Andrew Eccles/USA Network
Sigourney Weaver plays Elaine Barrish in the new series 'Political Animals.'
In the new USA-TV drama ?Political Animals,? Sigourney Weaver plays a Hillary Clinton-like character who does what Hillary did not.
After Weaver?s Elaine Barrish narrowly loses her party?s nomination for President, she tells her philandering husband, ex-President Bud Barrish, that she wants a divorce.
Weaver acknowledges with a mildly reluctant nod that this moment could make millions of women clench their fists and say, ?Yes!? But she quickly makes it clear that she doesn?t want payback to be anyone?s takeaway from Elaine Barrish.
She wants people to watch Elaine and say we?d be better off if we had women making more of the big decisions.
?We need more women in government,? says Weaver bluntly, ?to get the country moving forward again. Women aren?t tied to the old ways. We don?t just talk. We roll up our sleeves and find ways to get things done.
?Women in Congress, even though there aren?t enough of them, support each other. They?re more collegial.?
The men in ?Political Animals,? which launches its six-episode run Sunday night at 10 with a powerful cast that also includes Carla Gugino, Ellen Burstyn, James Wolk and Sebastian Stan, often live down to Weaver?s fears.
Her husband, Bud, is a cad. Brilliant and charming, but a cad. The man who beats her in the primary asks her to become his secretary of state, promising a new era. After she agrees, he too disappoints her.
?She thinks he?s going to be different,? says Weaver. ?He turns out to be the same.?
That means deals, deception, dishonesty, compromise on principles and all the rest, which Weaver fears is exactly what?s stalling real-life America.
Acknowledging that?s always been one element of American politics, she traces the current malaise to Bill Clinton?s Monica Lewinsky scandal.
And she doesn?t blame Clinton.
?What he did was wrong and hurtful,? she says. ?But what his enemies did was disgraceful. All those self-righteous Republicans. What they put the country through, taking it all the way to impeachment ? it was insane. I don?t think the country has recovered.?
What has lingered, she suggests, is the sheer viciousness of the arguments. ?We have to somehow move beyond that,? she says, and that?s where an Elaine Barrish comes in.
She?s no saint, says Weaver, ?but she wants to use power to help people, to speak for people without a voice. She doesn't like politics. She tried to stay out. But she didn?t see any other way to do the things she can do there. She?s a political animal.?
Weaver, 62, shares more of Elaine?s life than she has shared with some of her past characters, like gorilla maven Diane Fossey or action hero Ellen Ripley in the ?Alien? films.
Still, she calls Elaine ?the most challenging role I?ve ever had. The Barrishes are a very difficult family ? and like so many of us, Elaine sometimes finds that it?s much easier to go to work than stay home and try to solve what?s there.?
Fans who still cherish Weaver as Ellen Ripley, mowing down large, angry and gooey interplanetary invaders with a super-machine gun in the ?Alien? series, will see a far different Weaver gliding elegantly through the halls of Washington power on ?Political Animals.?
But in the end, she says, ?Alien? and ?Political Animals? aren?t necessarily all that far apart. ?They?re both addressing the same issue,? she says. ?How to run the planet.?
dhinckley@nydailynews.com
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