting in a jail cell in Connecticut after being arrested on his drive to Washington. A few states away, Toby is confronting Mendoza face-to-face. He knows that Mendoza’s hepatitis keeps him from drinking, there’s no chance this was a legitimate arrest. But Mendoza doesn’t wasn’t to be saved by the federal government. He wants to wait until Monday to legitimately clear his name through the system. He was picked up because he looks like his name is Roberto Mendoza and he could be comin’ to rob your house! Without just cause, the Breathalyser test is an illegal search and a civil rights violation.
MENDOZA: (pause) I was cuffed and patted down in front of my nine-year-old boy. And he and his mother watched while they put me in a squad car and took me away.
TOBY: He’s also seen you wearing a robe with a gavel in your hand.
MENDOZA: He doesn’t understand that, he doesn’t know what that is. He understands the police, he watches TV. That’s what he’s going to remember. That they handcuffed his father. So the America just got one more pissed-off guy with dark skin.
Toby understands Mendoza’s desire for justice and his feelings of humiliation, but he says he can’t get Mendoza confirmed if this story gets out to the press. “There’s nothing about this that doesn’t stink. And nothing about this that wouldn’t be better if you were a Supreme Court justice,” Toby says. He extracts an apology from the cops who arrested the judge. Mendoza leaves with Toby under the condition that the cops will apologize to his son too.
Toby calls Josh to tell him the emergency is over. Josh is still on the platform, and smiles and promises that’s the last time his phone will ring. He can’t tell the students what the calls have been about just yet, but he’d be happy to take some questions about daily life in the White House.
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