ABC has a new show premiering Tuesday that seems to have all the ingredients Paul Fahri described as the recipe for TV success: an experienced director, tested writers and big-name stars. It also serves up a heaping helping of politics, but not politics as usual. Brooke is out this week, but she left us this consideration of the new drama called Commander-in-Chief.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: A few TV seasons back, President Jeb Bartlett, the Commander-in-Chief of NBC's long-lived The West Wing, made what my husband considered a very bad decision, a decision so bad his finger twitched over the remote, threatening TV impeachment. When he complained to a friend about Bartlett's poor judgment, she glared and said quietly, "That's my President you're talking about." And in a way, he is. [VIDEO CLIP - SOUND UP AND UNDER]

ACTOR: I want to introduce to you the man and honor all his extraordinary achievements for ordinary Americans, our President, our Commander, still the leader of our Democratic Party, President Josiah Bartlett!

BROOKE GLADSTONE: In a 500-channel universe, it's harder to craft a hit, harder to tap into the zeitgeist of a critical mass of potential viewers, harder to hold their gaze. [VIDEO CLIP - AUDIO UP AND UNDER]

JEB BARTLETT: Thank you. It's been an honor to serve you the past eight years. [AUDIENCE CHEERING]

BROOKE GLADSTONE: As faith in government erodes, The West Wing pulls in the eyeballs of American Democrats who crave an alternate reality, much as Rush Limbaugh captured the ears of Republicans two decades ago. But next Tuesday, another White House drama pitches tent in TV-land. This one on ABC, called Commander-in-Chief, features a non-partisan President, an independent who is, incidentally, also a woman. [FILM CLIP - SOUND UP AND UNDER]

MAN: I, Mackenzie Spencer Allen -

MACKENZIE SPENCER ALLEN [GEENA DAVIS]: I, Mackenzie S. Allen -

MAN: - do solemnly swear -

MACKENZIE SPENCER ALLEN [GEENA DAVIS]: Do solemnly swear -

MAN: That I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States.

MACKENZIE SPENCER ALLEN [GEENA DAVIS]: That I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States. [END FILM CLIP]

BROOKE GLADSTONE: Academy Award-wining actress Geena Davis is Mackenzie Allen. We first see her serving as Vice-President to a politically savvy conservative. When he suffers a stroke, the dying President asks her to resign so that the wily House Speaker, a man who more closely reflects his views, can replace her. She agrees. Then she meets with the Speaker, played by Donald Sutherland. [FILM CLIP]

NATHAN TEMPLETON [DONALD SUTHERLAND]: You know that your Vice-Presidency was never, ever intended to be a Presidency. It was done as a stunt. I mean, you can see that. You're a female. You're an independent. You're a teacher.

MACKENZIE SPENCER ALLEN [GEENA DAVIS]: Mm, university Chancellor.

NATHAN TEMPLETON [DONALD SUTHERLAND]: A - a philosopher queen. But the point is it was all done as pure theater. And you got great reviews, but now you should get off the stage while the audience still loves you and before they figure out that your Vice-Presidency was a whole lot of nothing. [END FILM CLIP]

BROOKE GLADSTONE: She exercises a woman's prerogative. She changes her mind. Now, this could set some viewers against her from the start. After all, shouldn't she follow the wishes of her President? Her conservative daughter thinks so. [FILM CLIP]

REBECCA ALLEN [CAITLIN WACHS]: I just think that people voted for what President Bridges believes in.

HORACE ALLEN [MATT LANTER]: You - you mean what you believe in.

REBECCA: I just - you know, if - if you can't deliver, then - then maybe you should step aside. [END FILM CLIP]

BROOKE GLADSTONE: Then again, it is her constitutional obligation to serve. It's what the electorate expects. So the series kicks off with the first of many ethical dilemmas that she resolves independently.

ROD LURIE: One of the things that we're really aiming to do by making her an Independent is, A, giving her a lot of enemies, you know, Democrats and Republicans, and B making less predictable what her position on certain issues will be.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: Rod Lurie is the show's executive producer, director and one of its writers.

ROD LURIE: You know, part of the wish fulfillment that we had with Ross Perot when we thought he was actually sane was that this was a guy beholden to no party. He didn't need dough. All he needed to do for the legacy of his life was to do the right thing. And I think that our - our Independent President is going to be just that.

MARIE WILSON: Television can tell you who can lead. [LAUGHS] Television can show you what you can be, even when you can't see it in the real world.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: Mary Wilson is the President of the White House Project, which aims to see a woman in the White House. She's also co-creator of Take Our Daughters to Work Day. She notes that the movie portrayals of political women have progressed since 1964's Kisses for my President, when Polly Bergen resigned her post as leader of the free world after she became pregnant. Since then we've seen a masterful Vice President in Glenn Close when the President's plane was hijacked in Air Force One, and a dignified Joan Allen as a VP nominee smeared by a sex scandal in The Contender, also by Rod Lurie. Now, says, Wilson, we need a woman President and we need her on the small screen.

MARIE WILSON: You don't have a consistent image of a Bartlett, like on West Wing [LAUGHS], you know, somebody that people would like to see be the President. You don't have a Dennis Haysbert on 24, who has been very clear as the first African-American man to play a series Presidential role that he changed the probabilities of an African-American President by that role.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: But how to depict a President of the female persuasion? We could look to the real world. This week in Germany, opposition leader Angela Merkel won a narrow victory over Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder. This week in Ukraine, President Viktor Yushchenko was struggling to replace the popular Prime Minister he fired, Yulia Tymoshenko. But neither of them have etched themselves on the American consciousness. Americans are more likely to think of, say, Britain's Margaret Thatcher.

MARIE WILSON: Which is to be a woman in drag - you know, a - a man in drag, so to speak. That's not what we're after. We're after women bringing a different voice, a different vision and different policies to the table.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: Wilson points to that scene in the Oval Office with the House Speaker when the gauntlet is thrown.

MARIE WILSON: He challenges her about: "Say here, right here in front of me, say that you want this power." [MUSIC UP AND UNDER] [FILM CLIP]

NATHAN TEMPLETON [DONALD SUTHERLAND]: In this room, [LAUGHS] where it's just you and me, just the two of us, the answer that you should be giving me is that you want to be President because you want the power. You want the power to control the universe.

MACKENZIE SPENCER ALLEN [GEENA DAVIS]: That's not me.

NATHAN TEMPLETON [DONALD SUTHERLAND]: Well, that's the problem! That's what I'm telling you. People who don't want power have no idea what to do with it. They have no idea how to use it when they have it.

MACKENZIE SPENCER ALLEN [GEENA DAVIS]: Mr. Speaker, I would very much like an invitation to address a Joint Session of Congress tomorrow night.

NATHAN TEMPLETON [DONALD SUTHERLAND]: For the funeral?

MACKENZIE SPENCER ALLEN [GEENA DAVIS]: Before the markets open. We want to convince the world there's no crisis of leadership, right? [END FILM CLIP]

MARIE WILSON: It's a non-heroic style, which is a good model for us right now because heroic leadership is at an end. [LAUGHS] We need non-heroic styles of leadership that acknowledge you need relationships with other people, with other countries.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: Rod Lurie underscores that difference in style by making Commander-in-Chief a domestic drama as much as a political one. His President is a mother, very much involved with her young daughter and her teenage twins, one of each gender.

ROB LURIE: What differentiates us from [LAUGHS] other - other shows dealing with the White House [OVERTALK] -

BROOKE GLADSTONE: Oh, say the "W word." We all know it's in the air.

ROB LURIE: Well, the - you know, the - the - you know, the -

BROOKE GLADSTONE: [LAUGHS] Can't say it, can you? [LAUGHS]

ROB LURIE: Yeah, of course I can. Of course I can. The - what differentiates us from - from The West Wing, among many, many, many things is that we also show what the impact of the Presidency has on a family.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: Much more than that "other show." So in future episodes she'll handle a Russian summit, a terrorist threat and even a major hurricane. But she'll also deal with the sexual awakening of her daughter, the high school shenanigans of her son and a loving husband - also named Rod, incidentally - who she has to fire as Chief of Staff out of concern the public would think he was running the country.

RENITA FENNICK: It's hard not to instantly like Mackenzie Allen. She's beautiful, a loving wife and dedicated mother of three who makes it clear early on that she does not lust for power.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: Conservative columnist Renita Fennick reads from her recent piece in the Wilkes-Barre Times Leader.

RENITA FENNICK: The influential people in entertainment land want us to respect and admire Davis' character Mackenzie Allen so much that we will give serious thought to electing a woman President in 2008. And they want it to be Hillary Clinton.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: So is that the subtext here?

ROB LURIE: It certainly never even remotely crossed my mind that we were creating any sort of Trojan horse for her. And, you know, you're going to see Democrat villains as well as Republican villains within the context of the future of - of the show.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: Independence with a capital "I" could well prove to be a dramatic windfall for the series. It could also provide some political cover against charges of knee-jerk Hollywood liberalism. Stuart Stevens, a Republican media operative who served on Bush's election team, is a consulting producer for Commander-in-Chief. Now, Stevens says he wouldn't vote for Jeb Bartlett.

STUART STEVENS: But I would vote for Mac - I could see myself voting for the Mackenzie Allen that's in the show. There's no question that she would have much more appeal to Republicans and more conservatives. Much more. And it helps Condi Rice as much it might help Hillary Clinton.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: Well, maybe. But Condi insists she's not running. Rod Lurie.

ROB LURIE: Let me say one thing which I think is important. I think that after a year's time, what'll happen to Geena Davis in the show will be what will happen if we ever actually have a - a woman President, and that is that the fact that she's a woman will begin to disappear as an important factor of her being.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: Whether Mackenzie Allen becomes your President - or mine - is an interesting question. Because she's not running against Bush. She's running against Bartlett, or rather his successor, either Alan Alda's principled Republican or the conscientious liberal played by Jimmy Smits, good guys all who strive to be ethical in their pursuit of office and show us their sensitive sides. Who knows? They may even be allowed to cry. We'll really have to forget that Geena Davis is a woman, a tall order, needless to say to say, before it's safe for her to shed a tear.

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