The ‘Political Animals’ Running Washington, D.C.

If you only knew about America from watching TV, the last few months might lead you to think that women here wield enormous political power. First you had Game Change, the story of Sarah Palin’s attempt to become vice president. Then you had Veep, in which Julia Louis-Dreyfus’s character has accomplished just that. Now comes Political Animals, a new USA network series about a strong female secretary of state who I suspect even a Martian would realize is based on Hillary Clinton.

Sigourney Weaver stars as Elaine Barrish, a smart, controversial ex-First Lady. After losing her party’s nomination to a charismatic upstart, Paul Garcetti — played by creepy-handsome Adrian Pasdar — Elaine surprises the world by doing two things. She accepts President Garcetti’s offer to become Secretary of State, and she divorces her husband, ex-president Bud Hammond, a narcissistic southerner with zipper-troubles played by the Irish actor Ciarán Hinds with more braying Belfast ham than winning North Carolina charm.

Judging from the vigorous, if overblown pilot, Political Animals is about how Elaine juggles her tricky relationships with two different presidents — her boss, whom she finds annoyingly slippery, and her ex, whom she can’t quite resist — and how she deals with her two very different sons: Douglas Hammond, played by James Wolk, is the smooth, dutiful one who fits easily into the Beltway ecosystem. In contrast, T.J., played by Sebastian Stan is gay, does drugs, and can’t bear the political life. More tellingly, perhaps, Elaine also finds herself developing ties to a D.C. reporter, Susan Berg – that’s Carla Gugino – who’s written nastily about her in the past.