How high can you fly on a left ‘Wing’? Viewers cast their vote

The election is over (the outcome was never really in doubt), and everyone is hoping to get back to business as usual.

Of course, I’m talking about “The West Wing.”

America’s fictional president, Jed Bartlet, easily won reelection last Wednesday, after trouncing a language-mangling southern governor in a debate the week before. To some, the parallels between Bartlet’s opponent and the White House’s current occupant were representative of a liberal bent that has turned off conservative viewers.

Talk radio host Larry Elder, for one, has insisted the program’s 20%-plus ratings stumble versus the corresponding stretch last fall is directly attributable to its out-of-step politics, and he found plenty of callers to echo that position.

A less subjective analysis suggests the decline is more complex, with competitive factors explaining much of the audience attrition. Faring best as it does among older and more affluent viewers, “The West Wing” has always been vulnerable to titillating concepts that lure away the younger crowd -- from Fox’s “Temptation Island” and “Celebrity Boxing” to the show’s current nemesis, ABC’s “The Bachelor.”

To test my own theory, when I broached the subject of watching “The Bachelor” to a class at USC last week, nearly every female hand shot up. (Yes, parents, this is what your tuition is paying for.)

Still, given last week’s disparate election results real and imagined, the question of how politics affect “The West Wing” merits consideration. The world and mood of the country, after all, have changed considerably since the series premiered in 1999, when Bartlet and his team provided an idealized wish-fulfillment version of the then-administration.

The hard evidence, such as it is, lends qualified support to the notion politics has been at least a contributing factor to the show’s sluggish performance.

According to demographic data from Simmons Market Research Bureau, people who identify themselves as “very conservative” have always been less likely to watch the show, but the gap grew during the most recent survey period from May 2001 to May 2002. “West Wing” viewers were more likely to identify themselves as “somewhat conservative” than the average viewer, as did those in the “somewhat liberal” or “very liberal” categories.

Breakdowns for the Los Angeles area from Scarborough Research, meanwhile, actually found self-identified Republicans to be slightly more likely than Democrats to watch the series, with only independents placing below average.

This shouldn’t be a complete surprise. “West Wing” viewers tend to be older and richer -- attributes generally associated with Republicans.

As one research analyst put it, people might listen to Rush Limbaugh because they like his politics, but in prime time, most folks simply want to be entertained.

In that respect, it’s easy to see how lecturing the audience might be off-putting, something series creator Aaron Sorkin has seemingly done with greater frequency since the 2000 election controversy and Sept. 11.

Many critics derided the hastily assembled Middle East civics lesson that kicked off last season for being preachy. Similarly, some have said that Sorkin wrote himself into a corner with the election story arc, which almost required being heavier on ideology and lighter on suspense.

Had Bartlet lost, after all, the series would have become “West Wing 2: The GOP Years.”

Yet with the show amassing record ratings a year ago and its creator heralded as a genius, who around him could say no? Such naysaying has thus been left to Web sites like www.tele visionwithoutpity.com, where some posters labeled the debate anti-climactic and the show more one-sided since losing its most fleshed-out conservative voice, Ainsley Hayes, with Emily Procter, who plays her, relocating to “CSI: Miami.”

Deborah Birkett, a Beaverton, Canada, writer who provides the site’s detailed recaps of each episode, called the Republican contender “a straw man” for Bartlet to steamroll. “Why they paid James Brolin when they could have just cast a scarecrow I have no idea,” she noted, adding in regard to Sorkin, “I keep hoping he’ll get back on his game.”

Sorkin declined to be interviewed. Talking to Newsweek, however, he suggested that press coverage of the show’s diminished ratings was somehow tied to upcoming contract renewal negotiations with NBC -- a conspiratorial mind-set better suited to “The X-Files” than “The West Wing.”

To keep this in perspective, “The West Wing” remains a success by virtually any measure, averaging 16.2 million viewers this season, 11th among prime-time programs. The renewal fee might drop from what its studio, Warner Bros., would have commanded a year ago, but no one needs to hold bake sales for the profit participants.

Rob Lowe, in what was apparently a snit over money, is leaving. New characters will come on board. Life goes on.

Still, it seems equally true that “The West Wing” peaked last year and will be hard-pressed -- for various reasons, not least among them the TV world’s preoccupation with the new and different -- to reverse its current parabolic course. The series will still be popular and prestigious, to be sure, but hardly the sensation it was.

Whatever Sorkin may infer, this is also noteworthy. Not only is the program a three-time Emmy winner as best drama, but for many it provides a more enticing window into the world of politics than any hour spent watching CNN or Fox News Channel ever could.

In addition, the lines between news and entertainment, fact and fiction, keep blurring. Episodic dramas rip stories from the headlines, right next to newsmagazines that behave like dramas. This dynamic helped fuel interest in “The West Wing,” but it has also kept a spotlight trained on its foibles and shortcomings. Such is life inside the fishbowl.

President Bartlet delivered a monologue during the debate that could easily be the show’s own disclaimer to critics: “I’m the president of the United States, not the president of the people who agree with me. And by the way, if the left has a problem with that, they should vote for somebody else.”

Based on the ratings, some are using their remotes to do just that. And whether it’s because of their affinity for “The Bachelor” or George W. Bush, it seems pretty clear that the honeymoon is over.

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Brian Lowry’s column appears Wednesdays. He can be reached at brian.lowry@latimes.com.

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Winning with flowers and a smile

*--* Ratings for “The West Wing” have gradually declined this season -- to the show’s lowest levels for original episodes since 2000 -- while viewing of ABC’s “The Bachelor” has steadily risen By week 9/25 10/2 10/9 10/16 10/23 10/30 11/6 The West Wing 18.2 16.7 16.0 15.9 12.6* 15.7 16.2 The Bachelor 8.9 11.0 12.8 12.6 14.9 15.0 16.3 *Rerun against the World Series Viewers in millions Source: Nielsen Media Research

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