Impeachment: American Crime Story asks us to reconsider Linda Tripp
The season-three premiere works as a dizzying and soapy villain origin story.
TV Reviews Linda Tripp
From the multimedia campaign Impeachment: American Crime Story has unleashed, it could be assumed that the protagonist of FX’s anthology docudrama is Monica Lewinsky. Beanie Feldstein, playing the world’s most famous intern, is on the poster wearing Lewinksy’s infamous beret, and graced the cover of The Hollywood Reporter with the real Lewinsky. The first trailer ends with an ominous shot of Feldstein-as-Lewinsky and Bill Clinton (Clive Owen) in the Oval Office.
If you take another look at the trailer, though, there is a voice that predominates, and it belongs to Linda Tripp, played by Sarah Paulson. It’s a clue that this re-examination of the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal may have a very different main character than initially believed. And though this might change as the season unfolds, the first episode of Impeachment gives Tripp the role that eluded her during her professional career—that of a star.
The season premiere, “Exiles,” mostly functions to set up the many disparate threads that will culminate in impeachment. As such, it can be a lot to keep up with and might require a few quick trips to Wikipedia to fill in the gaps. It highlights four different moments: Lewinsky being ambushed by FBI agents at a mall in January 1998, Tripp’s demotion from White House staff member to Pentagon clog in 1993, Paula Jones’ decision to accuse Bill Clinton of sexual harassment in 1994, and Lewinsky and Tripp’s burgeoning friendship in 1996.
If your head is spinning already, it’s understandable. After all the ink spilled over the years about the sexual aspect of it all, it’s easy to forget that the scandal didn’t start with a stained blue dress. It was meant to be a detail in another controversy: the Whitewater affair.
Tripp is so over the Clintons by the time we see her working as a secretary in the office of White House counsel Bernie Nussbaum (Kevin Pollak). She never liked them to begin with. Coming off as the resident Karen-from-Accounting meme, she is annoying to her fellow colleagues and oblivious to their disdain. She has an outsized sense of self-importance, constantly mentioning how she will be summoned to testify at this and that thing. She waxes poetic about the Bushes, admiring their sense of protocol. She scoffs at the pizza party on casual Fridays, finds it insulting that Hillary Clinton (Edie Falco) uses the communal bathroom, and namedrops any Republican she can think of. She’s competent but inept at social cues—a mortal sin in any political job, even if that job entails bringing a hamburger to your boss.
The only person who seems to appreciate her is Deputy White House counsel Vincent Foster. When he dies by suicide, it has the unintended consequence of putting Tripp’s job at risk. Convinced that she will be a key figure in the Whitewater investigation, she constantly eavesdrops on Nussbaum’s conversations and takes a meeting with scheming literary agent Lucianne Goldberg (a glorious Margo Martindale). She first pitches a book about Foster, but Goldberg brushes it away, noting no one cares about a sad story. She needs something big.
The urgency to secure her position in the White House intensifies when Nussbaum announces that a new Counsel, Lloyd Cutler, is taking his place. Tripp convinces professionally frustrated but well-connected aide Kathleen Willey to set up a meeting with the two of them and Cutler. The plan is to convince him to hire them both. Despite having been previously groped by the president, Willey agrees. Such is her desperation to be something more than the socialite wife volunteer.
The meeting is a disaster for Tripp, who spends her time complaining about her former Dem bosses while singing the praises of the Republicans. When she receives notice that she’s being transferred to the Pentagon—with a raise and promotion to match—the only one surprised is Tripp. “I’m being exiled to Siberia!” she yells in her best “speak-to-your-manager” tone at the human resource manager, who notes that no one wants her in the White House. She becomes even more incensed when she discovers that Willey was offered a job as a secretary, accusing her of only getting the position because of Clinton’s sexual interest in her. Willey responds with a sentence meant to destroy Tripp’s own sense of self: “The President has no idea who you are.”
As writing instructors will tell you anywhere, a character’s wants and motivations are crucial to the development of plot. In this take, Tripp is looking for petty revenge against her friend— “I thought we were women supporting each other” she tells Willey. Furthermore, she’s looking for real vengeance against a workplace that cares so little about her, there’s almost no need to make her disappear. To many, she doesn’t even exist.
The question of course is how? Part of that is answered by Paula Jones (Annaleigh Ashford), with her big hair and Arkansas accent bordering on mockery, and Steve (Taran Killam), her man-child of a husband. A mention of her supposed encounter with Clinton in a magazine has Steve worried about his non-existent acting career, because Jones’ traumatizing experience is clearly all about him. Her decision to pursue legal action with a small-town lawyer is framed as a way to calm down Steve. All she wants is an apology and a role for Steve in Designing Women. What she gets instead is a spot on the 1994 CPAC lineup, where reporters play Twenty Questions and a ghoul by the name of Ann Coulter (Cobie Smulders) sees an opportunity.
Soon Paula is whisked away to a meeting in the law offices of Cammarata and Davis, drawing the president’s private parts and praying to the church of Delta Burke that she gets what she wants. Instead, she is pushed by Steve and the lawyers to file a suit, with no time to spare, because statute of limitations waits for no woman. And the rest is history!
Except, not yet. Tripp is still a non-entity by the time she meets her new, young co-worker in 1996. She must be someone’s “pet rock,” Tripp muses during the lunch break where she and Lewinsky bond. Lewinsky denies this. She too is in exile. She is also lonely. The man she’s involved with in unavailable. Tripp then plays her own version of Twenty Questions, but she doesn’t need answers to know it must be someone important. She calls Goldberg with the news. She wanted big? She’s going to get it.
Stray observations
- Extremely brief explanation of what the hell the Whitewater controversy was: the Clintons made a bad investment on some land with a guy named James McDougal. McDougal late went on to defraud a firm and a savings and loan association. Allegations were brought that the Clintons were somehow involved.
- We will not be trafficking in Vincent Foster conspiracy theories, mmmmkay? Not in this house.
- For anyone nostalgic about old tech, this episode is a delight. Beepers, pay phones, slow-churning computers, printers the size of a small house—a nice walk down electronic memory lane.
- Talking about old timey memorabilia, the sartorial choices are a treat. It’s hard to remember truly how uninspired DC fashion was before Michelle Obama dared to grace us with her presence, but costumes here take the dowdiness a step further. Despite it being the ’90s, Tripp dresses like a woman stuck in time by opting for bottleneck glasses and the boxiest of shoulder pads. Jones is also portrayed as being incapable of letting go of the 80s heydays, as if her Little Rock ways were impervious to Californias’ influence.
- I promise we will talk about the prosthetics in future recaps. Oh my God, the prosthetics. That prosthetics budget needs its own independent counsel.
180 Comments
The Whitewater saga has to be one of the stupidest fucking scandals ever. It’s so complicated and full of innuendo which never went anywhere in particular, yet became a springboard for all sorts of other bullshit.
So if I understand the (edit: core sequence – I know Whitewater was a separate real estate related thing) sequence of events, an intern who got a placement to the White House had the intention of fucking the president when she got there and instead of sending her elsewhere or at least continuing to rebuff her advances, Clinton got his dick sucked by her (I think, I’ve never been quite sure what happened) and then for some fucking reason, she kept the dress with semen (ugh) on it, felt the need to tell Tripp who felt the need to tape record this and one thing led to another (Why did any of the people involved in this behave like this? None of this behaviour is normal!) and it seems like this was one of the myriad parts of the jigsaw that led to Gore marginally lost the election and that led to Bush the even Lesser and fucking us all. Am I wrong in thinking that to varying degrees all the people involved can just fuck off?People keep saying Gore should have used Clinton on the campaign trail but that’s not such an easy decision without hindsight given how puritanical the US is as proven by this whole bullshit scandal.I mean look at Clinton and that whole depends on the definition of what “is” is. If we mere plebs tried that in court, we’d be proper fucked.
Bill Clinton was forcing himself on women long before Lewinsky, legit following interns into their rooms with one claiming he raped her. I don’t know why people try and paint Clinton as some dimwit and Lewinsky as something as reductive as some seductress, he’s a predator.
I haven’t watched this yet (I’m still at work) but both the book this is based on, as well as Monica herself in more recent interviews) both made it clear she was attracted to Clinton and that she wanted to pursue him.This isn’t it any to excuse Clinton himself, his ongoing behaviour towards women, the shockingly unequal power dynamic or the horrible treatment of Monica in the press.But it is disingenuous for anyone to suggest she was either utterly passive or did not play an active role in pursuing a sexual relationship with Clinton.
I never said she had no agency, but the level of coercion with her being very young(and that’s not to be dismissive) and him being not only her boss but also the actual president kind of negates anyone’s argument that somehow Lewinksy deserved what she got. And really, that’s what people are saying when they say “well she consented”. I think the power imbalance is just so greatly immeasurable here that consent and what that really means is something people have to take into consideration, and not just the black and white legal thinking about what consent is. Clinton is a predator, and he would have continued doing this to more women. He abused his position and abused Lewinksy.
To be clear, I wasn’t saying you were making that argument but others certainly have argued it when it’s fundamentally not true, at least up until the point at which Tripp sold her out to the FBI.Once you reach that point then she absolutely became a pawn between a whole bunch of competing interests who didn’t give a shit about her.
Yes that’s fair, I think from Clinton to Tripp to the FBI to the Public, Lewinsky endured an insane amount of coercion and really wasn’t in a position to give her consent to anything.what a mind fuck that must have been, I don’t know if I would have made it out without self harming myself.
It’s still wrong for a boss to give jobs to interns cause they put out, even if she wanted to suck his dick, especially if it’s the government.It’s not that much different than Harvey Weinstein’s casting couch.
She was a very young woman who made a massively idiotic decision (which she has paid for many, many times over) and he was a grown-ass man who should have known better and said no thanks. Tripp was a grifter working this situation to her benefit and Hillary didn’t care because that was the deal she’d struck in order to be married to a rising political star. NO ONE looks good in this story.
Agreed. Even before the onset of #MeToo educating people en masse (myself included) about how chronic perpetrators operate, back then I still even thought “that’s A LOT of F-ing smoke surrounding just one man.”*But he was able to coast by on his charm by doing things like playing sax on The Arsenio Hall Show. Ugh.*(And I say this as a die-hard super progressive Leftocrat).
I semi-felt bad for Bush the Elder in that regard, as many fucked up things as he did he was being judged far more by how “fun” he was, and his own wife’s looks. By all accounts he was a smart guy and hard worker, and cared for the country in his own way. He just wasn’t the tv quipper type. He also did his best to resist the stupidity his boss dredged up and actually raised taxes when needed, and didn’t go into full-scale war with Iraq. If only his son paid attention.
Clinton can be both. I don’t think you need to be a Rhodes Scholar (which I think he is) to be a creep.
To be more exact:Linda Tripp got an exile “promotion” out of the White House to the Pentagon Paula Jones sued Bill Clinton for sexual harassments but is mocked, belittled, etc because the press is in the bag for Clinton and don’t want to rock the boat. Jones’ suit is financed and researched by a cabal of people who want to get rid of Clinton through any means necessary, that include among other people Anne Coulter and Future Supreme Court Justice Kavanaugh, among others. Bill start using young intern Monica Lewinsky for oral sex meanwhile Kenneth Star is named special prosecutor to investigate Whitewater (a bad land deal which the Clintons were involved in and spirals out of control into a witch hunt to find dirt to hang on Clinton)
Bill has Monica exiled to the Pentagon when Monica starts getting to clingy to his liking; but not before he cums all over a blue dress of hers which she secretly hides away as a souvenir. She befriends Linda Tripp, who starts recording their conversations about the affair and gives them to Paula Jones’ lawyer. They finally get Bill in front of a grand jury and he denies committing adultery. The tapes make their way to Kenneth Star, who now has Bill dead to rights for perjury. Monica gets taken into custody and interrogated. Word leaks out about the affair but the Clinton loving media covers it up, until Matt Drudge finds out and breaks the story (and media coverup conspiracy) online. Everyone follows suit. Bill gets Hillary to helping him smear Monica’s good name to the press and screams she’s a lying slut and it’s a right wing plot against her husband’s Presidency. WHEN Hillary finds out the truth, is left vague but by late summer 1998, the blue dress is produced as irrefutable proof Bill is lying to the public and the DNC and the elites basically have to bribe Hillary with a New York Senator seat and potentially the White House/Presidency to keep her from dumping Bill on the spot. The GOP file impeachment against Bill Clinton but then Bob Guccione of Hustler, starts soliciting women to come forward with affairs they had with GOP Congressmen and uses that to blackmail Newt Gingrich into resigning as Speaker and force his replacement to resign too.
Before being blackmailed, Newt goes hard in on the impeachment to get a super majority to convict but fails. In the void left by his departure, Tom DeLay rises and makes the GOP double down thinking they can shame the Democrats into removing Clinton from office.
They fail….. Clinton is impeached but then acquitted at trial.
Ironically the entire impeachment process also saves social security as Clinton and Newt were about to privatize social security when the scandal hit and Newt called off talks.
Clinton ironically remains insanely popular but that’s because no one cares about him being an adulterer and more to the point the 90s boom is still going strong so no one wants to rock the boat. However, Gore aligns with Joseph Lieberman, one of Bill’s biggest critics in the DNC during the impeachment scandal and refuses to let Bill campaign for him claiming he would “taint things” for Gore. Gore loses. Linda Tripp is a pariah. Monica does a reality TV show host gig for a show that is decent but only lasts one season then disappears. I forget how the Paula Jones stuff ended. Coulter gets famous and fucks Bill Maher on and off over the years, Kavanaugh gets falsely accused of rape by a coke slut, and we have to endure the DNC constantly trying to make Hillary President to pay her off for not leaving Bill.
From what I remember many if not most people were more sympathetic to Clinton than to the Republicans by the end of the scandal, so I dunno if that’s really evidence that Americans are puritanical.
I think that’s because while most people thought the whole thing was gross and embarrassing, he hardly deserved to be impeached over it. Classic political overreach.
Exactly. Poll after poll after poll showed the American public did not GAF about his getting a hummer in the White House, or his lying about it. No one cared, other than GOP politicians.
I have friends who used to work for various Senators and from their perspective a majority of mid- to lower-level staffers and functionaries are there entirely because being at the center of power feeds their already inflated egos, with a heavy helping of unearned arrogance. Look at Tripp. She was a secretary who somehow believed her proximity to power made her important (and found out in brutal fashion how untrue that was).
Other reasons why Gore lost was because he was a plank of wood trying to follow a super charismatic dude who was great at being a politician. He also lost because over 200K registered Florida Democrats voted for Bush (some put the number at over 300K). How are you going to win an election when so many of your own party defect? Hell, he couldn’t even win his home state of Tennessee, which would have easily put him over the top, regardless of the Florida vote. Also, it’s pretty rare for the party in the white house to win three presidential elections in a row. And who knows, maybe if he let Bill get out there for him, it would have swayed enough voters, but I doubt it. lockbox
Clinton behaved like this because he wanted sex. A lot. Plus, an adoring intern was good for his ego. Plus, Presidents are insanely lonely and it’s a really weird job with intense hours.Lewinsky behaved like this (having sex with the president) because she wanted sex, and probably because she wanted to ‘bag’, as it were, a major celebrity. Also, because she was a naive young woman completely out of her depth, and she felt a confused combination of personal and political loyalties. She kept the dress partly as a trophy and partly as collateral, because she wasn’t ENTIRELY naive. She talked to Tripp because she was naive, and lonely, and also probably a bit scared, and maybe even because in the massively unequal relationship with Clinton, she wanted to have her own secrets and leverage.
Tripp behaved like this because she wanted fame and fortune, and because she wanted revenge on people she thought looked down on her and humiliated her.The Republicans behaved like this because they wanted to remove Clinton, but even more so because they were just realising they needed some focal point to unite their party, which was difficult to deliver without the white house, and all-out attack on the white house seemed like good politics. Particularly because Clinton was a Democrat who’d won the South, and they wanted to put a stop to that sort of thing, and culture-warring the Democrats as immoral cosmopolitans seemed like a good way to win the South back for good.This all seems very natural behaviour, to me!
Clinton behaved like this because he sexually assaulted numerous women before Lewinsky, and took advantage of an eager intern. Bill was vile, don’t reduce the harm he did.
Monica didn’t make the choice to keep the stained dress herself; she was convinced to keep it dirty “just in case” by Linda Tripp. She was young and naïve thinking that Tripp was a friend whom she could confide in.
Gore used Clinton just enough, people were tired of him by then, or at least 900ish Floridians were, along with New Hampshire and Gore’s own state. And at that time personal morals were indeed a huge issue, even Gingrich had to step down due to his massive hypocrisy
“…how puritanical the US is if you’re a Democrat as proven by this whole bullshit scandal. Same rules don’t apply to Republicans as proven by electing President Orange Asshole.” FTFY
As for the “is” exchange, Clinton was trying to “lawyer” his way through a question, but I think many people would try to do the same. The context, they were asking if he was lying when he told aides “there’s nothing going on between us”. The gist of his “depends on what the meaning of ‘is’ is” was that if one reads ‘is’ as meaning ‘there never has been’ anything going on, that’s one interpretation, but if one hears ‘is’ as “right now”, then the day he said it it was a true statement.
He was trying to be too clever. But I think most people have been asked about something, in work or relationship or something, and tried to thread a needle (“I never got the email with that memo” when one did get a print out of it… technically not lying, but being deceptive). Though doing so under oath versus in a meeting are two different things, to be sure.
This is why I am often quick to dismiss conspiracy theories… you stop to consider how many people it would take to pull it off – say, the thousands to fake the moon landing as well as foreign powers who spy on us and would love to embarass us – yet this was a guy in a side office getting a BJ, just 2 people in the room, and we know all about it.
As a side note as to how Americans and other English speaking countries are divided by a common language, did you remember that time news reports in the US excitedly announced they’d found a ‘condominium’ that Lewinsky had inherited in Western Sydney?Now when we hear the word ‘condominium’ down here, don’t we think of something fancy and kind of luxurious? Turns out it was an apartment in Bankstown or something like that.Interview with the tenant went like you’d expect. “Did you know Monica Lewinsky owns your apartment?”/”No I didn’t.”(proviso: this was a long time ago and memory could be to any degree wrong about all of this)
noun: condominium1. North American a building or complex of buildings containing a number of individually owned apartments or houses.each of the individual apartments or houses in a condominium complex.the
system of ownership by which condominiums operate, in which owners have
full title to the individual apartment or house and an undivided
interest in the shared parts of the property.A condominium isn’t necessarily fancy or not fancy. It’s just that you own your part of the real estate rather than rent.
If people still think of condominiums as being luxury apartments, they are sadly behind the times. There has been a wave of condominification of apartments over the last 20 or so years that includes many of the shittiest apartments in the shittiest parts of town.
Yep, this.
And it made Mike Huckabee a thing. Sorry America.
It smacks of Old Money Legacy-Rich beating up on Nu Money Rich-Wannabes. “A failed property-flip … The Horror!”
Even Donald Trump wouldn’t have found himself in such a stupid real estate development fuck up without at least extracting some money.
I used to assume Paula Jones was a golddigger, but that was before Harvey Weinstein and Louis CK and the whole dick pic thing, I just had no idea how much guys liked surprising women with their dicks.I’m about 99% sure she was telling the truth now.I bet James Carville is sweating when they get to where he drags her so hard over an accusation that he certainly knew was valid. I’ve always liked the guy, but in retrospect, that was just so wrong. They tried to destroy her, and they kinda did. Like I said, I bought it.
I seem to remember that she had originally said he did it at the end of the day, late afternoon, but after it was reported that he had only been there briefly, early in the morning, she switched her story to the incident taking place early in the morning. I don’t know if it happened or not, but I’m at far less than 99% on it (not at zero though).
Surprise!
Good for Monica for getting a chance to tell her story. She was a consenting (albeit young) adult who made a bad choice, lived with it and done so with grace. I hope they show Ken Starr preying on and terrorizing a young woman into sharing humiliating, private information completely irrelevant to the actual investigation. He was such a scumbag and continues to slime his way through life. I really thought he’d be dead by now. I also feel bad that Hillary and Chelsea have to deal with this again. I know so many women who were cheated on and it is devastating. Hillary is tough, smart, for some dumb reason half of the country HATES her-but she is a human being and I think that gets overlooked. Bill was a terrible husband. But a much better one than the last POS POTUS. And no I will not rethink Linda Tripp. Nope nope nope she was a terrible person.
Bill wasn’t just a terrible husband, he was serial sex offender. I don’t know the dynamics of his and Hilary’s relationship but I’m happy Lewinksy has the ability to reclaim some of the agency Bill took from her, and I hope it gives some peace to the other women who have accused him and were not listened to because of his political power.
I’m so glad Monica was an EP on this.And yeah, I don’t know the dynamics of that marriage either but I definitely knew it was wrong that somehow more people walked out of that scandal hating Hillary for it than Bill.
The Republicans focused on Hillary as Bill could not be elected again. Hillary could be elected, so she was the primary target on hate radio.
For many, and not my opinion just what I have seen, it was because Bill did what he did but that was “boys will be boys” kind of stuff. Hillary was hated because she “allowed it” by not divorcing him, etc. Their belief being that Bill was just doing what guys will do (not true) but that by not divorcing him or anything then obviously she had to be in on it, knew about it, or accepted it, and that as a woman that was wrong of her.Again, to be clear, I am not saying this is the correct thinking in any way shape or form. Just what I have heard having grown up in that time frame (young, but old enough that this was discussed around me and I could understand what they were saying).
He was undoubtedly that but the only person who is gonna come through this story looking good is Monica Lewinsky and she is the only person who should
In what way should she look good? Her punishment was definitely disproportionate to her “crime,” but her actions were not commendable. No one else’s actions really were either, though.
People forget that although there was a massive power imbalance in the relationship (him being President and all), she was the actual aggressor by her own account. She was the one that pursued the relationship. I don’t know why everyone forgets that. It’s in the public record.
Yes! And how can we expect the most powerful man in the world to say no to an intern half his age and NOT insert cigars into her cooch while in the oval office?!You’re a clown, dude.
I still think they could have gotten some Democrats on board the impeachment if the included the workplace sexual harassment… except so many of the Republicans would have to have started impeachment procedings against themselves.
I’m not even sure I understand how the phrase is being applied here — the show paints Linda Tripp as a massive monstrous shit-tastic villain. So I guess the “rethink” only applies if someone went into this thinking she was decent?
“for some reason” is decades of hate spewed into Middle America by Rush Limbaugh who used her as a boogeyman to sell his show. He lied about her for likely 10,000 hours of airtime. The last guy on a similar mission was Adolf Hitler lying about the Jews to get himself in a position of power. Rush was too addicted to various things to go that direction.
Nah.Regardless of Limbaugh or the Republicans, Hillary herself just isn’t that likeable.I don’t like her because i still remember her stance on video games. And her warhawk bullshit during the Obama years. She manages to combine the worst parts of aggressive neo-liberal ideology and fairly naked ambition, without the innate compassion and empathy that makes, say, Obama likeable.What I mean is, you look at someone like Barack Obama, or even Joe Biden and they at least try to show how that they are in political service to help others. Hillary always came of as being primarily interested in fostering her own ambition without a real vision for how to make America better.
Misogynists call Hillary and other strong women unlikable the same way racists call black people uppity.
You liked Trump more than Hillary because he spoke the same bigoted language as you. Hillary told you black lives matter, and you hated her for it. She warned that Trump was lying about Mexico paying for that stupid wall you wanted so badly, and you ignored her. She pointed out that Putin was pulling the strings on Trump, and you called her crazy.Thankfully, January 6th exposed you QAnon cultists as dangerous terrorists rather than just annoying internet trolls. Now, history will show all Hillary-haters were truly enemies of democracy.
I think too that Hill and Bill couldn’t shake their type A lawyering inclinations. Her whole career when someone lobbed a bullshit conspiracy or character attack at her, her (and their) go-to strategy was to clam-up and take a dozen secret meetings on the subject. “As my own appointed counsel to myself, I have advised myself not to respond.”Repubs took that (still always take that) as a “I’m not hearing a ‘No’ [tee hee].”The Clinton’s lived-in defensive crouch over Bill’s creepy philandering is probably the reason Hillary couldn’t win the presidency. They were locked into this 24/7 mindset that she spent her whole young adult life building to a top-tier level. When you do it long enough at that intensity, it becomes how you handle everything. Sorry for the rant. Lawyers are basically fucking the country. The GOP is using Mad-Scientist style lawyers to get their way, and Dems are bogged down in defensive-crouch lawyering.
That is basically it, as popular as Bill is he made some huge problems for Hillary in both 2008 and 2016, like the whole tarmac situation. They should know better than anyone what will give the GOP mob more fuel.
That is basically it, as popular as Bill is he made some huge problems for Hillary in both 2008 and 2016, like the whole tarmac situation. They should know better than anyone what will give the GOP mob more fuel.I’d be inclined to agree, but then the GOP mob is perfectly happy to invent fuel (see: Swiftboating) where there is none. It’s become their standard playbook.
Hillary had a lot of problems as a politician, but lacking a real vision is a weird thing to throw at her, of all people. She’s always been the ideas one – both times she ran, she did so with probably the most detailed proposals of any serious presidential candidate, and could answer questions about the minutiae of her plans on the fly. She was famously a ‘wonk’ (politician who cares more about policy details than optics). Whereas Obama’s plan was pretty much just to get power and assume he’d solve the problems just by being himself, which is why half his policies were taken from Clinton. During the primaries, for instance, Clinton ran on the basis of what would later be called Obamacare, while Obama opposed it, without a serious alternative option. Instead, he concentrated on slogans on his side (hope, yes we can) and attacks on Clinton’s ‘likeability’.
I’m not saying Clinton would necessarily have made a better president than Obama. But it’s clear which one of them had a specific vision to make America better!
She definitely had wonky ideas, but selling them was an issue for her. A few times in the debates she basically said “go to my website” as an answer. Still was better than TFG by a mile
What I mean is, you look at someone like Barack Obama, or even Joe Biden
and they at least try to show how that they are in political service to
help others. Hillary always came of as being primarily interested in fostering her own ambition without a real vision for how to make America better.She’s responsible for getting children public health care. And it STARTED as her wanting to overhaul health care in the entire NATION. She was the first one to really make a First Lady’s pet project an actual policy goal.You know the “fostering her own selfish ambition” accusation is only ever lobbed at women politicians, yes? And OMG SPARE me the “see, I knew you’d call me sexist! I’m not sexist just for disliking Hillary!” But, like, nobody would ever accuse Obama or Biden OR BILL CLINTON of doing the same thing, and Bill Clinton bombed Eastern Europe when the impeachment scandal was heating up. He literally did a war to get Ken Starr off his back and further his own political ambitions.
I’m old enough to remember when Hillary was considered a secret militant lesbian leftist. Hey, I wish.
My point is not she IS that way. My point is that she, herself, irrespective of any Republican smear campaign, “appears” to be that.Being not particularly personable or charismatic is not a character flaw. But it is a problem if you want to advance in a political career.Nor is it a specifically gendered issue. Plenty of male politicians, on both sides of the aisle, lack charisma. And plenty of female politicians have it. Hell, nobody accused Sarah Palin, for all her myriad and obvious sins, of being unlikeable. Nor is it an issue for Kamala Harris, for example.Hillary’s problem with her public perception is not due to her gender. Or due solely to Republican criticism. It’s just her.
the public perception of Hilary is so rooted in sexism compared to someone like Harris who wasn’t known to the public till recently. I think Hilary(and Biden) are both too conservative for America to see any major changes happen, but peoples hesitations towards Hilary seems to be the tired idea that her ambition is too obvious? like come on.
Except for that whole massive healthcare plan …. which was seen as overreaching for the First Lady and resulted in a lot of backlash.
It is not Hillary’s fault she did not want to bake cookies and everyone in 1993 really wanted her to bake cookies or some shit.
I remember when this happened and EVERYONE was furious at Hillary because it was so obvious she was a lesbian (gasp!) and she was acting as a beard for Clinton, and how dare she!Now, 20 years later, I ask myself wtf is wrong with being a lesbian? But more importantly, who cares who Hillary Clinton wants to have sex with?
Wait wouldn’t Bill be HER beard? Did people thing Bill was gay too? I know people thought Obama was
Yes, you’re right Bill would have been her beard, but in my defense in the 90s everyone just hated her in general and her being a short-haired women = lesbian. That’s why she had long hair as the first lady of Arkansas. She was too “butch” which is just so stupid but the 90s were not a good time for women in the US.At least in my memory everyone thought Bill was another JFK, a womanizer who couldn’t keep it in his pants.
It started with the goddamn chocolate chip cookies and kept on going from there. She wasn’t “likeable” becuase she didn’t fit any of the established roles at the time; people literally didn’t know what to make of a woman who was as powerful, smart, and openly ambitious as her. And these perceptions of her absolutely WERE due to her gender. everyone fawned over the picture of Bill meeting JFK and how he dedicated himself to being president without calling him “Calculating” or “power hungry”. People said that Hillary married Bill just to get closer to the white house, when you could just as easily say the same thing about Bill’s decision to marry Hillary. Oh, and before someone chimes in about the cookies, go back and read the what she actually said, there is NOTHING there that is disrespectful of homemakers. she simply stated that she had made a different choice in her life.
And no I will not rethink Linda Tripp. Nope nope nope she was a terrible person.Yeah, the headline is super-clickbaity because the summary makes clear that ACS is showing what an awful person she was. It can be possible, all at once, that she was indeed in it purely for herself and her monstrous ego; that the impeachment was primarily for political purposes and that Bill Clinton’s GOP prosecutors were as hypocritical as the day was long; and that we should believe Monica Lewinsky. (If I end up watching this, it will be for Beanie Feldstein, who I adored in Booksmart and Lady Bird.)
HRC shamed the shit out of Monica Lewinsky. LMAO
Fact check: so, that part where Tripp is a walking red flag of indiscretion and bitterness, but Lewinsky nonetheless confides to this person that she’s “in something”, twenty seconds into her first conversation with Tripp. That seems like some Ryan Murphy hyperbole, but it also seems like exactly what Monica Lewinsky would have really done.
Yeah, I feel like Tripp is… I don’t know, I was saying during the episode that if this weren’t a true story, we’d be saying the writing for Tripp is one-dimensional, too easy, needs nuance. Maybe she was this overtly awful at all times, but it feels unlikely that was as simple as this version suggests. Sure, drama needs some shortcuts, but this felt like massive overkill. So did the ease with which she was able to manipulate Monica moments into meeting her.
Having listened to Tripp give interviews in the last 5 years, she’s genuinely a terrible person. What I don’t get is why Monica didn’t pick up on her shitty attitude from the very beginning.
In real life, I can understand that Monica was a very lonely, sad kid and that when you’re in that situation, having a worldly, domineering, older person declare that they’re your friend can seem like a wonderful opportunity. What is being 22 if not ignoring red flags and making bad decisions about who to let into your life? But on this show…nope. Don’t buy it. Don’t buy that this horrible obnoxious person would clomp into Monica’s life, say a couple of alienating things, and that then Monica would start blurting. That relationship needed more setup.
yes, I’m wondering if it was “cut for time” but it seems like we could have less Ann Coulter (the whole world needs less Coulter) and more world building. Maybe it’s coming in time?
I would say it almost has to be condensed for the show given how much she confided in Tripp, but thinking about it more honestly any young woman who decides straightaway she’s going to seduce the President and provide sexual favors in the damn Oval Office was probably not playing with a full deck. She could think what she’s doing is sophisticated and elevates her position beyond that of typical intern. Reticence did not seem to be her defining feature.
Yes, that’s my issue — not that I don’t believe Tripp’s this terrible a person, but that there would be so little nuance to it that Monica would be sucked in and telling major secrets within moments of meeting her.
I was a lonely sad kid; but I managed not to suck any dick in The White House.
Can’t say I managed to do the same!
Don’t buy that this horrible obnoxious person would clomp into Monica’s life, say a couple of alienating things, and that then Monica would start blurting. That relationship needed more setup.I’ve read all of the transcripts of the recordings Tripp made when Lewinsky would call Tripp at home in the evenings. Believe me, Lewinsky did not need encouragement to talk about herself. She was ENORMOUSLY self-absorbed and she absolutely would not shut up. She blathered about herself for hours and hours and hours, telling Tripp basically about every sexual partner she had ever had. Tripp repeatedly steered conversations to Clinton, but Lewinsky needed little more than a nudge.
I think they bonded over dieting products.Every scene had at least a nod to their body image issues. SlimFast/Weight Watchers/etc.
And then they both got publicly savaged for their weight. That’s brutal.
I’m not sure about the headline here. On paper, I’ve always thought there was a case for Tripp-as-hero – a president shouldn’t be having sex with his interns in the Oval Office, and if someone finds out that he is, they should do something about it. But no one ever makes that argument, because Tripp came off as a tremendously unlikable human being, pretty much universally to everyone. I feel like a show that wanted us to “reconsider” Tripp would have provided a different angle than “oh, yeah, this person is 100% the worst 100% of the time.” As happens with Murphy, there’s no shading here—-this is the most obnoxious caricature of a public figure since, I don’t know, that time when Ross Geller couldn’t stop saying “Juice”.
Even a cursory glance at Robert Kardashians Wikipedia page shows more nuance then his appearance on OJ. That season was amazing but there were a couple strange creative choices and that’s one of them.
I haven’t seen this yet, but have you listened to the season of the podcast Slow Burn on the Lewinsky scandal? They interview Tripp extensively. I understand her motivation and it humanizes her more, but I stop short of calling her a hero. She basically offered up Lewinsky as a sacrificial lamb, deeply betraying her, which is not any better than what Clinton did. As for your comment on Ross Kardashian, I generally loved that season but yeah, never could really get into that character.
Yeah, what she did was a massive betrayal of trust, but she also got dragged for things like her looks which made the Democrats of the time look hypocritical along with their defense of Clinton
Yeah. It was pretty disgusting. Monica too.
Tripp as hero for whom? She blew Monica’s life to confetti, provided a platform for the oligarchs to gain the White House and both houses of Congress and with that control of the Supreme Court. I think a guy should not be divorcing his wife while she is getting cancer treatment, but no one went after Gingrich, a serial adulterer.
Yeah, before Tripp the White House was all humble men of the earth
LBJ was rolling in his grave!
Well, she certainly thought so!
I personally don’t think she’s a hero – I’m just surprised that nobody does. Tripp blew the whistle on the most powerful man in the world. You’d expect her to have her fans, either among Clinton-hating Republicans or among the #metoo crowd. The band of the political spectrum that thinks, “Bill Clinton was a good president, and his sex life is no big deal,” in 2021, is vanishingly small – everybody is either radically to his right on politics or radically to his left on conduct. In this kind of environment, I’d expect, oh, 90% of people to love Tripp. Instead, I am aware of zero people who love Tripp, including myself. I just find it interesting.
I think we can all, liberal or conservative, imagine having a “friend” like that. I remember some years ago Tripp lost some weight, and got plastic surgery, and gave interviews saying she understood why people didn’t like her because of her hideous appearance, but now it’s ok to like her. Nope, the fact that John Goodman was accurately playing you on SNL had nothing to do with the public’s dislike of you Linda, you’re just a shit person. Ann Coulter is traditionally attractive, but still a hideous person.
She’s nobody’s hero because everything she did was just gross and done for personal aggrandizement. “I need better dirt for a book deal, and boy do I have it! PAY ME!”
Or simply to the left of his politics which were quintessentially “Republican-Lite” He represents everything wrong with the Democratic Party. Until recently, I did not give a shit about his personal life.
“I personally don’t think she’s a hero – I’m just surprised that nobody does. Tripp blew the whistle on the most powerful man in the world.”
It’s quite simple. Left-wingers don’t like that she manipulated and betrayed Lewinsky, and called out bad behavior for purely self-serving reasons. Right-wingers, meanwhile, love celebrity and power, no matter how much they pretend otherwise (and projectingly mock leftists for the same), and Tripp never had an ounce of either, so she was never more than a blip on their radar.
Ok, so be likeable, smile, try to look pretty if you want men to take you seriously.
I think “Deep Throat” was also a disgruntled bureaucrat who felt unfairly passed over.A whistleblower can be sort of a hero even if their motivation isn’t exactly altruistic.
I read all of the transcripts of the hours of phone calls between Lewinsky and Tripp, which were included as appendices to the Starr Report. Anyone who has done that would see what an insidious villain Tripp really was. Lewinsky was extremely immature and naïve, and Tripp absolutely goads her into telling everything about Clinton. She gained Lewinsky’s trust by listening to Lewinsky’s self-absorbed blathering for hours and hours and hours like the world’s most patient and understanding friend, but the whole thing was a setup from the start. Tripp had been in Washington a long time, she knew Lewinsky would be destroyed when it all came out, and she did not care because she wanted revenge on the Clinton White House that dared not to give a shit about her. Tripp really was a monster.
Beanie Feldstein looks nothing like Monica Lewinsky to me. Really, none of the cast looks like who they are playing all that much. Plus, and more importantly, the subject matter is more frustrating (for a variety of reasons) than it is anything. So after one ep, this one looks like a big No from me. Though I am somewhat interested in seeing how many people are interested in torturing themselves reliving this. My guess is a lot.
none of the cast looks like who they are playing all that much.
See Also: The People Vs. OJ Simpson.
OMG, the casting for TPvOJS drove me *nuts*.They didn’t even try to get an actor that resembled OJ in either looks or personality.It was like they comprised a list of AA actors in their late 40s and could only get Cuba Gooding Jr. He was so wrong for that part.Faye Resnick is *clearly* biracial and they cast…Connie Britton. Whom I love, but WTF?Billy Magnusson, a reasonably hot piece of A on a good day plays unemployed hag Kato Kaelin? Again…da F?The only people who remotely looked like the people they were supposed to play were Paulsen (no surprise) and Sterling K. Brown as Christopher Darden.
It’s been sad to see Kato go flying off into MAGA town the past year or two.
For reals? I had no idea. The mind boggles at the intricate spiderweb of irony and cognitive dissonance.
He’s white, and trash. What do you expect?
As an aside, I have YET to hear it adequately explained just why Kato was living on Simpson’s property. I mean, what was the deal there?
The way I heard it described on a podcast I listened to was that Kato knew Nicole somehow, and he was staying with her, paying her rent, this was her only source of income at the time. OJ found out, and offered to let him live in his guest house for free, to deny her that source of income. Of course, even being friends with Nicole, that was an offer too good to turn down, so that’s how he ended up there.
Ooh, I can explain, and it’s pretty shitty. Kato Kaelin had met Nicole Brown at a party, and was later invited to her house. She had a guest house, and he was looking for a place to stay, she said he could stay in her guest house for nominal rent. An unspoken part of this dynamic is likely that she wanted a man around to protect her from OJ, who was actively stalking her at the time.
Nicole and Kato became close friends, and consequently when she and OJ reconciled Kato and OJ became friends. After the reconciliation soured, OJ offered Kato his guesthouse for free – his motivation probably being to take away one of Nicole’s friends and supporters. Kato picked the free option, even though it was a complete betrayal of Nicole, who begged him not to go and never spoke to him again afterward. Fin.
I assume that 100% of Murphy’s decision-making when choosing a project to take on is, ”How good of a role there is for Sarah Paulson?”
No kidding. But once Paulson bounces, he’s only going to have Lily Rabe left in his (former) murderer’s row of incredible actresses.Jessica Lange was clearly over things (understandably) after the disastrous “Freak Show”. He’s lost Angela Bassett to both Marvel and Mission Impossible movies. And Paulson is so clearly gone once she wins an Emmy for this.(c’mon we ALL know she’s going to win…let’s not even pretend).Murphy’s totally priming his Hellraiser-Pinhead meathooks for Rabe as I write this.
Your probably right and that’s a shame, Lily Rabe is my favorite of the Ryan Murphy Entourage.
I don’t think Sarah is gonna win.
With how Nine Perfect Strangers is shaping up, I could see her losing to either Nicole Kidman or Melissa McCarthy, assuming they’re nominated for leading actress
I think it was Magnusson’s jawline that got him the part. They both have (had) those pronounced mandible muscles.
True. But at least Travolta was fun to watch in a comical kind of way
I feel like the other thing is, Murphy keeps picking stories where it matters what the characters look like. O.J.’s physical appearance mattered to that story. Bill Clinton’s attractiveness matters to this story. (I like Clive Owen, and wonder if he will appear in future episodes in place of the melting wax dummy who played Clinton in the premiere.)
I agree with you that Murphy definitely doesn’t seem to get that he’s picking stories where a reasonable resemblance to key personas is important to the overall series working.OJ was very good looking in a non-threatening ‘model minority’ sort of way, which is exactly why so many white people from that time period glommed onto him pre-murder. And why they were all shocked by the truth of who he was post-murder.Murphy’s problem is that he thought Gooding’s alleged geniality (but boy, THAT shoe dropped) was enough in approximating OJs looks + star power.Clinton (IMO) is not physically attractive in the traditional sense – but he *is* incredibly charismatic. But there’s a considerable difference between the two. Clinton himself, however, definitely thinks it’s one and the same…which is exactly why he has a long line of accusations that have (rightfully) trailed him for decades.And yeah, Clive Owen was an…odd…choice for Clinton. It feels as if Murphy thought adding a well-regarded Brit would an additional sheen of prestige to the series.
I can’t tell if this is a media shitstorm I followed for several years, so what the people look like is pretty cemented into my brain, but no one in this cast looks like the person they’re playing. It’s wild. And not to shame size but I don’t remember Monica being as big as they’re made Beanie in this first episode. That seems kind of gross. But maybe I might being remembering Monica from the late 90s when she lost a lot of weight?
You could be conflating Lewinsky with her post-weight loss appearance. There was a lot of “her…?!” type comments about Lewinsky during that period. It was pretty gross.Plus, clothes during that period were *not* slim cut to be flattering to one’s body. So anyone who was zaftig was guaranteed to look even bigger than they really were.Combine that with the fact that Washington D.C. was even more of a fashion black-hole then so people dressing in the governmental were guaranteed to look heavier (not that there’s anything wrong with it).
If you look at her when there’s a full body shot, Beanie looks like she lost weight. Monica was always curvy but never that much. It’s Beanie’s face that is still fuller than Monica’s. Not that it should matter all that much in the end. It’s the performances that I care about more than anything.
My thoughts exactly. I’m sorry – Monica is and was much, much prettier than Beanie. I don’t get the casting at all. I guess she’s fine actress, but…they could have found an unknown who could have done justice to Monica’s appeal.
My recollection is that her weight went up and down quite a bit at that point in time. She would go from kinda chubby, to actually being a good 50 lbs overweight. I get the impression she was a serial dieter back then.
Beanie looks like she’s lost some weight to play Lewinsky, they didn’t “make” her fat, she just is what she is! Monica was pretty zaftig back then. It’s unusual for a film production to not make a real-life character “Hollywood-fat”, meaning fifteen pounds over very slim. Don’t get hung up on it. If Lewinsky is happy with the casting, I’m fine with it.
Her casting seems weird to me, Monica was a little chubby then, like maybe she could have stood to lose around 15 pounds, but she was never that heavy. I’m not slamming Beanie Feldstein’s appearance, I think she’s quite attractive, it just seemed a strange bit of casting to me.
Yeah, it’s weird. Monica is too big and Tripp is too small.
1) Linda Tripp was portrayed as an unlikeable beast in the 90s and seems identical here – not sure what’s being “reconsidered.” And bitching about a pay raise to work at the Pentagon? WTF? It’s far easier to commute there than the WH thanks to the bus and metro lines. 2) Americans in the White House dressed like crap in the 90s, 00s, 10s, and even now. Michelle Obama was just slightly less bad than the rest. Macron’s wife could teach everyone a lesson or two in fashion.3) Bill Clinton was a predatory monster, and I get that some people didn’t quite comprehend that in the 90s, but one person definitely knew what a shitbird he was: Hillary Clinton, who DELIBERATELY chose to embrace it in order to fuel her megalomania. Anyone who says she is human should re-watch the video of her cackling about the gruesome death of Qaddafi.
I think they said a $20K raise, in the 90s. That’d keep me quiet for awhile.Sounds like she was at least right about nobody worrying about anybody auditing anything.
Your “comment” about Michelle Obama is a crime against humanity. I’d downvote you if I could.
Like it’s a high hurdle to jump; Nancy Reagan, Babs Bush, Hillary, Laura Bush…Michelle was a frump compared to Jackie Kennedy, and especially Melania. Not surprising, but again – it’s not like she was terribly attractive to start with.
It used to be hating Hillary Clinton was a socially acceptable position for someone to have, but you QAnon crazies decided to take it too far with your rants about Benghazi and drinking the blood of babies. Thankfully, now anyone saying they hate Hillary Clinton is lumped in with the Covid-deniers and the the 1/6 insurrectionists. I imagine you incels will be filling the comments of each Impeachment recap with your deranged fantasies about Jewish space lasers and the Democrats stealing the elections.
Please. Bill Clinton was a pig, and Hillary was an enabler. Anything more is window-dressing.
Gruesome deaths are a fine thing to cackle about, provided the dead is a real shitbird like Qaddafi.
1) Proximity to power is everything to a lot of people who work in DC. White House pretty much being the apex. They could have doubled her money and given her a seat on the National Security Counsel and she’d probably have considered it a banishment. Lot of venality in that town.
2) As happens at the rollover of every decade the early 90s were really an extension of the 80s. Fashion-wise you still a lot of hair, shoulder pads in women’s suits, etc.
People on the left were overjoyed at the possibility of Trump dying of COVID last year. It’s a pretty common human phenomenon, and Qaddafi was a tyrant. Were you really all that sad when he was killed by his own people?
“She’s from California, too. Glendale, is that it?”“Glendale is never it.”That got a cackle out of me. Impeachment is ok so far. But the reviewer rightly guessed my head would be spinning. Premiere felt a little all over the place to me, and yea, if Linda Tripp is going to be the main character, this could be a chore. She is very… unpleasant, to be spending this much time with. (Also, Sarah Paulson fatigue). But she’s not… uninteresting. I quite liked that outdoor meeting, and the scenes of her home alone. (Watching, was that J.A.G?)The Paula Jones accusation held my interest a bit more. I’m less familiar with this stuff, but it felt like the part of the episode with more forward momemtum, and she feels sympathetic; Especially how the reporters treat her at CPAC. It’s got urgency, and a sense of unease, but it’s also got some humor to it too. We’ll see where this goes.
The CPAC press conference was excruciating, though I’ve been to a fair few disastrous ones like that where the person who calls it won’t, for whatever reason, actually talk about what they’ve promised to talk about.When journalists get called out to a press conference and have their times wasted, they get very, very, pissed off.That wasn’t Paula Jones’ fault though. She should never have been put in that position by her idiot husband or lawyer.
haha. I also thought it was J.A.G.
I think the Clintons and their advisors generally did a good job of keeping the pre-White House stuff out of the mainstream consciousness. Consensus at the time was “yeah that guy definitely got up to some stuff” but there was so much contradictory public noise (orchestrated by the likes of Carville, to great effect) that it became background.
Back in the day, SNL had Paula Jones (Rachel Dratch maybe?) on Weekend Update and she described herself as a ‘stay at home actress’. One of my favorite lines ever.
Back in the day, SNL had Paula Jones (Rachel Dratch maybe?) on Weekend
Update and she described herself as a ‘stay at home actress’. One of my
favorite lines ever.Holy shit, that’s amazing.
Back in the day, SNL had Paula Jones (Rachel Dratch maybe?) on Weekend Update and she described herself as a ‘stay at home actress’. One of my favorite lines ever.Holy shit, that’s amazing.Was copying the entire comment necessary just to reply that?
Was copying the entire comment necessary just to reply that?Since in threads often end up long and Kinja sucks at nesting replies (if it does at all), yes. It was.Go cry about it if it upsets your internet experience so much.
*wipes eyes*, ok better…
From the multimedia campaign Impeachment: American Crime Story has unleashed, it could be assumed that the protagonist of FX’s anthology docudrama is Monica Lewinsky. Beanie Feldstein, playing the world’s most famous intern, is on the poster wearing Lewinksy’s infamous beret, and graced the cover of The Hollywood Reporter with the real Lewinsky. The first trailer ends with an ominous shot of Feldstein-as-Lewinsky and Bill Clinton (Clive Owen) in the Oval Office.
If you take another look at the trailer, though, there is a voice that predominates, and it belongs to Linda Tripp, played by Sarah Paulson. It’s a clue that this re-examination of the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal may have a very different main character than initially believed. And though this might change as the season unfolds, the first episode of Impeachment gives Tripp the role that eluded her during her professional career—that of a star.ADVERTISEMENTThe season premiere, “Exiles,” mostly functions to set up the many disparate threads that will culminate in impeachment. As such, it can be a lot to keep up with and might require a few quick trips to Wikipedia to fill in the gaps. It highlights four different moments: Lewinsky being ambushed by FBI agents at a mall in January 1998, Tripp’s demotion from White House staff member to Pentagon clog in 1993, Paula Jones’ decision to accuse Bill Clinton of sexual harassment in 1994, and Lewinsky and Tripp’s burgeoning friendship in 1996.If your head is spinning already, it’s understandable. After all the ink spilled over the years about the sexual aspect of it all, it’s easy to forget that the scandal didn’t start with a stained blue dress. It was meant to be a detail in another controversy: the Whitewater affair.Tripp is so over the Clintons by the time we see her working as a secretary in the office of White House counsel Bernie Nussbaum (Kevin Pollak). She never liked them to begin with. Coming off as the resident Karen-from-Accounting meme, she is annoying to her fellow colleagues and oblivious to their disdain. She has an outsized sense of self-importance, constantly mentioning how she will be summoned to testify at this and that thing. She waxes poetic about the Bushes, admiring their sense of protocol. She scoffs at the pizza party on casual Fridays, finds it insulting that Hillary Clinton (Edie Falco) uses the communal bathroom, and namedrops any Republican she can think of. She’s competent but inept at social cues—a mortal sin in any political job, even if that job entails bringing a hamburger to your boss.ADVERTISEMENTThe only person who seems to appreciate her is Deputy White House counsel Vincent Foster. When he dies by suicide, it has the unintended consequence of putting Tripp’s job at risk. Convinced that she will be a key figure in the Whitewater investigation, she constantly eavesdrops on Nussbaum’s conversations and takes a meeting with scheming literary agent Lucianne Goldberg (a glorious Margo Martindale). She first pitches a book about Foster, but Goldberg brushes it away, noting no one cares about a sad story. She needs something big.The urgency to secure her position in the White House intensifies when Nussbaum announces that a new Counsel, Lloyd Cutler, is taking his place. Tripp convinces professionally frustrated but well-connected aide Kathleen Willey to set up a meeting with the two of them and Cutler. The plan is to convince him to hire them both. Despite having been previously groped by the president, Willey agrees. Such is her desperation to be something more than the socialite wife volunteer.The meeting is a disaster for Tripp, who spends her time complaining about her former Dem bosses while singing the praises of the Republicans. When she receives notice that she’s being transferred to the Pentagon—with a raise and promotion to match—the only one surprised is Tripp. “I’m being exiled to Siberia!” she yells in her best “speak-to-your-manager” tone at the human resource manager, who notes that no one wants her in the White House. She becomes even more incensed when she discovers that Willey was offered a job as a secretary, accusing her of only getting the position because of Clinton’s sexual interest in her. Willey responds with a sentence meant to destroy Tripp’s own sense of self: “The President has no idea who you are.”As writing instructors will tell you anywhere, a character’s wants and motivations are crucial to the development of plot. In this take, Tripp is looking for petty revenge against her friend— “I thought we were women supporting each other” she tells Willey. Furthermore, she’s looking for real vengeance against a workplace that cares so little about her, there’s almost no need to make her disappear. To many, she doesn’t even exist.
ive used the insult “stay at home actress” so many times since then. Wasnt that froma skit making fun of celebrity boxing when tanya harding whopped her?
It’s sad for her and those that loved her that Tripp passed away last year. But some solace for them in that she doesn’t have to watch Paulson’s typical scene-chewing performance.
I’ve liked Sarah Paulson in several things, but I first saw her on “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip”, and I still haven’t forgiven anyone involved in that.
I still don’t understand how no one involved with Studio 60 realized that in order to pull of a show about a sketch comedy program, the jokes actually have to be funny. The lack of any humor killed that show.I first saw Ms. Paulson in Deadwood, and she was great in that. As was everyone who appeared on that show.
Aaron Sorkin only has one story: the greatest genius in the world, doing the most important job in the world, turns his workplace into a codependent surrogate family and monument to his genius. This story is one thing when it’s about the American presidency, but when it’s about Howard from The Big Bang Theory doing his Nicolas Cage impersonation…no.
That really sums up all that’s wrong in America. Too much worship of the strongman, and too many people thinking THEY are that strongman
Sorkin was more obsessed with making his SNL-analogue smart instead of funny, which was his first major mistake. Any comedian (even the smart ones) will tell you that you go for the laugh first and foremost. George Carlin would happily make jokes about pussy farts before discussing bullshit power structures. And, of course, any writer who wasn’t Aaron Sorkin’s self-insert was an idiot hack who pandered for laughs.
I love that on 30 Rock, Tina Fey openly acknowledged that most of the skits on SNL were completely stupid. Sorkin is trying to impart truth, meanwhile Fey is putting Gaybraham Lincoln on the air.
30 Rock was VERY smart to make the in-show show dumb and make the jokes ABOUT the show. They also really didn’t show much at all about TGS, all we got were background site gags and occasional rehearsal screw-ups. Studio 60 went out of it’s way to make it seem like this alt universe SNL was the greatest achievement in TV history… and then make a whole episode about them opening a show with a skit about some old musical that the showrunners assume everybody loves just as much as they do.
I remember her best from a halfway decent episode of Family Guy where they all do commentary on an episode she guest stars in, and we learn she was Peter’s first wife, which Lois never knew
Her character on that show was the perfect example of telling, not showing. She was supposed to be a genius comedian, but she just was not funny.She’s a great dramatic actress, but she’s just not funny.
Eh, get her away from Murphy and she’s just fine.And having said that, she was actually a great Marcia Clark.
“a role for Steve in Designing Women”?
They really think big, don’t they?
The lack of attention to historical detail bothered me with that, almost to the point of losing interest in the show altogether – I knew without even confirming on Wikipedia that Designing Women had ended by the time that line was supposed to have been uttered (show was done in 1993, scene was set in 1994). How sloppy for a show attempting an exact recreation of the 1990s. Lazy writing (you can’t just recreate a time period, the writing needs to match)! I mean, you could have literally just name dropped any other popular ‘90s show, but chose that one.
Maybe he was really dreaming of a role in a new Star Wars movie; but that was still a few years away.
Remember a time when people looked forward to a new Star Wars movie?
I read this as the Joneses being stupid and not knowing the show was off the air.
At some point every role on television will be played by Paulson.
This is known as the Paulson Exclusion Principle.
Six Degrees of Sarah Paulson sounds like an invitation for the universe to collapse on itself.
Kevin Bacon IS Sarah Paulson!
careful…
This fat suit ain’t big enough for the both of us!
Cher tried this once
As someone who lived through this mess in real time I have precisely no interest in reconsider any of this. The same was true of the OJ murder trial. I did tune into “The Assassination of Gianni Versace” because that news event wasn’t front and center in my experience at the time but nothing and no one can make me revisit the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal unless it’s to remember what an asshole Jay Leno was.
Yeah, this is right there with the new 9/11 documentary. Hard. Pass.
Agreed. The whole thing still pisses me off to the extent I have no desire to revisit any of this in any shape or form. I’m still gobsmacked by the sheer stupidity of what Bill did and still angry that the Republicans basically went on a years long witch hunt and got away with it. Some of them are even on the Supreme Court and Ken Starr has revealed himself to be an utter shit of a human being. Oh God, I’m getting all revved up again.One of the big “what if’s” of our current hellhole is what would have happened if Bill wouldn’t have been such an idiot. There’s an argument to be made that everything that’s gone wrong since the 2000 elections wouldn’t have happened if Bill would have been able to keep zipper shut
Nah, if you REALLY want to get into how this country became such a shitshow, it goes back to the assassination of Robert Kennedy, who likely would have become President and sent us on a different path.
I have a whole curriculum on this I taught in 1998.
To 14 year olds.
As a first year high school teacher, my principal had this great idea to do an integrated law elective curriculum that was reading and writing heavy (I was supposed to be an English teacher, but I also coached the debate team and mock trial), and overlapped with the social studies and science (Scopes, climate change policy) curriculum.
And then the Impeachment happened and I had to figure out how not to talk about Presidential blowjobs. So I think I’ll pass. I ALREADY explained how power dynamics in the workplace mean that consent cannot be considered without coercion.
Ha, I remember my teacher who was SUPPOSED to be teaching social studies/government instead spent the entire year railing against Clinton talking about the scandal as much as possible. Although to be fair, she never said the words “blow job” to her class of 12 year olds, but she did say that TVs have cameras in them for the government to spy on you!
Anyone remember this Howard Stern-ism: “Monica Blewclinsky”?
I watched the 1st episode last night, and one thing bothers me that nobody seems to have mentioned:WHY did the director of photography think it was a good idea to shoot *every* scene with such dim lighting?? This show makes it look as if the White House didn’t pay the electric bill at all during the 1990’s. Even outdoor shots (Tripp and Willie being interviewed by Lloyd Cutler) have a dark, creepy, unnatural bluish tone.
I get it, I get it, dark lighting implies dark motives and behaviors, but it looks like the cinematographers exposure meter was off by two stops on the under-exposure side.
Watched too much West Wing?
It’s crazy how spot-on that casting was, for both of them.
“After all the ink spilled over the years about the sexual aspect of it all, it’s easy to forget that the scandal didn’t start with a stained blue dress. It was meant to be a detail in another controversy: the Whitewater affair.”Good God almighty! Growing up in Arkansas in the 1990’s, I heard those words on a daily basis. I thought that nightmare would never end.
If you’re happy about any of this, then you can’t bitch about how Roe will be overturned probably next term. The current SC all is a result of that disgusting woman, Linda big fatty in hell, Tripp.
So this isnt really a review, just a recap? No commentary on the acting at all?
yeah, I don’t even have to watch it now!
Yours truly was in middle school during the impeachment circus and even as a 12 year old the whole thing seemed bonkers. As an adult, I think I frame the whole thing as a study in how many things can be true at once:-Bill Clinton can be gross, to put it mildly, and still be the subject of a witch-hunt. The GOP operatives could have very easily gone all in on actual things he actually did that were actually a problem – but they only seem to care about that angle as a way to make Trump look ok in comparison, and that’s only 20ish years after the fact. -Linda Tripp can … well never mind, she just seems like every Karen or Kevin you work with, who overestimates their own importance and underestimates how nauseating they seem to everyone else. They have no friends and no serious responsibilities and that’s everyone else’s fault. I took my contacts out and for a brief moment thought I saw my mother-in-law. -Monica Lewinsky can have been naive and have made a major error, but also didn’t need to be dragged and turned into a punching bag. To be honest, I find it kind of fascinating to think of this whole episode in terms of being a kinda-sorta love story thing. -Could Hillary have “ditched Bill’s ass,” then used it to be some kind of empowered feminist divorcee icon thing? I don’t know. Who knows. I do think she’s both a very ambitious person who would do anything to get places, while also realizing that a wannabe woman in power in the 80s and 90s was a tough road that she rightly surmised probably needed any lever she could pull. She’d have been 100x the president Dimestore Mussolini was. Word vomit over…
Tripp may or may not have been a horrible person, and I know this is a Ryan Murphy show, but Paulson’s portrayal is just downright nasty.
Ah, the latest Ryan Murphy production, the Emperor New Clothes of television.
“If your head is spinning already, it’s understandable.”Lol, what? There might be some heads spinning but those heads are likely younger than 35. Also, your physical resemblance to Lewinsky is…. well, interesting.
It’s funny, even with all the prosthetics and fat suit the Sarah Paulsen portrayal of Linda Tripp is still way more attractive than the real thing for one reason: I never saw Linda Tripp without that perma-sneer on her face. She was like that warning our moms used to give us: “If you keep making that face, it will stick like that”. Her inner ugliness was so foul that it manifested itself into outer ugliness. It didn’t have to be that way.
Are…..you saying Linda Tripp should smile more?
Nope, there are plenty of other expressions other than sneers or smiles! What I am saying is that your personality shouldn’t be so poisonous that people can read it on your face, because your disdain for everyone else is so high that you can’t, or won’t even try to hide it. Then you wonder why no one wants you around.
I am not sure I will be watching this show but can we as a society agree that Margo Martindale should always have the word ‘glorious’ before any discussion of her and her roles?