For the two Sorkin fans who don’t know yet: there’s a new version of Sports Night out. I don’t have it yet – a full review will follow when I do – but I’m watching my plain, old, no-extras version of the show, and wanted to say the following:
Yes, Sorkin has flaws. Yes, he’s got problems writing real, mature relationships and yes he tends to get preachy. Yes, he’s pedantic and yes he insulted and ridiculed a woman I consider a friend. Yes Studio 60 sucked, and yes there were serious problems with his other shows.
But among other things, one of the aspects of Sorkin’s work that I adore and worship is how much his characters love to work.
Think about it. How often is that a trope in Hollywood films? Characters rebel against unfeeling and ungenerous bosses, they organize unions, their bosses oppress them, or their workplace in no way resembles the real world. Sorkin celebrates the oft-ignored part of the American Dream, where people love what they do not for what it gets them – power, recognition, money – but for the sake of the work itself. The people in his shows and movies want to come to work. I’m at once intensely awed by and incredibly envious of Dana Whittaker, Casey McCall, Dan Rydell, Natalie Hurley, Jeremy Goodwin, Sam Seaborn, Josh Lyman, C.J. Cregg, Toby Ziegler, Leo McGarry, Lewis Rothschild, A.J. MacInerney, Robin McCall, Sydney Ellen Wade, Danny Concannon, Matt Albie, Danny Tripp, and of course, Jed Bartlett and Andrew Shepherd. As Dana once said to Casey: “I love producing Sports Night. I live from 11 to midnight, and the rush is so great, I don’t come down until three in the morning.”
I want to know what that feels like. To show up at your job every day and feel like you’re doing something; even if it’s not curing cancer or uncovering Watergate or whatever – to feel like what you do is meaningful in some way. I haven’t felt that way in a long time. And this is why, in spite of all his flaws, I can’t hate Aaron Sorkin. May your next project be less aggravating and more inspirational, sir. In the meantime, Christmas is only a little more than two months away, so anyone who wants to get me that new Sports Night box set…
The Film Cricket 