You're listening to The West Wing Weekly. I'm Rishikesh Hereway.

And I'm Joshua Molina. Today we're talking about Episode 7, Season 1 of The West Wing,

the State Dinner. It was directed by Tommy Schlame and written by Aaron Sorkin and Paul

Redford. It aired originally on November 10th, 1999. It's worth noting that on this episode,

Alice Daniels, the costume supervisor and Lynn Palo, who's the costume designer, they were nominated

for an Emmy for outstanding costumes. And Lynn Palo is the costume designer for scandals, well.

She's a lovely person. And a little bit later, we're going to catch up with her and talk to her

about her work on this episode. Do you guys work together a lot? Is it like Aaron makeup where you

see her on every episode? No, she's too important for me. No, she is the ultimate eyeing and I will

occasionally at the beginning of a season, I'll have a big fitting with her. And then later in the

season, as I put back the weight that I lost in anticipation of the season, I'll have a second

fitting where she lets out all my suits. Somebody like Carrie Washington probably sees her much more

frequently throughout the season. I'm sure for every episode. You're just wearing a suit. You're

not wearing special fancy dresses every time. Yeah, that's true. Although, you know, she has a great

eye for detail and how character informs dress and vice versa. And so, for instance, when

my character became the attorney general of the United States, as he likes to point out, on

scandal, David Rosem. Yes, he was making a little more dough and but slightly nicer suits. And so,

you know, as I came up in the world, I started to express that in the clothes I was wearing.

Well, what did you think about this episode? I felt this episode was a bit thin. Wow, really?

Are we going to fight? Maybe, yeah. For me, it was a little bit diffuse. There was a lot going on,

which is not something to which I object, but almost all of it took place off camera. And I felt

in this particular instance, it was a little bit of a weakness. There was a lot going on and

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