Washington’s Language Gridlock : Larry Gelbart’s ‘Mastergate’ on PBS Dissects the Art of Doublespeak

In the packed congressional hearing room the lights were hot and the dialogue between committee members and witnesses even hotter. During a break in the heated testimony some panelists used little battery-powered fans to cool off, while some spectators passed the time reading newspapers. On close inspection it wasn’t The Washington Post being read, but the Los Angeles Times.

Just what kind of congressional investigation is this, anyway? The larger-than-life, fictional kind. Larry Gelbart’s satirical 1989 Broadway play “Mastergate” has moved from the stage to the screen with a veteran ensemble cast that includes Ed Begley Jr., James Coburn, Robert Guillaume, Bruno Kirby, Darren McGavin, Pat Morita, Jerry Ohrbach, David Ogden Stiers and Paul Winfield, among others.

Filming earlier this fall in downtown Los Angeles, “Mastergate” transformed the Emerald Room of the Biltmore Hotel into a Washington hearing room. The dark-paneled set reeked of smoky political authenticity, from a majestic painting of the founding fathers looming above the proceedings down to official-looking “National Security Council” press passes and binders.

“When it works it’s like gangbusters,” said Stiers, who plays the committee’s chief counsel. “But that’s the writing and our own knowledge of what we bring to it, to the annoyance, from whatever point of view, of watching hours drip away in hearings examining things that never should have happened--not come to light, but should not have happened.”

With obvious shades of Iran-Contra mixed with echoes of Watergate and McCarthy, “Mastergate” exposes the Machiavellian maneuverings of Oliver North-like Major Manley Battle (Coburn) and the late Svengali-like CIA director Wylie Slaughter (Burgess Meredith) who orchestrated the diversion of weapons to a Central American guerrilla group under the guise of filming a war movie in a neighboring country.

“I feel that these kinds of situations are going to be with us forever with government, the military and business being as big as they are,” said Gelbart, whose long list of credits includes creator of TV’s “MASH” and Tony-winning writer of “City of Angels.” “But first and foremost, ‘Mastergate’ is a play about the language. It’s not for me to discover that politicians are corrupt or full of hot air. It’s really about what they and television have done to the way we speak and the way we listen.”

Echoing the playwright’s emphasis on language, Coburn has nearly 20 pages of doublespeak dialogue. In full military uniform with his chest dripping with ribbons and medals, he struts erectly through the adjoining waiting room while puffing on a long cigar. During a break he said, “If you miss an ‘and’ or a ‘but’ or a ‘which’ or a ‘who’ it throws it off just a little bit. Then pretty soon it wobbles like a top and you get all off and you have to start all over again.”

But, “Mastergate” is less about rhythm and timing than about emotions boiling beneath the surface. “It doesn’t have to do with how we time those lines, it has to do with the energy behind them, the tug of war,” Stiers said.

“It’s extremely musical in a difficult way. It’s the mark of a brilliant writer who managed to put a harness on his anger and lead it to the typewriter or the word processor without diluting that anger ever, parsing it out very carefully and making out of that anger an annoyance and sense of betrayal that forms a coherent, linear, sometimes savage, always funny, persistently insightful piece.”

New revelations about Iran-Contra broke during “Mastergate’s” filming, again turning the nearly six-year-old scandal into front-page news and exemplifying the play’s dual timeliness and timelessness. On NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Brent Scowcroft, George Bush’s national security adviser, was asked if he believed Bush’s contention that he was unaware that George Schultz and Caspar Weinberger vehemently opposed the weapons-for-hostages plan. Scowcroft replied, “I think it’s quite possible that it’s a truthful statement.”

Such classic Washingtonian doublespeak could have come from the pen of Gelbart, but when apprised of Scowcroft’s comment, the Emmy-, Humanities- and Peabody-winning writer simply shook his head slowly and smiled. “I think the president may have said something truthful,” he translated. “Listen--accidents happen.”

But it’s no accident that Showtime is airing “Mastergate” two days before Election Day, maximizing exposure during this contentious campaign season. Still, Gelbart harbors no secret political agenda, and while welcoming the exposure questioned the public’s response.

“I think those people who are suffering from outrage fatigue are not going to be reinvigorated by this,” he said. “In fact this might seem too much for them ... People used to say ‘MASH’ was so wonderful because it would deter people from thinking about war. Can you count how many wars we’ve been in since that series was on?”

“Mastergate” premier e s Sunday at 10 p.m. on Showtime.