The American President is a 1995 romantic comedy film directed by Rob Reiner and written by Aaron Sorkin. It stars Michael Douglas, Annette Bening, Martin Sheen, Richard Dreyfuss and Michael J. Fox. In the film, President Andrew Shepherd (Douglas) is a widower who pursues a relationship with attractive lobbyist Sydney Ellen Wade (Bening) — who has just moved to Washington, D.C. — while at the same time attempting to win passage of a crime control bill.
Composer Marc Shaiman was nominated for the Original Musical or Comedy Score Oscar for The American President.[1][2] The film was nominated for Golden Globes for best director, best screenplay, best actor in a comedy/musical for Michael Douglas, best actress in a comedy/musical for Annette Bening, and best comedy/musical motion picture.[3][4] The American Film Institute ranked The American President #75 on its list of America's Greatest Love Stories.
Plot
Andrew Shepherd (Michael Douglas) is introduced as an immensely popular Democratic president from the state of Wisconsin preparing to run for re-election with a 63% approval rating. The President and his staff, led by Chief of Staff A.J. MacInerney (Martin Sheen), attempt to consolidate the administration's high poll ratings by passing a moderate crime control bill. However, support for the bill from both parties is not very strong. Conservatives and Republicans don't want the bill at all, and liberals and Democrats think the bill is too weak. If the bill passes, Shepherd's re-election is presumed by his team to be a shoo-in.
The President of France is about to arrive on a state visit to the United States, occasioning a state dinner in his honor. As a result, Shepherd is presented with the awkward predicament of having to find a partner for himself: his wife has been dead for three years, and his cousin, with whom he had planned on attending, is ill.
The President's attention soon focuses on Sydney Ellen Wade (Annette Bening), who has just moved to Washington, D.C. to work for an environmental lobby in the attempt to persuade the President to pass legislation committing his Administration to substantially reduce carbon dioxide emissions. During their first meeting, Shepherd and Wade are immediately intrigued by each other, and Shepherd invites Wade to the state dinner.
At the same meeting, Shepherd strikes a deal with Wade: if she can secure a certain 24 votes for the environmental bill, he will deliver the last 10 votes. Whatever his personal feelings towards Wade, he expresses this to his staff, especially the pragmatic A.J., as a sound political move. He believes Wade will not be able to get enough votes to meet her obligation, thus releasing Shepherd who will be seen to have tried, without being blamed for failing.
During the state dinner, as well as subsequent occasions, the couple falls in love. The relationship, as well as Shepherd's politicking down the middle, results in a decline in his popularity. The decline is spurred by relentless attacks by presidential hopeful Bob Rumson (Richard Dreyfuss), a conservative Republican Senator from Kansas and the Senate Minority Leader. The attacks focus on Wade's activist past, an attack on Shepherd's family values, and the President's refusal to respond to Republican attacks. The President's precarious situation is exacerbated by the impending failure of his crime bill.
Eventually Wade does manage to get enough votes for the environmental bill to meet her part of the deal. Before she can tell Shepherd, he discovers that three Congressmen from Michigan are willing to deliver their votes to him on the crime bill if he shelves the environmental bill. As he is exactly three votes short, with no other apparent options to acquire them, he agrees, seemingly betraying Wade, who is fired from her lobbying firm, then breaks up with him. However, when she visits the White House to "break up" with him, he explained that politics is making choices, and that he had never made an pretense that anything other than that the crime control bill (as opposed to her environmental bill) had been his number one priority.
The film builds to a climax timed to coincide with the State of the Union speech, planned as a conciliatory, non-partisan event. However, ruminating on Wade's leaving him and his sacrifice of a bill he believes in for the sake of a bill he doesn't really believe will have much effect, Shepherd has a change of heart.
He makes a surprise appearance in the White House press room to rebut the Republican attacks on his values and character, and then sends the controversial environmental bill to Congress while withdrawing his support for the moderate crime bill, promising that he will write a stronger crime bill in due time, and fight for that as well. His passionate defense of what he believes, in contrast with his earlier moderate conciliation, galvanizes the press room and his staff. Wade comes back to him, arriving in the Oval Office just before he leaves to go to her house, which leads to their reconciliation. The film ends as Shepherd enters the House chamber to rapturous applause.
Cast
Influence on The West Wing
The screenplay was written by Aaron Sorkin, and inspired many aspects of his television drama The West Wing. The two productions follow the staff of a largely idealized White House, and like many of Sorkin's projects share liberal ideologies. Even the set of the Oval Office in The American President was later used in The West Wing (and was also used for the film Nixon).
The movie's influence can be seen most clearly in early episodes of The West Wing; some dialogue from the two are nearly identical. Sorkin has been known to say that much of the first season was actually taken from material he edited out of the first draft of The American President's script. Sorkin was accused of lifting ideas from an earlier screenplay by William Richert, which was denied by the WGA.
One of the issues touched on in the film and developed in the series relates to gun control bills, developed in "Five Votes Down." While the bill is ultimately withdrawn by President Shepherd because it is ineffectual, on the series President Bartlet and his staff work hard to pass their bill even though it's badly flawed (and end up doubly unhappy when VP John Hoynes, who the President and senior staff are feuding with, clinches the bill for them by persuading an influential southern Democrat to support it). More significant is the issue of a "proportional response" to military attacks on American assets abroad. In The American President, Andrew Shepherd finds himself in the Situation Room having to order such an attack against Libya's intelligence HQ after they bombed something called "C-STAD" (Capricorn Surface-To-Air Defense, a missile defense system) which had been positioned by the U.S. in Israel. He muses for a single line "Someday, someone's gonna have to explain to me the virtue of a proportional response," before giving the order. In "A Proportional Response", President Bartlet finds himself in similar circumstances (Syrian intelligence shot down a U.S. plane in Jordan and killed numerous Americans, including a young Naval officer who the President had decided would be his personal physician) and, seated in the White House Situation Room with his own National Security Council asks: "What is the virtue of a proportional response?" In both cases, the President chooses a military response that is relatively measured, but in the movie President Shepherd never considers a "disproportionate" response while President Bartlet plans such an action to destroy a huge civilian airport in Syria; he eventually OK's a strike similar to the one used in the movie.
The Global Defense Council, the fictional environmental lobby where Sydney Wade worked, is also featured in the West Wing episode called "The Drop-In," and is often referred to in other episodes.
In The American President, Sydney Ellen Wade is ultimately fired from her lobbyist position because the president has brokered a deal that causes her legislative effort to fail. Similarly, in the final episode of the third season of The West Wing, Deputy Chief of Staff Josh Lyman uses the same tactic and ends up getting Amy Gardner fired from her position at the Women's Leadership Conference. Josh and Amy are dating when this takes place, just as the main characters are here. However, on the TV series it's Amy who tries to scuttle a bill (welfare reform) and Josh refuses to accept the demands of three Florida GOP Congressmen because they amount to blackmail. His deal cannot be classified as a betrayal of Amy in the way President Shepherd's was of Sydney Wade.
The American President includes mention of a Governor Stackhouse, while there is a Minnesota senator Howard Stackhouse (George Coe) in the two West Wing episodes "The Stackhouse Filibuster" and "The Red Mass". In the same way, the French President attending a state dinner in The American President seems to be the same President d'Astier that is often referred to in the West Wing.
Several actors from The American President reappear in The West Wing, including Martin Sheen (whose character in President, A.J., is at one point accused by Shepherd of lacking the courage to run for office himself) as President Josiah Bartlet, Anna Deavere Smith as National Security Advisor Dr. Nancy McNally, Joshua Malina as White House Communications Director Will Bailey, Nina Siemaszko as Ellie Bartlet, and Thom Barry as Congressman Mark Richardson.
Rights
The film was a production of Universal Pictures and Castle Rock Entertainment. Castle Rock led the production process and Universal participated in financing and distribution. Universal distributed the film outside the U.S., and Columbia Pictures distributed it domestically under its distribution contract with Castle Rock that existed between 1987 and 1999. After Time Warner's acquisition of Turner Broadcasting System (which owned Castle Rock), the film became part of the Turner Entertainment library under WB. However, in terms of domestic distribution, Warner Bros. is responsible for sales and distribution. Universal has maintained international (i.e. outside of the U.S.) rights for the life of the film.
See also
References
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