Head Back to The West Wing With a New Behind-the-Scenes Book — Read an Excerpt! (Exclusive)

With election season upon us, many of us are thinking about who will occupy the West Wing in 2025. But for those who have no stomach for real-life politics, there are plenty of fictional TV shows, movies and books to keep you up to date without having to follow what’s happening. is happening.

Perhaps he is the most famous West wingpolitical series that debuted on NBC on September 22, 1999. It followed the idealistic staff of Democratic President Josiah Bartlet (Martin Sheen). The series ran until 2006 and won 26 Emmys along the way — earning the distinction for most Emmys won in a TV show’s debut season with a whopping nine.

Now, a new book pulls back the curtain on the making of the iconic series, just in time for pre-election rewatches. What’s Next: A backstage pass to the West Wing, its cast and crew, and the service’s lasting legacy Melissa Fitzgerald and Mary McCormack is out August 13, and we’ve got an exclusive sneak peek. Below, step into the casting room with Bradley Whitford, who played Josh Lyman; Richard Schiff, who played Toby Ziegler and Allison Janney, who played CJ Cregg — with a special look you won’t see.

‘What’s Next’ by Melissa Fitzgerald and Mary McCormack.

Dutton

You know that old saying “No one touches my brother but me”? That’s why Brad [Whitford] he can get away with saying things like that. In a very real way, just like their West Wing counterparts, Brad and Richard [Schiff] they are almost like brothers and sisters. In fact, they first met thanks to Richard’s real-life brother Paul Schiff, a film and TV producer who, back in his college days, happened to be Brad’s roommate at Wesleyan University.

“He and my brother took care of my dog ​​for six months,” Richard recalls. “So I was forever in Brad’s debt for that.” (MELISSA: The dog’s name was Lyle, and he was, as Richard says, “a Manhattan mutt who got into a thousand fights and won none.”)

Given his long history with Brad, it must have felt like kismet—a “sign” even—to Richard when, upon entering his callback room, he saw his old dog sitter. “I walked in and there he was,” Richard would recall years later. “And he plays Josh! I just started giggling, it was so weird.”

Really. As another West Wing alum Josh (Malina) points out, “Giggles is not something you’d normally associate with Toby Ziegler.”

Richard Schiff, Bradley Whitford, Rob Lowe and Allison Janney in ‘The West Wing’.

Steve Schapiro/NBCU Photo Bank/Getty

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Despite the “church laugh” and the resulting twitches and jerks it caused in both actors, Richard made it through the callback relatively unscathed. He came to this stage of the process—reading for Warner Bros. executives—with Tommy’s assurance that it was “just a formality,” and he largely took it to heart.

When it was over, Tommy ushered him out of the room, reminding his future Toby that “tomorrow is the test”. He added: “We hope to see you there.”

“Well, just so you know,” Richard replied, “I might not show up.”

Tommy nodded at that, not unkindly, but with a telling smile.

“Yes, I heard.”

“And if I do show up,” Richard snapped awkwardly, “…I’m going to be very bad.”

Tommy laughed. “I heard that too.”

The cast of The West Wing.

James Sorensen/NBC/Newsmakers

What Tommy did next made a real difference to Richard and relaxed him greatly, or at least as close as Richard could get. It would also effectively set the course for the next few years of their work together. Tommy put his hand on Richard’s shoulder, looked him in the eye and said, “I really hope you come tomorrow.”

“There was so much love in that gesture,” Richard told us, “such appreciation, true appreciation for how crazy we all are — and no judgment. He must have thought: ‘You’ve lost your mind! This is, like, the best show ever – you’re not going to show up?!’ But he didn’t do that. He just said, ‘I hope you show up’.”

It would be the first of many times during the run of The West Wing that Tommy was able to do this for him, “to kind of disarm all my neuroses and psychoses,” Richard would later reveal. It was the right moment. But the moment was not over. On his way out, Richard turned a corner to find a bunch of women mentally preparing for their auditions. “This,” he thought, “is for CJ.” Looking around, he saw the brilliant actress CCH Pounder and, as she sat nearby, another familiar face.

Allison Janney.

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Allison Janney as CJ Cregg. James Sorensen/NBC/Getty

At the time, Richard didn’t know Allison very well. He met her one night after a show in New York – “a little off-off-off-Broadway thing” – and remembered how great she was. “Then I saw her in Primary Colors.” Allison’s outstanding performance as a sleazy, vaguely mischievous adult literacy teacher (who would end up on the “highway” with John Travolta’s swindling presidential candidate) wowed him that night and cemented the actress as truly “special” in Richard’s mind.

A year later, there she was, outside the audition, waiting to test for Claudia Jean Cregg. At that moment, Richard had a classic Richard thought: “I said, ‘Oh, God, these people are never going to hire her, they’re not that smart.'” Then he thought again, “If they’re serious about her… . .they really know what they are doing.”

Allison’s presence that day was another part—along with the incredibly high quality of Aaron’s script, Brad’s serendipitous involvement, Tommy’s good-natured insight—that contributed to Richard’s growing excitement about the project and his opportunity to be a part of it. And, of course, we know that he did appear on the test.

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As he remembers, the audition for NBC executives took place in a small room, where everyone sat in rows, huddled around one table. “Like a suit album cover.”

Allison Janney and Joshua Malina in The West Wing.

Paul Drinkwater/NBCU Photo Bank/Getty

Richard says he was so bad that I started laughing in the middle of it and said: ‘I’m sorry, this is really rubbish. I’m bad today. Let me start over.’”

But an hour later, as he walked across the parking lot to his car, a thought crossed his mind that didn’t resonate with Richard: “I think I got this thing.”

A few years after Richard’s stint on The West Wing, at “one of three parties I ever went to in Los Angeles,” he was approached by a respected performer whose talent he knew and loved. “I don’t know if you’re aware of this,” Mr. Richard said, “but I was the second actor to go for Toby the day you auditioned, and I was one hundred percent sure I got the part.”

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When Richard asked why, he was told, “Because I put my ear to the door when you were auditioning and I couldn’t hear a fucking word you said.”

That actor was Eugene Levy. (Given the endurance of Eugene’s career since the early days of SCTV, readers may know him as Best in show a character who “wasn’t the class clown, but sat next to the class clown and studied him” or the father in American Pie series or, most recently, dad on Schitt’s Creek. Either way, it’s hard to beat.)

From WHAT’S NEXT: A Backstage Pass to the West Wing, Its Cast and Crew, and Its Enduring Legacy of Service by Melissa Fitzgerald and Mary McCormack, to be published on August 13, 2024 by Dutton, an imprint of Penguin Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House LLC . Copyright (c) 2024 Melissa Fitzgerald and Mary McCormack.

What’s Next: A backstage pass to The West Wing, its cast and crew, and the service’s lasting legacy Melissa Fitzgerald and Mary McCormack is out on August 13 and is available for pre-order now, wherever books are sold.

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