A Surprise on the Small Screen

Politics as played by Sam Seaborn in “The West Wing,” and as envisioned by Rob Lowe, who plays Sam, is politics the way it used to be. The way it could be. Which is not to say that all is neatly resolved at the hour’s end. Things can definitely get ugly.

“People lose their way, some days the demons drown out the angels, but for the most part, it is people who are very well-intentioned and very hard-working,” Lowe says. “On that level, this script rang true to me.”

Usually near the center of the storm, Sam is the harried and gorgeous deputy communications manager in NBC’s new darkly comic behind-the-scenes look at a Democratic White House. That said, Lowe’s Seaborn might just be one of the most refreshing young politicos to hit TV’s Beltway in some time. Even down in these trenches, Seaborn stands out as an idealist’s idealist. In other words, he really lets it all hang out.

Take the pilot episode, for instance. There’s a heart-stopping moment halfway through in which Seaborn comes to the unfortunate discovery, thanks to a pager mix-up, that the lovely chestnut-haired law student with whom he has just spent the night is moonlighting as a high-priced call girl. You could almost hear the collective sofa springs creak as some 12 million viewers cringed reflexively before their TVs in anticipation of yet another White House scandal. Later, when the cumulative pressures of the day get to be too much, Sam blurts out to a total stranger all the awful details in a last-ditch bid for sympathy.

As easy-going as Sam is serious, Lowe gets an obvious kick out of playing someone so clearly willing to buck the usual Washington trends. Neither is Sam shy about challenging his colleagues’ claim to the moral high ground. One ongoing story line has him continuing to escalate his battle to maintain a friendship with the hooker because, Lowe will tell you, “he’s a rescuer.”

Maybe it is actually just as we always hoped: Despite a fair amount of recent evidence to the contrary, most politicians really are out for the common good. It’s a sentiment, at least as far as Lowe is concerned, that might be just the antidote Americans need for a colossal case of political disillusionment.

“Whenever people are feeling that way, that’s exactly the time to do a show that reminds them what it could be like,” Lowe says. “In the 1980s, no profession was more vilified than the law profession, and that was the time they launched ‘L.A. Law.’ ”

More forgiving than vilifying, more “An American President” than “Primary Colors,” “The West Wing” has an upbeat score, a benevolent patriarch of a president and errant but well-meaning sons like Sam who are still welcomed back into the fold when the day is done.

In some respects, serial TV is the last place you’d expect someone with Lowe’s big-screen credentials, including, recently, a wicked cameo in “Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me,” not to mention a fledgling career as a writer and director.

But with kids in school, he started weighing the costs of schlepping halfway across the country, and sometimes the world, for a typical 26-week location film shoot. From that perspective, Lowe became open to the idea of a series after years of disinterest, but it had to be something that he felt was the kind of role he could really sink his teeth into. Then comes a script from “West Wing’s” executive producer, Aaron Sorkin. It was the first one Lowe’s agent sent him.

“I just read it and fell in love with it. As baseball players like to say, ‘It was right in my wheelhouse.’ ”

Sorkin still remembers thinking years ago of Lowe as a teenage heartthrob who, if he could overcome his good looks, “really could be terrific.” So he was a little surprised when he walked in the office and saw Lowe’s name on the audition list. It was 0 to 100 in about 30 seconds.

“First of all, [the audition] was terrifically prepared. Rob came in and it made it extremely difficult for anyone else to get the job,” Sorkin says of the very brief audition that followed. “Despite the looks, you got the sense that there was this very smart guy.”

To hear Lowe tell it, “West Wing” underwent a most unusual development process for TV: There’s no bible, no back story and very little discussion about what a character’s going to be doing down the road. “[Aaron] will show up on a Thursday with the script due Monday and say, ‘I don’t mind tellin’ ya, I have no idea what I’m going to write.’ ” Lowe pauses, as if he’s still absorbing this fact. “You know what? I don’t know how I would feel about it except that I felt that I knew this guy so clearly.” Well enough, it seems to confide a well-kept secret about Sam: “When he was young--a teenager, he did some campaigning for a Republican party. Wait till Aaron hears that!”

Speaking of Republicans, all this talk brings up a very important question. What would “West Wing” look like if it were a Republican administration? “Hmmm, let me see,” says Lowe, gamely. “The women would have neater hair and the jokes wouldn’t be as funny.”

Get Lowe on a roll about the political animal and he’ll run down the differences between big-city Democrats and, say, “Clinton under the spell of a Dick Morris,” the former chief strategist who maneuvered the then-candidate between the parties, leaving the Republicans with no issues. Or talk about the zealotry evident in George Stephanopoulos’ book, which describes the kind of highly factional politics that Lowe would like to see the show take on.

Family Photos in His Trailer

A Kennedy-phile since youth, Lowe’s is the passion of one who still wants to believe in Camelot and the ideal of the American dream. Among the gallery of family photos and a stack of stories about Lowe’s new gig, the actor makes sure to point out a drawing by one of his two young sons that holds a place of honor in the trailer. “I love you, Daddy” is written in big block letters across the bottom.

“That’s a heron,” announces the proud father as he takes a seat on the narrow apple-green sofa that dominates this home-away-from-home.

Still an avid political junkie, Lowe had already made bedside reading of virtually all the resource material assigned to “West Wing’s” ensemble cast, books like “The Choice,” “The Agenda” and “Behind the Oval Office.” He’d seen “The War Room,” thedocumentary about Clinton’s 1992 campaign, four times. And Lowe’s own brief political foray in the 1980s, campaigning in 13 states for presidential candidate Michael Dukakis, didn’t hurt his preparation either.

But don’t expect to see Lowe returning to that arena any time soon. He’d rather not let anything interfere with the public’s perception of the work. As far as his work in “West Wing,” the most gratifying success seems to have come quite unexpectedly, the day Lowe drove his son to kindergarten and the sixth-grade social studies teacher stopped him to talk.

“She told me she was going to show ‘West Wing’ in class. The hair stood up on the back of my neck. This is great! Out of all the good reviews, that’s the best.”

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* “The West Wing” will be shown tonight at 9 on NBC. The network has rated it TV-14 (may be unsuitable for children younger than 14).