Exclusive Interview: Aaron Sorkin

September 19, 2012 World Screen Top Stories

PREMIUM: Aaron Sorkin, who won an Academy Award for The Social Network and multiple Emmys for The West Wing, talks to World Screen about his latest show, The Newsroom, for HBO.

WS: Why did you choose TV news as a topic to explore in a TV series?
SORKIN: I like writing working stories and [about] workplace families. I like writing romantically and idealistically. A TV newsroom felt like a good place to do that.

WS: Who or what served as inspiration for the lead characters?
SORKIN: All the characters on the show are fictional.

WS: Tell us what you mean by, "The show’s got one foot in reality and one foot in this romantic wish-fulfillment fantasy."
SORKIN: The show looks and sounds real but the aspiration of its characters—and every once in a while the outcome—are out of a fairy tale.

WS: What research did you do before or while writing the show?
SORKIN: I spent time in several newsrooms just to get a feel of the place (and it turns out they’re all different.) I also had a series of meetings with some of the top people in American journalism. Sometimes they were one-on-one and sometimes they were rowdy roundtables. I asked a ton of questions but mostly let them do the talking. At some point I’d ask two questions: The first was, "What would a utopian news show be?" and the second was, "What’s stopping someone from doing that?" The answers to the first question varied a bit but the answer to the second question was always some form of, "Guts." If you want to write romantically and idealistically, that’s the best answer you could hear.

WS: On one hand, too much of television news today is fluff, on the other, there are 24-hour news channels that are guided more by political ideology than by a desire to give real context and analysis to news events. What does this all mean for the democratic process in America?
SORKIN: All of my education, training and experience has been in playwriting and screenwriting. I don’t want to pass myself off as an expert on the things I write about. I think everyone can agree that a well-informed electorate is crucial to the success of a democracy.

WS: HBO is known for giving writers freedom to follow their vision of a show. Do you feel you could not have done The Newsroom for a broadcast network?
SORKIN: I had great experiences at NBC and ABC but we wouldn’t have been able to do The Newsroom on a broadcast network.

WS: I have spoken to a number of writers and showrunners, including Terry Winter, the creator of Boardwalk Empire, who feel that The Sopranos on pay TV and The West Wing on broadcast TV, changed the course of TV drama series. What did you set out to accomplish with The West Wing? Were you trying to advance the drama genre?
SORKIN: When I write something I don’t have my sights set any higher than entertaining an audience for however long I’ve asked for their attention. Terry keeps raising that bar.

WS: The West Wing offered viewers intellectually challenging, rapid-fire dialogue. In the beginning of the series, were you concerned that such an ambitious show might not find an audience, especially on broadcast TV?
SORKIN: I try to write something that I like and that I think my friends would like and that I think my parents would like and then I keep my fingers crossed that enough other people will like it that I can earn a living. I think it’s important to like your audience and have faith in them. I don’t think the people who watch television are any dumber than the people who make television.

WS: What are some of the different creative challenges between writing a feature-film screenplay and writing for television?
SORKIN: The biggest difference is time. When I’m working on a screenplay and it’s not going well—which is almost all the time—I can call the studio and say, "I’m sorry, I’ve hit rough spot and it’s going to take longer than I thought." With television you have a hard deadline and that means that you have to write even when you’re not writing well.

WS: You initially trained as an actor. What made you want to become a writer? And when did you discover you had an ear for dialogue?
SORKIN: I acted in all the school plays and I went to a conservatory theater program instead of a liberal arts school. I’d always loved the sound of dialogue but it wasn’t until the end of my senior year in college that I tried writing it myself. I still feel like it’s the end of my senior year in college.

WS: I’ve read that when you write you do not always stay seated at your keyboard; you move around and act out the scenes and characters you are imagining. Can you tell us about that process?
SORKIN: I’m pretty active when I’m writing. I start arguments in my head between two characters and if something sparks I’ll be on my feet and talking out loud and before you know it I’m out on the street looking like someone a mom would tell her kid not to make eye contact with.

WS: You have said your next project is a movie based on Walter Isaacson’s biography of Steve Jobs. You have already written movies that are adaptations of books. How do you plan on approaching this screenplay and what creative challenges does it present?
SORKIN: I’m at the beginning of the process with Steve Jobs. The irony of staring at a blinking cursor on a blank Apple screen isn’t lost on me.