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I am the Lord your God, and thou shalt worship no other god before me.’ Boy, those were the days, huh?” So thunders Jed Bartlet at the end of the first episode of The West Wing, 25 years ago today. As character introductions go, television has seen few as potent and delightful as when Martin Sheen’s avuncular Democratic president swept into the White House.

Over the course of seven seasons from 1999 to 2006, Aaron Sorkin’s political drama achieved the impossible: transforming the starchy, cutthroat world of Washington DC politicos into something joyous and accessible. The story of Bartlet and his diligent, whip-smart aides – among them loyal chief of staff Leo McGarry (John Spencer), savvy press secretary CJ Cregg (Allison Janney), cocksure fixer Josh Lyman (Bradley Whitford), curmudgeonly speechwriter Toby Ziegler (Richard Schiff), and his idealistic deputy Sam Seaborn (Rob Lowe) – was the perfect vehicle for Sorkin’s distinctive gatling-gun dialogue. It was a show that was smarter and more eloquent than almost anything else on TV, and wasn’t afraid to flaunt it. “It was,” says cast member Joshua Malina, “a show that encouraged you to care about people and how they are affected by political decisions.”

Viewers watched in awe through elections, filibusters, tribunals, military invasions, health scandals, attempted assassinations, and even a kidnapping. The guest roster was a who’s who of venerable stars: JK Simmons, Amy Adams, Gabrielle Union, Glenn Close, Laura Dern, Christian Slater, Christopher Lloyd, Matthew Perry, James Taylor, and Yo-Yo Ma among them. The series’ legacy can be seen not just in TV – in the snappy “walk and talk” device that it originated, and which spawned a hundred parodies – but in the world of theatre (in the hit musical Hamilton), and even in real-world politics. The West Wing was the series that inspired a generation of young Democrats. And for everybody else, it was simply compulsively well-made television.

Sorkin came into The West Wing with real Hollywood pedigree, as the writer of A Few Good Men and 1995’s The American President. It was in this latter film, a smart political drama starring Michael Douglas, that the idea for The West Wing was born. But he began pitching the show at a time when the public was stubbornly resistant to political narratives. “When we first started, it was right after Bill Clinton’s [Monica Lewinsky] scandal,” recalls Janel Moloney, who plays Josh’s secretary Donna Moss. “People were just cynical and grossed out by politics.” TV executives were, accordingly, hesitant to greenlight a series about DC politicians – a genre that had, even in less jaded times, never really produced a hit. As the script for The West Wing went unheeded, Sorkin made inroads elsewhere, creating the well-received TV-insider sitcom Sports Night. But The West Wing remained at the back of his mind; eventually, NBC commissioned a pilot.

Bartlet himself was conceived as a kind of blend of three US presidents: John F Kennedy, Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton. But while it’s impossible to imagine The West Wing without Sheen as its Jupiterian centre of gravity, the premise could have gone 100 different ways. Sorkin’s original idea was to focus exclusively on the president’s underlings, and never even show Bartlet on screen.

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Early brainstorming meetings also suggested a complete uncertainty as to the direction of the character: James Earl Jones, Jack Lemmon, Bruce Dern, Donald Sutherland, Clint Eastwood, Helen Mirren, Jane Fonda, CCH Pounder, Johnny Carson, and (bizarrely) New York Yankees boss George Steinbrenner were among the myriad names floated. Talks with Sidney Poitier didn’t get far, and Alan Alda – who would join the series towards the end of its run as Republican presidential hopeful Arnold Vinick – turned Sorkin down. The role was actually offered to Hal Holbrook after an impressive audition, only for Sorkin and director/exec producer Thomas Schlamme to change their minds overnight. Sheen ultimately won out, and brought his own key touches to the role – Bartlet’s staunch Catholicism, and his history as a graduate of Notre Dame University.

The pilot was a triumph, and critics quickly took notice. The show’s first season bagged nine Emmy nominations, winning five – across its run, it would go on to win a total of 27 awards from a staggering 98 nominations.

Sorkin, who personally assumed far more of the writing duties than is typical for the collaborative American writers’ room system, has been described as a “demanding and sometimes difficult” boss, but one whose results speak for themselves. His rapid-fire back-and-forth dialogue was a thing to behold, and tackled complex political ideas with wit and verve. Actors have sometimes described the knack for delivering Sorkin dialogue as having “West Wing-mouth”. Not everybody could do it.

“People always came onto the show and they’d say, ‘I just have to say it really fast, right?’” Moloney tells me. “They try and put the cart before the horse. But I think one of the reasons why the show worked is that the cast were all quite emotional actors who just happened to be really facile at language. Most of us were theatre actors. And the dialogue wasn’t a challenge. It was a pleasure. What’s challenging is bad writing.”

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There is an almost musical rhythm to a Sorkin script – perhaps it’s no coincidence that The Social Network scribe got a degree in musical theatre. It is also dialogue to be recited with precision: on the set of The West Wing, he would misleadingly tell guest actors to “make it your own” – but would insist on strict adherence to the script. Of the main cast, it was Schiff who would most push back against this approach – a creative obstinance befitting his character. One of Sorkin’s great strengths was writing specifically to the actors; there were, amid the sea of Sorkinese patter, all sorts of nuances to be found.

Kristin Chenoweth, who joined as deputy press secretary Annabeth Schott in season six, recalls a “particularly long monologue” that had to be rattled off in one shot. “When the camera rolled, I was halfway through the speech and I went blank, the director yelled cut and we did it again and the same thing happened,” she says. “I was horrified and upset. But John Spencer pulled me aside and said, ‘Kris, it’s happened to every single one of us, now you’re in your head. Let that go and just say the words.’ And I learned a valuable lesson: don’t overthink that dialogue too much, just speak it. The words are the star.”

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The fourth season brought the first major change in the departure of Lowe, who felt his character, initially the most narratively prominent of all the White House staffers, was being marginalised. So in stepped Malina as plucky, nebbish Will Bailey. Malina had a long history with Sorkin, having appeared in Sports Night and all three of his films, and may have once saved Sorkin’s life by administering a Heimlich when the writer began choking at a bowling night. When he learned that Lowe was leaving the series, he rapidly emailed Sorkin, proposing himself as a replacement. “Tommy [Schlamme] and I were just discussing this!” came the reply.

The newcomer’s role involved a lot of scene-sharing with Schiff, something Malina tells me he “always loved” despite their “antithetical approaches” to acting. “If the script says, ‘Will is wearing a moose costume, I’m like, ‘Alright, give me a 42-regular,’” he jokes. Schiff, meanwhile, would scrutinise every minutia of the script. “In one scene we did, Richard was asking, ‘Why am I picking up the phone and saying hello at this point?’ I was like: ‘Richard – because it rang.’”

Malina also became renowned for his belligerent practical jokes on set – pages ripped from books, iPods wiped of music, cars filled with dirt. “Malina has no sense of proportional response. If I used a hand buzzer on him, he would, you know, pick up my daughter from school and not tell me,” Whitford says in What’s Next, the recent behind-the-scenes book written by ex-cast members Melissa Fitzgerald and Mary McCormack.

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An even more momentous departure, however, was yet to come. At the end of the fourth season, there was a change of administration. Not the Bartlet administration – but Sorkin’s. Following a protracted butting of heads with the studio over issues of budget and production, Sorkin and Schlamme exited the show, leaving producer John Wells to take over as showrunner. “I thought it was a death knell,” Sheen later said. “I didn’t know if we’d last another year.” Others, however, were more optimistic. “Aaron and Tommy left in a very loving, positive way,” says Moloney. “It didn’t feel like this toxic, tragic, messed up thing. John Wells was already deep in the show… it was pretty seamless.”

Malina remembers it taking a while for everyone to “find their feet” again. “There was a shift in my character’s arc and John Wells had a meeting with me to explain my storyline,” he says. “I’m a very practical actor, so I was like, ‘Whatever keeps me on the show and gives me a storyline, that’s up to you.’” The new arc saw Will Bailey jump ship and work for “Bingo” Bob Russell (Gary Cole), Bartlet’s mediocre VP. “I know big parts of the audience felt disappointed in Will’s trajectory after that,” he says. “But I thought John Wells and the writers did a fantastic job of maintaining a high quality.” Will wasn’t the only character to take a turn after Sorkin’s departure; the most controversial plot development saw Toby, the series’ moral anchor, leak classified secrets to the press. Schiff ended up being “phased out” during the final series, by mutual consent.

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While the latter years of The West Wing never quite hit the ebullient heights of the Sorkin era, this was nonetheless no lame-duck presidency. Invigorating the series in its final two seasons was a pivot towards the post-Bartlet presidential campaign – a battle fought between Republican old hand Arnold Vinick and progressive Democratic outsider Matt Santos. To play these statesman, the series turned to two actors with heavyweight TV credentials: M*A*S*H* star Alan Alda, and NYPD Blue’s Jimmy Smits.

The crowning achievement of the election arc came on 6 November 2005, with an episode titled “The Debate”. Recorded and broadcast live – twice in one evening, for the airing on each US coast – the episode comprised a full-length, half-improvised debate between Santos and Vinick. It was, in many ways, the perfect distillation of The West Wing’s civic ambition: taking something as stiff and prosaic as an issue-based debate, and convincing people to watch it for their own entertainment.

Ultimately, it was Santos who emerged as the winner – the final twist of an election race that anticipated (in several oddly specific ways) the real-life ascent of Barack Obama two years later. Originally, the creators had equivocated over who would win the election – but the decision was made by the sudden death of John Spencer, from a heart attack, midway through filming the final season. His character Leo, who had been running as Santos’s prospective VP, was sombrely killed off, and writers feared that a Democratic loss would compound the tragedy too much. Thus, the series ended with a characteristic swell, as the Democrats – including a newly coupled-up Josh and Donna, and a returning Sam Seaborn – prepare for the transition of power.

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But The West Wing didn’t end in 2006. Not really. In the years since the show went off the air, it has retained an ardent and devoted following. Sorkin went on to a career of coruscating highs (The Social Network, Steve Jobs) and dismal lows: his follow-up TV series Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip and The Newsroom were lambasted for indulging his worst tendencies. In recent years, The West Wing too has been criticised for its rose-tinted vision of US politics. In a post-Trump America, Sorkin’s vision of an ethical and conscientious government seems not just sentimental but wholly preposterous: some have argued that Sorkin’ political fairytale could, in its misrepresentations, have done more damage than good.

“There’s criticism now,” says Moloney, “that these legions of Democrats went to Washington with their head in the clouds thinking it was gonna be like The West Wing. That they should have been preparing for a different, dirtier fight. I find it a little depressing. You can’t blame us for the politics. We’re just a TV show. And the fact that it inspired all these people to get into politics is surely a net-good thing.”

“I wouldn’t overstate the positive way it’s affected politics,” says Malina, “but in the 20-odd years since it aired, I’ve been approached constantly by young people telling me I went into politics or community activism because of The West Wing. The series was its own civics lesson.”

The cast too have remained firmly ensconced in the world of politics, and are – more or less all – actively involved in activism, particularly in and around the Democratic party. “The show lives on because we dream of a better future, even now,” says Chenoweth. “It reminds us of how good we once had it. I think we all still long for what we once had – and The West Wing offered hope. I wish they would reboot it, because we need more hope now than we ever have.”

Chenoweth isn’t the first person to propose a reboot – but, outside of a one-off, non-canonical reunion special in 2020, there have been no credible murmurs of a West Wing comeback. Perhaps it’s for the best. The series endures as a product of its era, a shiny relic of a more hopeful time. And besides, adds Moloney, the window for a sequel is probably fast closing. “You’ll have to get out the walkers if we don’t hurry,” she laughs. “There’ll be walker and talks.”

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Tate Donovan’s Joshua entered the Friends universe in the 1998 episode “The One with Rachel’s Crush”. He played said crush, a client of hers at Bloomingdale’s with sandy curls and woolly jumpers – and the first man Rachel (Jennifer Aniston) ever asks out. She fancied him so much she couldn’t stop repeating his name: “Josh-ooh-ah. Josh-ua.” That said, Joshua spent most of his five-episode arc entirely oblivious to her feelings.

Their behind-the-scenes dynamic couldn’t have been more different – in reality, the two actors had been dating for two years, and were in the process of breaking up when Donovan was cast on the show. There were certainly feelings involved, and no one was oblivious to them.

Speaking 26 years on from sunny Texas, after a career that’s seen roles in The OC, Argo and Rocketman, Donovan tells me about his experience of filming the show, from how hard it was to shoot his scenes with his ex-girlfriend to why he thought of Matthew Perry as the “beating heart” of the sitcom.

I have to admit, I’ve loved rewatching Friends in preparation for this interview.

English people in general are just obsessed with Friends. It blows my mind. Jen and I dated for two years – when we went to England together, it was like being with a Beatle. We had to say we were having reservations at one restaurant and then go to another. There were fake cars and everything, all to avoid the paparazzi.

Then I did a play with Judi Dench on Broadway [Amy’s View in 1997], and it was directed by Richard Eyre, a titan in the world of theatre. We went out for dinner at this beautiful restaurant and I’m just imagining all the questions about theatre I could ask. So, we sit down and he’s like, “Tell me about Friends.” He was obsessed with f***ing Friends and all he wanted to know about was Joey and what Courteney Cox is really like, and this episode here and that scene there.

I couldn’t believe it. I didn’t get a word in edgewise. I thought we were going to talk about Shakespeare and the Globe, but nothing. The National Theatre? Forget about it. Nothing could top Friends.

You joined Friends 26 years ago – what was it like starring on it so soon after breaking up with Jennifer Aniston?

I’d been dating Jen for years, and I knew the cast. Every Friday night it was just like a ritual – I’d go over there and watch the taping, and it was always such a blast. Then Jen and I broke up, but we didn’t really tell anyone.

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I had always mentioned to the producers that it’s always hilarious when Jen, who’s this gorgeous woman, is madly in love with somebody and the guy just doesn’t see it. It cracked me up. I’d seen it when we first started dating – she did an episode where Rachel was on a date with a guy and the guy was just not into her, and she was falling all over herself. It works because that’s not really how she is in life, but she can act it so well.

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And so, the producers came to me and said, “Hey, we want you to do a five-episode arc where you guys are dating and you’re not really that into her.” And I was like, “Oh, so you’re gonna do that thing.” We were just breaking up and I, for some weird reason, thought that maybe working together would ease the breakup. Maybe we’d become friends quicker. I just wanted to go gently into the good night – we both did.

You thought it would change the dynamic in a good way?

Yes, but it was very tough. Everyone was so supportive, but it was hard. It’s like going to class when you’re in high school and you’ve broken up with the girl who you sat next to and… argh, it’s tough.

But it makes you a pro – it’s like, OK, we got over it. Nobody knows; the audience isn’t gonna know; the audience is gonna think just the opposite. When I look back on it, I’m like, “Wow, good for you, man. That was pretty good.”

There have been reports that you two were engaged, are they true?

No, that wasn’t true. We did live together for a little while, but we were never engaged.

Watching it back, there’s no hint of heartbreak. You both disguise it very well.

Looking back at it now, the thing that just kills me is that Matt Perry was the beating heart of that whole cast. He was the funniest.

When you do a sitcom, you do your scenes and then you get out – you don’t really pay attention to the other scenes. But Matt Perry watched every scene that everyone was in. He certainly watched every scene that I was in. He was such a champion of mine. He was so sweet. He was the only one who called me when me and Jen broke up. And we ran into each other throughout the years, and he was always so incredibly supportive.

It meant so much to me [that he was kind on set] because I was really heartbroken, and you don’t know how well you’re doing, and you’re just trying to survive at that point. It’s such a tragedy that he had such a difficult time in life because, for me, Matt Perry was just… they all imitated his humour.

You joined Friends the year after Perry’s jetski accident, which was a catalyst for his worsening addiction issues and led to an opioid dependence. Could you tell things were beginning to unravel?

Not at all. It’s crazy. And we went out. I was there every Friday, and we would take trips together. I had no idea. It didn’t show. Maybe Jen knew and the other cast members knew, but they certainly kept it very quiet. I remember birthdays and going out to dinner and big parties where people got f***ing hammered, and I never saw Matt more wasted than anybody else, that’s for sure. Super-high-functioning guy.

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Do you ever watch Friends now?

I was flipping through the channels at a hotel recently and I saw it, like, “Oh God, there’s Joshua.” I watched a bit of it and thought it was really good, and funny – for many years it was too painful for me to watch those scenes. I liked that my performance wasn’t too broad. It was a grounded scene – and that’s exactly how I like to see comedy, where the actors are more focused on the scene rather than getting laughs.

My son is 19 and he couldn’t be less interested in Friends or really any television show. It’s amazing to me. He’s into TikTok, and he barely sees movies. He’s a big jock and he’s a good student. I’ve brought him onto sets – when I shot Rocketman, he came to England and he was on the set every day but he couldn’t be less interested in a career in entertainment. It’s kind of hilarious.

There were so many funny moments in your bunch of episodes – especially Joshua’s fear of the ducks at Joey and Chandler’s flat.

Does the duck bit work? I remember them saying, “So, there’s a duck, and you’re frightened of ducks.” And I was like, “Who’s frightened of ducks? That’s not a thing.” I didn’t know how to make it work, but I just went for it.

Were there moments where it was hard not to laugh when you were filming, or was it too emotionally weird filming with your ex to find things funny?

I was never close to corpsing on those episodes. Throughout the two seasons before, you can hear me laughing on the laugh track off stage because I’d be hanging out with the assistant directors, watching the scenes.

Did you get any interesting insights from being behind the scenes and watching the tapings?

All the cast were obsessed with the schedule, especially Courteney Cox. She was hilarious. She could have been an air traffic controller at JFK. She was so focused on when they’re doing a scene, when she has to be in hair and makeup, and when she can leave, when she can go back home, [and] when she can come back.

Friends is still being watched all the time, all around the world. On the one hand, you’ve got lots of people discovering it for the first time and falling in love with it. On the other, there’s been a reappraisal of the series, with criticisms over its lack of diversity and its gay jokes.

I’m kind of shocked that people are still enjoying it because so much of the culture has changed for the better – like, who really cares about all these privileged white kids? It’s the same with The OC. I’m definitely ready for there to be far more diverse voices heard. It’s such a breath of fresh air.

When you look back, where does Friends sit in the puzzle of your career? I know it came after Ally McBeal and Inside Monkey Zetterland, but before The OC and Argo and Damages.

I’m so lucky that I am still acting and directing, and Friends was a great jewel in the crown for sure. But in my career, nothing’s really led to anything else. I can’t see a through line. I’m just trying to get another job – I’ve been that way for over 40 years and, well, I’ve been lucky.