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By Jack Nichols
I hear Warren Beatty's been waiting to hear whether or not people want him to run in 2000. I do, Warren, I do. And not just because you've always been a knock-out in the looks department either, though that surely helps. Better a handsome face to contemplate for four or eight years on the evening news, says I, than a redneck-Texan with looks in the Pat Robertson mould, a jerkoff Daddy's boy like George W. Bush, Jr. HBO is currently showcasing Bulworth Warren Beatty's latest masterpiece—a film for which he's responsible in every conceivable way. The fact that he's capable of putting together such a film and acts in it too speaks volumes about Beatty's political acumen.
Beatty knows how to present politics on film with glorious finesse and so it's a sure bet he'd do it with equal effectiveness from his White House perch. He's a long-time director, after all. And, unlike actor Reagan, he's capable of putting together his own scripts. The Sherlocks in our midst say Beatty's an ultra-liberal. These are the same people who cringe whenever Bulworth rants. Beatty's lovable character, Senator Bulworth, you see, has a kind of nervous breakdown and—instead of feeding campaign listeners bull, he gives 'em the honest truth. He even delivers it in comic non-stop rap, enjoying an interracial affair in the interim. Beatty's realistic touch is clear here in that he knows any current Senator would probably have to have a nervous breakdown before saying the kinds of things the fictional Bulworth says. But Bulworth, obviously, is saying the kinds of things Beatty would say in a run for the Presidency.
Therefore, he must be encouraged to run. Run Warren, run! The Beatty message—delivered during the 2000 race—might just cause enough ripples in the two mainstream parties to make them look less like the very Tweedle Dee's and Tweedle Dum's that Gore Vidal accused them of being in his 1974 Esquire "State of the Union" essay. They'd have to deal with Beatty's ideas.
The political script—Bulworth's speeches—is all ready for launching. Hilarious clips of Beatty damning the insurance companies, the educational establishment, the health crisis and the racial divide could be run as TV ads. A Beatty campaign would therefore save hundreds of thousands of dollars bypassing unneeded help from expensive ad agencies. A director with Beatty's talent proves he's ready to do the President's job. He knows already how he'll look in those scenes wherein he'll be called to perform. He'll get the lighting right. No shiny nose. His deliveries will be executed to perfection. Beatty has always been a political animal, a man with sincere convictions who's previously been asked to consider running for office, but is only now giving the possibility some thought. Just imagine, Shirley McLaine for First Sister. If the President were not entertaining enough, we could look forward, perhaps, to seances in the Blue Room. Shirley could campaign for her brother too—promising a more thorough-going federal investigation of the UFO phenomenon, you know, the arrival of those extra-terrestrials. Whether they do or do not exist is beside the point. A whopping 37 percent of the public thinks they do and that could translate into big time votes, n'est pas? Or does this all sound just too California? Beatty—as shown on CNN this week—already has the approval of Chippy, the chimpanzee who's beating out all the pundits with his predictions. (See Brill's Content (July/August p. 41). The chimp, asked if Beatty should consider running, nodded his head "yes" vigorously. That settled it for me. The final words spoken in Bulworth, I suggest, could become the hopeful rallying cry of a Beatty campaign. An elderly bag man hobbles down the street and peers into the camera. He speaks to the apathetic, to the uninvolved, to the conservative zombies of our own time: "You gotta be a spirit—you can't be a ghost." |
Warren Beatty (right) in Bulworth 
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