Stop Whistling, Start Listening

Strong women on TV - CJ Cregg: The second in an occasional series

It was when I was recently re-watching episodes of The West Wing that the idea of doing this occasional series occurred to me as, without doubt, Claudia Jean Cregg is one of the most fabulous characters to ever grace our TV screens.

The West Wing was, for many reasons, a fantastic show. It was smart, well-written, funny, dramatic, sad and absolutely addictive. I initially caught the first few episodes on More 4 when they began rerunning it a few years ago. I missed one or two and just had to buy the box set of Season One to catch up. I now own all 7 seasons. All of the characters were people I wanted to know in real life. I wanted to work there and engage in brilliant banter while solving the world’s problems - I wanted to be CJ Cregg (I completely blame this period of frantic West Wing-watching for the fact that I signed up for my Diploma in Politics and Government with the Open University at this time).

So what made CJ so brilliant? She was fantastically smart for one thing. As White House Press Secretary she was the public face of the Presidency. She was the one in the front lines, facing reporters after assassination attempts on the President, when it was announced he had MS and had not disclosed it when seeking election, and when the President’s daughter was kidnapped. And that was just the big events. Every episode brought new issues for CJ to raise in the press briefings and be interrogated by reporters about. At all times she remained cool, professional and brilliant. It was always interesting to see her briefed on her way to the press room about some military, economic or medical issues and then breeze through the briefing as if she was an expert.

In later episodes, CJ became President Bartlet’s Chief of Staff after Leo McGarry suffered a heart attack. She was Leo’s own recommendation on a list with only one name. It was a very different role but she never tried to fill Leo’s shoes, making it her own.

On top of all the serious business of the White House, CJ was funny. She was capable of fantastic put-downs and could hold her own with all the White House boys. Anyone who’s seen her lip-synch performance of The Jackal couldn’t doubt her cool humour and her reaction to finding out that her secret service assignation was ‘Flamingo’ was also priceless (she describes them as ‘ridiculous-looking’). Best of all was the episode where Sesame Street came to the White House and CJ met her much-despised namesake, Big Bird.

Best of all though, CJ was all woman. She was tough, smart and mouthy but she managed to be all those things without being ‘one of the boys’. She looked as fab in her day-to-day work suits as she did in black Vera Wang gowns. She was sexy and flirty when having fun, but was professional and serious when situations demanded. The men all seemed to adore her for who she was and she walked tall and proud through the West Wing hallways.

The West Wing actually had several fantastically written female characters. I always loved Dr. Abigail Bartlet, the President’s wife, for her strength, her feminism and her counsel to the President. Amy Gardner appeared on and off over the years but always made me laugh. Her relationship with Josh Lyman was great, but I was gutted when she effectively lost her job having done battle with him politically. It’s also hard to match Ainsley Hayes for sheer impact on the show, and in the fictional White House. Her spirited argument against the Equal Rights Amendment was also quite genuine food for thought. Finally, it was always a great moment when Nancy McNally entered a room as National Security Advisor. Her cool authority on military matters was inpsiring.

But as one of the main, recurring characters, CJ Cregg was fantastic to watch. Of course, all of this is fictional drama, so respect has to go to the fabulous Allison Janney for making CJ the woman we love and portraying her with such grace and wit. Seeing a woman characterised with such quiet, undramatic authority was a genuine joy to watch in each and every episode.