>> i could not see going out on stage and having a party without first finding some sort of peace with what took place. >> he also reveals why he's rapping again. >> i'm a bit of a king in the rap world, sir. >> you really are. they're talking about you in every club. >> this is piers morgan tonight. >> good evening, big story tonight. truth, power and the media, colliding like never before in the "newsroom." alan sorkin gave us the west wing and social network and now taking on cable news, i'll talk to him in a moment and jeff daniels plays the cynical anchorman and who he based his character on and the hit maker with a hit show, l.l. cool j and opening up about his private life and what it really means to be a role model. first, the big story, hbo's newsroom. now the show's creative writer. alan sorkin and jeff daniels. welcome to you both. i was at the premier of the newsroom in new york, a very gradios affair with all the great of media there, lots of cable news anchors racing to see how accurate this was. i think it's fair to say, general consensus was it was pretty darned accurate. people really enjoyed it. i found it a thrilling reality check, for me, what it's like to see it through the prism of your character, jeff. i'm curious about your motives here. i'm an unashamed "west coast wing" fan. privilege to have you here. what are you trying to achieve with the cable news genre, if anything? >> i'm only trying to achieve one thing. one goal. that's to entertain the audience for an hour. we shoot our show on stage 7 at sun set studios, the same stage where they shot "the monkees" and we're going for the exact same thing. >> but are you, though? >> you say all this stuff. i think underneath it, you do like to make your point. some of the criticism the reviews i've seen is not centered around the show or jeff, but this sorkinism, somehow an offensive new term for the polemic stuff you put in and i really enjoy, i suspect some people don't. tell me about that criticism you get. >> i do enjoy it. i enjoy language very much. it sounds like music to me. i enjoy oratory. that's the reason for the long speeches. i grew up in a family where anyone who said one word when they could have used 10 just wasn't trying hard enough. i was the dumbest kid in my family. i'd sit at the dinner table just listening to fantastic arguments, like i was listening to a tennis match. i grew to really like that. i loved the sound of a point really well made, of somebody saying, but you haven't thought of it this way. think about that. what if this were to happen. as a writer, i grew up wanting to imitate that sound. >> a fantastic speech at the start of episode one, your character, will makes, jeff, trapped in this boring convention with students and then goaded by the moderator into finally letting go what he really thinks. let's listen to this. >> we didn't identify ourselves by who we voted for in the last election and didn't scare so easy. we were able to be all these things and do all these things because we were informed. >> by great men, men who were revered. the first step in solving any problem is recognizing there is one. america is not the greatest country in the world anymore. >> it was fascinating watching the room reaction, all these hard edges newsmen, a lot of them nodding along with that because it was a great speech and a classy, if you don't mind me saying sorkinism. >> i don't mind. at its best. it made you think. you rattled all these statistics where america is not number one anymore. made the point it used to be a great country and could be a great country again and right now it's not the greatest credit in the world. let me ask you a difficult difficult question. when you said it, did you believe it yourself? >> it was interesting to do the speech, work on the speech. it came late. there were some drafts it wasn't there. there was something that happened at northwestern that was referred to, i think one of the last couple of drafts before the pilot. >> last seen written. here comes the speech. let's see it. i remember reading it, going, you may not like it, you may disagree with it, you know, you -- for those who are patriotic and wave the flag and don't want to hear it but there's nothing in it that's not true. that went all the way -- each phrase, each thing aaron has will say is all true. >> sorry to tell you, but it's true. that really resonated with me, to be able to say that, take words like the way this guy can put them together and throw it at the lens and throw it at an audience, it's for an actor, it's gold. >> it seemed to me, you're doing with will's character, who's the cable news anchor, kind of what you did with president bartley, he make these great speeches and makes these great moments sitting at his desk wherever he may be and over time, you start to speak for what america should be like. it's a better world, if you like. i sort of take issue with you slightly devaluing what your objective is here. i actually believe you do have a slightly higher calling with these things. >> listen, i do -- my point, with devaluing is simply that. this show wasn't asking anyone to eat its vegetables at all, really, its spirit is screwball comedy. it's romantic comedy, heightened reality, idealistic, swashbuckling and we do just want people to have fun for an hour. but i'm writing about things i really, you know, believe in. one of them is i'm a patriot. i love america. that word "patriot," at least in my lifetime, has been defined over a different way as just somebody who flies a flag in front of their house. if you for instance criticize america, if you give the speech that jeff gives at the beginning of the show, that makes you anti-american. that's something on "the west wing" and this show we fight against. >> aaron, you said, i felt like a lot of news outlets abdicated their responsibilities and a lot of people want to carry the torch of edward r. morrow. critics say you have to live in the real world, if you go to high faluting with your news coverage, if you try and do it in the purest sense, what your character does in this show, it doesn't rate, especially if it's not big breaking news. i can tell you a hard fact it is true. >> no. i know it is true. >> how do you tackle that? how you had your toes dipped in our waters for a while. if you were running a news network, what would you do? >> let me back up and say i don't have to live in the real world. i'm a fiction writer. get to write a democratic administration that can get things done and i get to write about a very idealistic newsroom where these guys reach unrealistically high so they fall down a lot and we're still rooting for them anyway. there's no question that the antagonists in this show doesn't come so much in the form of a person although that's the role jane fonda plays and the role kris messina play, it's ratings, if we have a problem in this country with the news, it's at least as much the consumer's fault as it is the provider's fault. but this show doesn't live in the real world. it seems like it does because it's set against the backdrop of real news events. we never do fictional news on the show. it's all real. the characters are all fictional and not based on anybody, i know you will get to that question. they're constantly referencing don keheady and camelot and the name of the cable station is atlantis and its parent company is atlantis and these are all lost cities. >> unimaginable romantic and idealist. he excels in that. the happy ending, swashbuckling. aaron told me when we started this, by the way, if you're in here to be likable all the time and it ain't going to work that way because you're going to fail. will is going to fail miserably. we do. over the first season, it is a struggle, just like the struggle a lot of these tv journalists say they're going through. >> it is a quite spectacular [ bleep ] from time-to-time. why i like knew thank you. >> let's take a short break and talk more about [ bleep ] will and aaron the genius. 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[ male announcer ] the citi thankyou visa card. redeem the points you've earned to travel with no restrictions. rewarding you, every step of the way. people don't come here looking for handouts. we are a nation of striver and climbers and interprets the hardest working people on the nation on earth. >> how does people on earth -- is he slightly deluded, president obama, taking from your character's speech at the start of the first episode? are americans still the hardest working people on earth? >> i have no idea. i have detested to how other people in the world work. it's good oratory. >> you didn't write that speech? >> no, i didn't. but jon favreau, not the actor but the president's speechwriter would tell you barack obama is the best writer in any room barack obama is in. i always smile when people have a problem with the teleprompter. he's the guy that wrote what's on the teleprompter. >> yeah. let's watch how this speech goes. quite interesting what he then says. >> nobody personifies these american values, these american traits more than the latino community. >> he's shameless. i would have thought -- again, you could expect that to pop up in the west wing at some stage, as a campaign message. for a president to be standing there today deliberately pandering like there at to the latino community at a latino conference. >> right. >> am i being too cynical here? >> of course, you're not. listen, he's at a latino conference. governor romney spoke there yesterday, i think. and they both need the latino vote. but i -- i will say that i -- it's -- it's nicer hearing that than hearing about the lazy mexicans who come here who are draining our resources, selling drugs and shooting guns. >> that's true. >> you get up at 6:00 in the morning and see who's waiting at the bus stops. any time a new hotel opens in town, see who's snaking around the block three times waiting for a job. >> and you ruined it basically for every american president by making bartlett so likable principled and everything else that he was, have you basically ruined -- do all of them now get unfairly compared to bartlet? i have seen polls that bartlett would have made president time and again? >> i have the benefit of fiction. i don't just get to decide what bartlett say, i get to decide what everybody else says and does, too. it's a lot easier for bartlett than for a real president. >> jeff, what is it like to work as an actor with someone like aaron's words because he's famously -- he strives over everything himself. this is absolutely his stamp on almost every word you will be in the end acting? >> every word, yeah. you memorize every word. that's the drill. i was doing a movie with meryl streep once and the hours and we were going to walk into a doorway where david hair was the screenwriter, merrill, say a few words coming in through the door. she was what, i have to write it, too? i never heard an actor say that. david harris sitting there, came up with two lines. why do i have to write it? that's how you feel. you have aaron sorkin, a singular voice, you don't have a committee, you don't have executives noting him to death and three or four writers on it, he has every word on it. >> by the same token, when i'm writing it, i get to know jeff is going to be playing it, emily and sam waterston, these people are going to be playing it, you know what, you don't need a half page speech here. it's going to happen on jeff's face when he lights the cigarette. >> i did an interview with you a few years ago after the drugs thing that happened to you and you were talking about you like to just disappear on your own. at the time, it would be with drugs. >> yeah. >> you wanted to go to vegas on your own rather than go with other people. >> yeah. >> just have a night in a clean hotel room, as you put it. that is a strange thing to do. why do you like that solitude? >> i liked it then because of the drug use. i didn't party with other people. i never did drugs with other people, i only did it by myself. now, solitude is about writing. because so much of that process is thinking about what you're going to write before you write it. i'm also a father now, so when i'm not working i like to spend my time -- >> did you let the beatles do your best stuff on the drugs? >> you know what -- the last thing i want to do is make drugs sound good to anybody. but, you know, bill maher once said drugs sure haven't hurt his record collection. i don't think i did do my best stuff while i was high, but even if i had, if i was writing at shakespeare level high and the hackiest hack level straight, i'll take not being high and a hack. >> have you arrived at a good place in your life, do you think. the hard way maybe, but you have? >> i'm the luckiest guy in the world. i love being a father. i get paid to do exactly what i love doing, exactly what i'd love to do for free and i get to work with the greatest people in my industry. >> without wanting to be too intrusive, according to the photographs i saw after the premier, you are dating a beautiful woman from "sex & the city"? is this true. >> every so often. i am a single man. but every so often, an otherwise brilliant woman will have a short lapse of judgment and agree to go out on a date with me and that's what happened with christine davis, who was nice enough to be my date for the l.a. premier the other night. >> you make a very nice couple. >> thanks. we'll see what happens. >> let's take a hurried break. jeff, when we come back, i'll talk about the fact you were compared to be the new cary grant. and how is that going for you. >> atsz going well, thank you. m. it's an honor to be a fire fighter. my job involves life or death situations you. satsz going well, thank you. going well, thank you. it's a 156-week contract. it gives me the opportunity to fire you 155 times at the end of each week. we'll wait a few months to make sure it's not a story bill carter can shove up my -- >> how did you get my contract changed? >> i gave the network back some money off my salary. >> how much money? >> a million dollars a year. >> you gave back a million dollars a year. you paid a million dollars to fire me any time you want? >> 3 million dollar. not any time i want, just the end of each week. >> aaron sorkin and jeff daniels here to talk about "the "newsroom"." i love your character. i'm sure you feel this way about an actor. a great role. so much you can go to with him. what's she like to work with? >> she's a dream, an incredible foil, if that's even a word for will. through will's bluster and screaming and yelling and treating everybody as if they're peasants, when the smoke clears, emily is still standing there going, are you done? she comes right in. she knows him better than he knows himself for reasons that will show over the season. he's madly in love with her and hates her guts at the same time >> they clearly had a fling. this is the obvious. >> off-camera, she's a dream. she's a pro and works so hard. the chemistry we have is two actors listening to each other in front of the camera. she's beautiful to work with. >> the worrying thing i felt i said this to you, it will put us all out of business because you're so good. the new will, when he gets reborn, as this kind of cynical charging firebrand has prompted this big debate over who you based this on, i suppose who you based this on. lots of names have been thrown. is it hybrid or is there one particular -- probably throwing his own hat in the ring but -- >> the character is entirely a product of my imagination and then jeff's imagination. this person doesn't exist on tv. will mcavoy is a moderate republican, who says that he's from a town outside a town outside lincoln nebraska. he is pro-life. he supports the arizona immigration bill and he's become famous and successful for aciduously hugging the middle of the road and not bothering anybody. >> finally -- >> if he's keith olbermann, i missed it. >> if you were in -- i have a "gq" cover to show you. it asked a great question. is jeff daniels the next cary grant? there it is. >> that's a great question. >> to which the answer was -- >> no. no, i believe, correct me if i am wrong, there was only one cary grant. i think woody had said it. woody had kind of mentioned there are elements of what he does in "purple roads of cairo" that are of that kind of cary grant way of acting. or some such -- >> you had a great line about it actually. i was aware i don't have the looks for that movie star thing and when you have the camera on, it sucks the lens and loves me. whatever career i have is because i'm an actor and good actor. >> yeah. i'll stand by that. >> i actually think he's the new spencer tracy. that's who -- any time i write something and it comes time to cast it and you sit around with 3 casting director to talk about who you're looking for, i always ask if spencer tracy is available. he never is and then we try to fulfill the role. it's impossible to find jeff daniels in hollywood. there's only one. he's the only person that we wanted to play the role. it would be an entirely different show if he wasn't playing it and we're lucky to land him. >> what do you think is the art of great acting? you've written for great actors, been a great actor. what is the art of great acting, other than listening? >> listening is a big part of it. i think it depends what actor you're talking about. i can tell you if there are some things an actor can't fake. an actor can't fake smart, an actor can't fake funny. if you need those things, you need to find somebody who is smart and funny. we were talking about emily a moment ago, really a remarkable winning performance that she gives. i don't write a lot of description in the scripts, but when her character enters, i describe it a little bit, as someone who doesn't need to act tough because she is tough, and that frees her up to be kind of silly and goofy and be who she is and that's exactly who emily is. there's -- she doesn't feel like she's a woman in a man's world. >> she's a great character. jeff, when you look around now in affirmant of great actor,