I watched 60 Sunset Strip, or whatever, last night. I’m sure for Sorkin fans it’s like stepping into a warm, comfortable bath. However, as someone who was never much of a fan of the guy’s work, I can’t say it offered much that was new to win me over. In fact, many of the elements feel like simple rehashes, and if I didn’t like them when they were new, I unsurprisingly found them worse the third time around.
Feel free to write off my complaints because of my conservative leanings, and it’s true that Sorkin’s ongoing attempts in all his shows to write ‘conservative’ characters are hilariously patronizing and completely off the mark. However, while I find such material predictably irksome, it’s really his incredible smugness that turns me off. Sorkin’s characters have as much a tendency to moral superiority as any of his cartoonish Christians are supposed to have, and that’s the element that’s always turned me off.
However, this excerpt from a blog dedicated to Studio 60 does suggest that part of the show’s appeal to Sorkin’s longtime fans does indeed derive from its preaching to the choir:
“[Actress] Sarah Paulson as Harriet Hayes was someone I heard a lot of people complain about…And she isn’t all over this episode but I sort of see the problem…Paulson seems too mature and, I’ll be frank, too intelligent to play this part…Paulson just isn’t convincing as a conservative, I guess the problem is. Now, I say this as someone who can not stand conservatives, Paulson should probably feel honored by this but I just am not sure she was right for this role.”
When Sports Night came out, it was lauded by lots of people. I checked it out, and while it was indeed smartly written, it was also (to me) unbearably pompous. Each episode I saw literally ended with a Big Lecture from one character or other, in the face of which the character’s opponent would inevitably crumble. These always struck me like those fantasy conversations teenagers dream up in their heads, in which they force some icon of the Adult World (parent, boss, teacher) to admit that the kid is morally and intellectually above them in each and every way.
Part of the problem was that I was already addicted to a Canadian show called the Newsroom, which was far more cynical and had no heroes of any stripe. Sorkin’s programs are chock full of sacred cows, and I’ll admit that gives me gas. I honestly think I’d have had about the same reaction if his incessant preaching had been conservative, but admittedly, maybe not.
West Wing seemed the same show as Sports Night, although at least the White House setting made the pompousness a little more natural. However, now we’re back to a TV show setting, and it’s the exact same thing. Maybe the show will do well, but again, I certainly don’t think it’s going to bring in many viewers who didn’t watch Sorkin’s previous two shows.
Again, many of Sorkin’s dependable riffs are increasingly threadbare. Like many liberals, Sorkin doesn’t seem to like [conservative] bloggers much. One character notes in dismay, “I like authority.” (In terms of ‘official’ gatekeeper media outlets like the New York Times.) I found that a pretty amusingly reactionary position for a ‘liberal,’ although it’s an opinion I’ve seen on lots of left-wing sites. However, if the position is at least something you can argue about, the tired japes about bloggers being “people in pajamas” and “surrounded by cats” seem like lame, already age-old stereotypes from some grumpy old man. That’s smart, with-it writing?
[To be fair, although it goes by without comment, there is a funny scene where Perry holds a writer’s meaning and is solely pitched a succession of skits by different writers, all based on the idea that President Bush is Stupid. I did think that was pretty funny, if only because such sketches are so stale after six years of them.]The manifold attacks on conservative Christians, meanwhile, seem even more tiresome, especially five years after 9/11. Really, are conservative Christians really America’s biggest problem right now? I honestly think Sorkin is trying to stir up controversy and publicity with this stuff. The early episodes have spent a lot of time talking up this sketch Perry wrote called “Crazy Christians.” It’s supposed to be brilliant, but if it is, why doesn’t it have better title than that? I mean, “Crazy Christians?” There’s a knee slapper.
One main character—the Matthew Perry guy—earlier broke up with the love of his live because she appeared on the Pat Robertson show. That seems insane to most of us, I think, but was justified because her doing so was, as he says—and he really does say this—like attending a Klan rally. Anyhow, I don’t think stuff like this will provoke more than yawns. First of all, Robertson hasn’t been anything but a fringe figure for decades now. Second of all, ho hum, a TV show attacking Christians. Whatever, dude. I look forward to Perry later getting equally uptight about somebody invited Al Sharpton to be on the show. Certainly Sharpton is at least as loathsome as Robertson, right?
Even the show’s big plot device, the Last Minute Brilliant Sketch Idea That Saves the Day, is wearisome, being—get this—a parody song set to the tune of I’m the Very Model of a Modern Major General. Gee, that’s fresh.
Anyway, for those who like Sorkin’s stuff, have fun. I’ve never been one of those people who think people who don’t like stuff I do are dumb or something. I’m one of apparently few Firefly fans who doesn’t blame Fox for the show’s failure. To my mind, there just weren’t a whole lot of people who fell into the Space Western demographic. What’ya going to do?
In contrast, a letter printed in this week’s Entertainment Weekly snidely opines that Sports Night failed because the average viewer was “not intelligent enough” to appreciate the show. Well, maybe. (Although West Wing did fine for a number of years.) Or maybe in the Age of Seinfeld a show that demanded it was About Something each and every week just grated on the nerves of many. Or, conversely, perhaps a sitcom set at a sports news cable TV channel wasn’t very appealing. Who knows?
Anyway, while I’ll probably occasionally drop in here and there, I think I’m more likely to find the SNL-derived Tina Fey sitcom more up my alley.
