What with there having been no female leaders behind the desk of the Oval office, we all – Hillary Clinton included – should look to film and television to work out how, conceivably, the world’s most powerful position could possibly be held by a woman. Here are a few helpful things Clinton might learn from her fictional forerunners.
How to become president
Forget about having to actually win an election, thereby gaining office based on your capability and due democratic process – TV and film writers rarely trust American voters to actually elect a woman. Instead, become vice-president and hop into the job once the real (read: male) president can no longer do it. It worked for Mackenzie Allen (Geena Davis) in Commander in Chief (the president dies of a brain aneurysm), Barbara Adams in the 1986 comedy Whoops Apocalypse (the incumbent dies after being hit by a journalist) and Selina Meyer (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) in the TV series Veep (President Hughes resigns to look after his wife). Hurry the process along by murdering him – in Prison Break, vice-president Caroline Reynolds poisons the head of state. Even if there are others above you who are more likely to become president, don’t lose hope – Laura Roslin (Mary McDonnell) becomes president in Battlestar Galactica after a nuclear strike on the Twelve Colonies, and she was 43rd in line.
Also: be a Republican. Allen was a Republican before she became an Independent. Reynolds is probably one, as is the latest president in the TV series 24, Allison Taylor.
Things to achieve once you’re in office
Laying out red carpets for high-heeled horses, as Betty Boop promises to do in the 1932 cartoon Betty Boop for President. Getting the public to swallow your taxation measures, as achieved by President Lisa Simpson (who succeeded Donald Trump and inherited financial chaos). World peace – President Diane Steen in the 1998 comedy film Mafia! is on the verge of accomplishing this before going off to get married. The survival of the human race (Laura Roslin’s preoccupation).
Things to watch out for
Evil foreigners, obviously – President Constance Payton in TV drama State of Affairs has to deal with Boko Haram, Islamist extremists, Colombian rebels and the Russians.
Your presidency is more likely to be viewed as being driven by emotion, with you as maternal nurturer-in-chief. “Like other fictional women presidents, Laura Roslin is portrayed as being motivated by humanitarian, rather than military, priorities,” write academics Kristina Horn Sheeler and Karrin Vasby Anderson in their 2013 study, Woman President: Confronting postfeminist political culture. But they also point out that people may still call you “sir” – as Roslin finds out.
When to step down
Perhaps, like President Allison Taylor in 24, you lose sight of your original good intentions, but then own up to your failures – things like torturing people and threatening nuclear war – and resign. But for a female fictional president, it’s more likely to be for less dramatic reasons: when your marriage and family are suffering and you realise your real place is back at home. The 1964 film Kisses For My President may have a vomit-inducing title, but Leslie McCloud was portrayed as a pretty decent leader of the free world. It’s her husband who can’t stand being first gentleman. Happily for him, she resigns when she gets pregnant.
