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Tavis: On May fourteenth, fans of "The West Wing" will have their last dose of the award-winning political drama as the show ends its seventh and final season. Say it ain't so, say it ain't so. Bradley Whitford has been a key part of the show's enormous success, with three Emmy nominations and an Emmy win for his role as Josh Lyman. Here now, a scene from last Sunday's "The West Wing."

Tavis: Mr. Chief of Staff, nice to have you on the program, sir.

Bradley Whitford: Thank you, sir. It's great to be here.

Tavis: If only the Democrats had you running campaigns.

Whitford: Oh, it would be a different story.

Tavis: (Laugh) So we got a brother running the White House.

Whitford: Yeah, yeah. We have a, what is he, a one-term Congressman from Texas who had the magic. And I brought him home.

Tavis: Yeah, you did that. You did indeed. So, does it feel like seven seasons?

Whitford: It feels like forever, and it feels like it went by very quickly. I was just watching that, thinking how lucky I was to work on a show where you could look exhausted and caffeinated while you were doing your job. (Laugh)

Tavis: (Laugh) No makeup required, huh?

Whitford: No, no, no, no, no. No.

Tavis: Last week's episode, Sunday's episode, was moving, on a number of different levels. Even though it's television, I just love seeing a brother running the White House for a change.

Whitford: Right. (Laugh)

Tavis: Maybe life will, in fact, imitate art one day in this country.

Whitford: Well, I think it does a little cultural tenderizing, to see it up there.

Tavis: Nice phrase.

Whitford: Thank you.

Tavis: Cultural tenderizing.

Whitford: I got more of those.

Tavis: All right, okay. Let me keep talking here. (Laugh) Pull some more of that good stuff out of you. That said, on a serious note, the show started last Sunday with a very nicely done tribute in the script to John Spencer, who has sat in that chair. I had the pleasure of interviewing him. How was it like to film that episode?

Whitford: It was very strange. I had mixed feelings about it. I was obviously, as we all were, very close to John, and I had gone through specific things of going to the hospital when John was sick, and finding out that he was gone, and actually being a pallbearer at his funeral. And it was strange to go through those experiences again.

And I honestly had sort of mixed feelings about it. I think ultimately the show dealt with it the only way it could, and in kind of an honest way. But it was strange to say "cut," and then sort of hand the coffin to the prop guy. It was a little weird.

Tavis: Yeah. Everybody kept it together?

Whitford: Yeah, everybody kept it together. It became a question of sort of keeping it in control. It was - John Wells was very sensitive about how strange it was going to be to shoot these things. And we just - the overwhelming desire was to do it well, for John, and for this character.

Tavis: I could very well offer this as my exit question in a few minutes when we get to the end of this conversation, but I don't want to wait that long, 'cause I think it might take us someplace else. What, in your view, is the enduring legacy, the lesson of this particular show? Obviously it's television. But it has had a dramatic impact, I think one can argue, on politics, on how we view politics, on the body politic in real life. So what's your sense of what the lesson is and the legacy is of this show?

Whitford: Well, I just want to preface it but saying that Aaron's intention...

Tavis: Aaron Sorkin, of course.

Whitford: Right. Was not to serve people their civic vegetables and ram a point of view down their throat and say that you should believe what I believe. I think we were looking, and Aaron was looking at it as a ripe, sort of untoiled arena where the stakes are high; there's a lot of conflict. Show's actually almost a back stage drama, if you think about it.

I think what he did do was he took politicians seriously. And there's a thing that happens in Hollywood where there'll be five bad baseball movies and then they'll say, well, you can't make baseball movies. And the truth is, no, you can't make bad movies about baseball. (Laugh) Or you can't make bad movies.

And politicians have been treated as either morons or saints. And obviously, they're neither. It happened at a time when this country became politically polarized. It happened at a time, we started when Clinton was President, 9/11 happened. And I think there is a sense that government matters now. I remember in 2000, there were a lot of people who would say, well, it doesn't really matter who gets elected.

I think that's gone. I think the downside of that is the polarizing. The upside is that there's this real sense that government matters. So I think the legacy was sort of taking it seriously. Taking politicians seriously, and humanizing them. We live in this age where there's no political discourse anymore. There's only dueling publicity, where people sort of rapid fire their talking points off at each other.

And it becomes this kind of pretentious, professional wrestling. And strangely enough, with fiction, you could show people, you could show politicians who hadn't made up their minds yet. And were actually kind of struggling with issues. And I think that was important.

Tavis: I'm fascinated by your formulation of the show taking politicians seriously, to your words, because they're neither morons or saints. There's some folks watching...

Whitford: By and large.

Tavis: ...I suspect, yeah, there you go. Now you say by and large. You knew where I was going with that, didn't you? I suspect there are folk watching who in fact do see it that way. That we got good guys, and we got bad guys, and that most of these folks fall into one category or the other. I was just reading the new issue of "Time" magazine, and the second cover of the new issue of 'Time' has the 10 best senators, and the five worst senators.

So these folk do, in fact, fall into certain categories. It's obviously subjective, but I wonder what you think of the parallel of a TV show taking politicians seriously at a time when many Americans think that they aren't taking their jobs seriously, or the American public seriously with things like the war in Iraq, etcetera, etcetera. It's an interesting parallel, I think.

Whitford: Yeah. I think it's one thing I keep thinking about that I don't know if this answers your question directly, but it's very strange to me that the Republican right, the right side of the political spectrum, now sees government as the way to execute its moral vision. The left and the Democrats, Party of Kennedy and 'Ask not what your country can do for you' - we tend to sort of - we don't see the government as the way to execute our moral vision.

I don't know what we see. We see culture or something. But the fact is, politics are important because they make the moral consensus tangible. It's not just a budget; it's values in action. And I think it's a little bit of a dangerous time for people who feel like I do, that the country's not going in the right direction.

'Cause there's a tendency to sort of bail on the process. The other thing I think is really important about the show was showing that purely standing on principle in the political arena is not the complete measure of integrity. I found it interesting that what my character went through every day and what I think was heroic and I think what people can relate to 'cause it happens in everybody's life is the question of how dirty do your feet have to get without disappearing in the mud in order to get an inch of what you really want done? That's heroic.

Standing on principle is easy, in a certain sense. And I get frustrated with the Democratic left, who tends to sort of bail on anybody who gets pragmatic.

Tavis: I suspect if I had to be typecast, I wouldn't mind being typecast having been part of "The West Wing." That said, you at all worried now about moving from this space, moving from this place, with regard to us seeing you as...

Whitford: To opening shopping centers in Arizona?

Tavis: Yeah, exactly. (Laugh) Can Bradley Whitford do anything else?

Whitford: Welcome.

Tavis: Yeah. (Laugh)

Whitford: It's funny, typecasting - from long ago, when I got out of acting school, it was like, well, he did a lot of Shakespeare plays; he probably can't do contemporary stuff. And then you do a Shakespeare play - then I did a Sam Shepard play, and well, you probably can't do classical stuff 'cause you were doing a Sam Shepard play. You always get typecast.

Typecast means hopefully you did your last job well. That's all anybody can imagine. Getting typecast as this guy is fine with me. You got to fire on all cylinders with this guy. He was horny, he was funny, he was smart, he was emotionally constipated. (Laugh) You just got to use so many parts of you that typecasting is inevitable, and that kind is fine.

Tavis: When you said you had more, you delivered. Emotionally constipated. That's the second one on the list now.

Whitford: Oh, that's the second one.

Tavis: Let's keep going.

Whitford: Okay. Cultural tenderizing, emotionally constipated.

Tavis: There you go. We're working, we're working. (Laugh) I don't know how to read this. You tell me, since I don't live inside your house, you tell me what the real deal is here. So I read that your wife, who we all know from "Malcolm In The Middle,' her series, 'Malcolm In The Middle,' ends, ironically, on May fourteenth, the same day as "The West Wing."

Whitford: We're opposite each other.

Tavis: Okay. So does that...

Whitford: Which happens a lot (unintelligible).

Tavis: Yeah. (Laugh) I'm going to stay out of that. I'm not in the house, and I'm not getting in the middle of that. (Laugh) That said, so are you guys, like, gonna be broke on May fifteenth 'cause you ain't got no more money? Or, like, what happens on May fifteenth in your house?

Whitford: God, that would be so sad.

Tavis: And so unrealistic.

Whitford: No. This has been a very strange - it's a miracle to get, we were around, it's not like...

Tavis: Have you seen your wife for the last seven seasons?

Whitford: Yes, yes, yes.

Tavis: Okay, all right. (Laugh) So I'm just thinking, on May fifteenth, you will at least see her.

Whitford: Yeah, I will recognize her.

Tavis: Okay. (Laugh)

Whitford: There's been a lot of makeup on the pillowcases on both sides. Daddy wears makeup. (Laugh)

Tavis: Number three.

Whitford: Number three.

Tavis: Keep on going, yeah.

Whitford: Number four, my ancestors cleared land and raised cattle; I wear makeup.

Tavis: (Laugh) Only in America.

Whitford: Only in America. They'd be so proud that I have a favorite moisturizer. (Laugh)

Tavis: Yeah. Number five.

Whitford: Number five. (Laugh)

Tavis: Keep going, yeah. (Laugh)

Whitford: Our shows - we had been bouncing around forever. It's not like we weren't available. And then the same week "West Wing" got picked up, her show got picked up, and we found out we were expecting our second child. So it's been this kind of, just tidal wave of chaos and...

Tavis: And blessings.

Whitford: Yeah, yeah. And it's been challenging in a lot of ways. We have three young kids, and we certainly don't want to miss that. I know that I won't be lying on my deathbed wishing I'd done one more episode of television. Which is potentially number five?

Tavis: Six.

Whitford: Six, okay.

Tavis: Yeah, you got five. Don't sell yourself cheap. Or short. So on a serious note...

Whitford: So it's been a wonderful and overwhelming time. It's like too much dessert. It's like a lot of good luck. And being actor is like dating a schizophrenic. Seven.

Tavis: Ooh. (Laugh) You can't name them yourself. I got to tell you if it works or not. You can't say, "There's number eight." (Laugh) I tell you if it works or not. You can't just...

Whitford: Dating a schizophrenic doesn't work?

Tavis: You can't just determine whether it works. It was good, though, it works. It works. Last question. (Laugh) Before you blow a fuse, I want you to go to 10 and just blow a fuse. So, maybe you can squeeze two in this last question. Last answer. So, what really does happen next? So I know you're too talented to just go sit down. Movies? Broadway?

Whitford: No. (Laugh) I'm doing the interesting thing. (Laugh)

Tavis: That was nine; that was good.

Whitford: Oh, that was nine. I'm doing Aaron's new show, which is called "Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip." Which is a show about, it's kind of like a cross between 'Network' and backstage at a "Saturday Night Live" kind of thing. Kind of an art versus commerce.

Tavis: Well, let's hope that will be 10, as in a major hit.

Whitford: Oh, oh yeah. Okay. Yeah, oh, good.

Tavis: Yeah, okay. Ba-dum-bump.

Whitford: Yeah. (Laugh) That's why he's got the show. (Laugh)

Tavis: And that's why we're out of time. (Laugh) Nice to have you on.

Whitford: Thank you, it was fun.

Tavis: May 14, last episode of one of our favorite shows, and that includes yours truly. That's our show for tonight. Catch me on the weekends on PRI, Public Radio International. Check your local listings. See you back here next time on PBS. Until then, good night from L.A. Thanks for watching, and keep the faith.