Sorkin plays kiss 'n' tell with Chenoweth
Studio 60 shows Kristin's quirks 700 Club, CNN imitation all true
Nov. 4, 2006. 01:00 AM
RICHARD OUZOUNIAN
While many showbiz pundits are offering their suggestions about how Aaron Sorkin could best fix his troubled NBC series, Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, everybody seems to be missing the most obvious solution: Just ask Kristin Chenoweth.
It's been one of the worst-kept secrets in Hollywood that the pivotal, tortured involvement on the show between Matt Albie (Matthew Perry) and Harriet Hayes (Sarah Paulson) is based on the real-life relationship Sorkin and Chenoweth shared several years ago.
"Well, what am I to say?" sighs Chenoweth sweetly when asked to comment on the situation. "That's tricky stuff. Some of it is literally verbatim me, and some of it is not me at all."
At this moment, she's miles away from the Sunset Strip in every sense of the word.
She's currently rehearsing for The Apple Tree, the Roundabout Theatre production of a musical set to go into previews at New York's Studio 54 on Nov.28. It's one of this year's most hotly awaited shows, thanks to the Tony Award-winning presence of Chenoweth.
But as she sits on a dilapidated couch outside a West Side rehearsal hall wearing oversized glasses and Dutch boy cap she looks more like the little girl from Broken Arrow, Okla., she began as, than the toast of both coasts that she finds herself today.
"It's hard," she says simply about the whole Studio 60 situation. "It's hard on a very private level. I once told Aaron, `Unless you accept Jesus Christ as your personal saviour, then get the hell out,' and he laughed for two minutes. Then I see it on the show in a different way, which I'm not really sure about.
"Yes, I went on The 700 Club to promote an album of Christian songs I had recorded and yes, Aaron and I argued about that, but it doesn't mean I want to watch that disagreement flung up on the screen for all America to see."
She twists at a random piece of her trademark blonde hair. "I'm trying to be supportive of the show, but it's hard. I'm not going to lie. I used to sit at home at night and do imitations of (CNN host) Nancy Grace and the next thing I know, they wind up on the air."
Her mouth twists into a mischievous grin. "We're still extremely close and Aaron called me up on the phone a few weeks ago to ask me what I thought about Mel Gibson. I said, `I'm not going to tell you what I think, because it's going to end up on the show.'"
She gets serious again. "I know some people are looking for failure for him, but I want that show to stay on the air. I think Sorkin is and it's not just because I love him I think he's a genius."
A lot of people use the same word to describe Chenoweth, who has had one of the most eclectic careers in modern show-business.
She was born in 1968 and grew up in the part of America known as "the buckle on the Bible belt." She was a sorority girl who performed at Opryland USA. She was also first runner-up in the 1991 Miss Oklahoma pageant and won a scholarship from the Metropolitan Opera's national auditions.
She threw it all away to go into musical theatre, where she quickly rose to the top, snagging a Tony Award for her delicious performance in You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown. The smash hit Wicked came next, with Chenoweth charming everyone as ditzy blonde witch Glinda.
The West Coast beckoned and she left to do a flop sitcom called what else? Kristin, as well as supporting roles in films like Bewitched, The Pink Panther and the current comedy Running with Scissors.
She also spent two seasons on The West Wing as media guru Annabeth Schott, but even though Sorkin created the series, that isn't where she met him.
"He offered me The West Wing many years ago," she recalls, "but I couldn't do it because of Wicked. Then, when I finally got cast in the series, he sent me flowers with a note saying, `Just my luck, I'm not on the show any more, but you are.'
"Then he called me up to ask me out, but I thought he was just being nice, so I didn't return the call. He called me back. We went out and that was it. I adore him."
It's strange how Sorkin put a certain amount of Chenoweth into the character of Harriet Hayes, but he's left out some of the more fascinating parts, as well.
Get Chenoweth talking about her religious beliefs these days and you'll find a complicated, committed woman, struggling to reconcile herself with what she sees around her.
"It's getting to the point where I don't even want to call myself Christian, because the connotations of that word today are hate, non-acceptance, judgment everything I believe Christianity isn't supposed to be about.
"When you think about it, Jesus was a poor liberal Jew. If he were alive today, he'd be working with people who have AIDS. I wonder how he would have felt about the people who call themselves `Christians' today."
She takes off her glasses and rubs her eyes. "The Christian right has come out against me because I believe in gay rights. And a lot of people in show-business mock me for being Christian. I just have to feel the way that I feel.
"You know, it's funny. I have parents who are right-wing Republican Christians and yet they somehow raised me to love everybody, not to judge everybody. When did that all change in America?"
It's a very good question. The kind of question that would make Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip a lot more interesting.
um, did anyone catch the part about why whatshisname was speeding and why they let him get away with it? i stopped listening
