Creative-Industrial-Complex Angst and Studio 60

In the New York Times, Michael Tolkin, author of the biting Hollywood satire The Player and its recent sequel, claims that, “The movies haven’t been very good the last three or four years, they really haven’t… Everybody knows that. At least that, maybe more. And what they were will never return.” The Times calls his statement an expression of “creative-industrial-complex angst,”—a pithy little soundbyte, and a pretty accurate one. While I’m certainly open to arguments about the decline of cinema, I think his statement is a little bit over the top, either because he believes it or because it will help generate interest in his book (or maybe both). No matter what, it’s part of a recent upsurge in rhetoric in Hollywood’s never ending clash between art and commerce.

Elsewhere, Kirby Dick’s unrated documentary This Film is Not Yet Rated purports to expose the ultra secretive MPAA ratings board, trying to persuade viewers that the business association’s ratings system is inconsistent and, worse, stifling to artistic freedom. It’s somewhat successful, but not nearly as much as it—or many of its critics—seem to think it is. But more on that in the future (the film doesn’t open in D.C. till the 15^th, so I’m mostly mum until then).

Perhaps the most interesting, and most persuasive, entry is Aaron Sorkin’s much anticipated new show, Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip. In the first ten minutes of the show, Sorkin makes an obvious allusion to Network (later referenced specifically as “a Paddy Cheyefsky film,” which seems odd given its more notable director), and all but proclaims his intention to wage small-screen holy war on the moralist censors in religious interest groups, the government panderers at the FCC, and the crude culture of commerce he sees as having ruined Hollywood in general and television in specific.

From the looks of the pilot, the show is going to do for Hollywood and television what The West Wing did for government and the presidency: make an impassioned plea for the renewed relevance of (what he sees as) a declining institution by vigorously arguing that the institution should stop pandering to a backward, lowest common-denominator public and embrace the mores, tastes, and predilections of the cultured intellectual class. In other words, Sorkin has appointed himself official spokesperson for the interests of the coastal elite. Insert snarky latte joke here.

And to be honest, the stereotypical coastal elite couldn’t have asked for a better representative. Sorkin’s shows don’t just whine about the problems they perceive; they present almost-convincing models for how their chosen institutions could succeed with the sort of wit and class he desperately wishes they had. In The West Wing, Sorkin presented an alternative-universe Washington, just slightly different from the real one, in which brilliant, dedicated, well-intentioned progressives could keep their integrity and use a combination of wits and hard work to design good government and keep it working. In Sorkin’s Washington, it was actually possible to win public sentiment and elections by making smart, complex arguments in a debate and following them up with equally complicated, but effective, policy. In Sorkin’s Hollywood, no doubt, it will be possible to earn massive ratings, win battles with moral scolds, and create truly inspired, classic television simply by virtue of smarts, talent, dedication and good intentions. His is a liberal dream world, in which, despite rampant institutional failings, right overpowers might and a few good people can actually solve society’s biggest problems. In other words, it’s Michael Tolkin’s worldview of a failed system, but with a determinedly optimistic outlook.

What made Sorkin-era West Wing work so well, and what looks likely to be the case with Studio 60, is that the shows appear to actually work on their own premises: They’re the determined product of a couple of very dedicated, very smart people’s good intentions—and more often than not, they’re pretty damn good. Sorkin doesn't just argue for good television; he shows us how it can be done. In some ways, then, his shows serve as a rebuttal to Tolkin’s pessimism: For some of the best material being produced in Hollywood today, maybe he should stop looking to the big screen and flip on the (slightly) smaller one in his den instead.