By Jamie Ruby

The Gilchrists are a typical American family that has typical problems, except they happen to live in the White House. The father, President Dale Gilchrist is played by Bill Pulman (Independence Day, While You Were Sleeping), his wife, and stepmother to the children, is played by Jenna Elfman (Dharma and Greg, Accidentally on Purpose). While he balances running the country and being a father, she tries to fit in with the kids and gain their acceptance. Eldest son Skip, played by Josh Gad (Broadway's The Book of Mormon, 21) is the clown of the family. His blunders and well-intentioned efforts to gain his father's respect often cause more problems than they solve, yet he is often the one who brings everyone together.

The series was created by Jason Winer (Modern Family), Jon Lovett (former White House speechwriter), and Gad himself.

1600 Penn returns Thursday January 10th to NBC.

The three stars of the series recently talked to the digital media about the comedy.

NBC Conference Call
1600 Penn
Josh Gad, Bill Pullman, and Jenna Elfman

December 14, 2012
1:15 CT

QUESTION: A question for Bill. I wanted to ask you about your previous presidency. I understand for Independence Day you had a chance to take the role that Will Smith ended up taking and instead you chose the presidency role. Did you regret that later when it made a Will star? And do you enjoy now the notion we think of a president when we think of you?

BILL PULLMAN: I heard that once before but that isn’t actually my memory of it so it’s somebody else. There was a period when Jeff Goldblum hadn’t been cast. And they said well, either part. But my Jewish credentials weren’t high at the time. Since then I’ve increased them but I didn’t want to take - that was the part that was open -- David -- and so even though I realized once I got in the room they really were hoping that I was intrigued by the president part.

But it was never Will. If it had been Will I would’ve asked for at least 10% of everything he’s made since then. But I missed my chance.

QUESTION: With gay marriage being such a big topic in politics, is that addressed on the show or are there any gay characters on the show?

BILL PULLMAN: In the pilot one of the characters expresses an interest in the same sex. But like all of the issues that we address on the show, the show itself is not very politically motivated.

And that’s not our intention. Our intention is to do a story about a dysfunctional family that happens to be in the most famous address in the United States of America. And while it touches on politics it’s [a] backdrop and not at the forefront of any of the storylines.

QUESTION: Do you like to believe that these kind of shenanigans really are happening behind the scenes in the Obama White House or were happening in the Bush or Clinton years?

JOSH GAD: To a certain extent Jon Lovett -- who was one of the President’s speech writers -- has said that in writing for the show that it was never his intention to portray the Obamas. Because the Obama family is almost supernaturally perfect. And perfection doesn’t really lead to comedy.

But I think that you can look as far back as Mary Todd Lincoln and you can look at some of the current presidential predecessors and you can see dysfunction in the halls of the White House for at least a hundred years.

And I think what’s so interesting now is under the scrutiny of the 24-[hour] media news cycle what happens if a family like were to be front and center? How do you avoid the blitzkrieg of questions? If you think back to [the] Bush twins and all the questions that they had to deal with about their alcohol consumption even though they were just in college.

Or you look at some of the questions that Chelsea Clinton got about her life and her lifestyle. I think that there’s a lot of questions that will be addressed the more and more we live in that bubble and the more that 24-hour cycle is there and present.

QUESTION: Bill and Jenna, given that pre-production for this obviously took place during this last presidential campaign, was it ever a consideration that together you two look like the Romneys?

BILL PULLMAN: Jenna?

JENNA ELFMAN: I don’t know, we were just so focused on – when we made the pilot we weren’t in that territory. We were cast back in April of this year. So it wasn’t really - we were in the middle of filming our season when that happened to really come to the forefront and all of the news and the debates and everything going on.

So when we took the role and we were cast in the roles that really wasn’t part of our mindset.

JOSH GAD: Technically Romney was copying Bill.

BILL PULLMAN: True. I think I - we (unintelligible) him in the office so he’s styling after me. I noticed that in his suits. Plus you’re around a lot of comedians here so they were saying, “Has anybody told you how much you look like Obama?”

QUESTION: Bill and Jenna, you are both playing a presidential family. Did you model anything over any families or did you meet with anyone? Or you just went with your own acting abilities?

JENNA ELFMAN: Well, thank god I have so many first ladies on my speed dial. So it was just like I closed my eyes and I scrolled and just picked, anywhere my finger landed.

I wish. Unfortunately, I couldn’t ring up any current or former first ladies so I used the old-fashioned way of a bookstore and books about first ladies. And really just tried to get a sense of what their reality is landing into such a heightened existence from their life prior to that and what obstacles they faced and what goals they had as first ladies, just to get myself oriented.

BILL PULLMAN: Yeah, it was a surreal time to be making this because of the campaign going on. So every time I read in the newspaper any account of either candidate going through something I could really zero in empathetically about what it must be like to be in private moments with the family about different issues and then ways in which that could be tweaked in a comic way.

So it was every day that we were shooting it was in the news.

QUESTION: Josh, did you write this while you were doing The Book of Mormon or was it before that time?

JOSH GAD: What happened was Jason Winer -- the director of Modern Family -- and I had met around the time that Modern Family was casting for one of the roles. And I had passed on it, which is probably stupid considering my bank account is a lot smaller now than it could’ve been.

But Jason and I met up again around the time of Book of Mormon and we hatched this idea. And we knew that we wanted to work together. We knew that this was the perfect vehicle to do that. And that missing ingredient was getting the person who could ground it into the reality that we wanted to set it against, which was the White House. And we came across Jon Lovett, who is not be confused with the former Saturday Night Live comedian but a young kid who was working for the President’s administration as a speech writer.

And then once that happened it started firing on all cylinders. But the process began around my final five months in Book of Mormon and then went from there. When I finished I went to shoot the show.

QUESTION: I was wondering if there was anything that wasn’t originally written for your characters that you felt you wanted to add to the role that might assist...

BILL PULLMAN: Jenna.

JENNA ELFMAN: Sorry - I’m chewing...

BILL PULLMAN: This is our lunch break so we’re still grabbing little bites...

JENNA ELFMAN: I ran from in front of a camera to a room and I’m stuffing rice in my mouth.

What was wonderful from my experience - we shot the pilot and then when we got picked up and we were getting ready to go into production to film all the episodes, the writers had asked me to come in and meet with them and hear stories of my life and things that are specific to me that they may be able to incorporate whether it’s actual technical things like the fact that I’m a classically trained dancer -- which they did bring into an episode -- or just more tonally, my sensibility in terms of my own humor, my voice, my rhythm, my timing so they could really write specifically towards me in their incorporation of the character.

And I found it was noticeable, the adjustment and enhancement going into filming the series from the pilot having done that. And I’m so glad they did. And it’s really made a difference. That was my experience.

BILL PULLMAN: Yeah, well, and I was out of town so I didn’t meet with the writers but they all seemed intrigued by the fact that I’ve had a ranch in Montana for a long time. And it ended up being the state was Nevada, for a while there was some talk it could’ve been Montana which would’ve been really an exact parallel. But we actually used that in an episode, too, which was a whole lot of fun to make that.

JENNA ELFMAN: Yeah you got to chop down some serious trees.

BILL PULLMAN: Yeah. Josh and I had to split some wood. We had to chainsaw...

JOSH GAD: No. Bill had to split wood. I had to act like I was splitting wood.

BILL PULLMAN: True.

SCIFI VISION: This question is for all of you. Can you talk about for each other how you think that they’re most alike and different from their characters?

JOSH GAD: I think that Bill has this absolute control of a room when he walks in. I think that there’s a reason that he’s played the president on more than one occasion. It’s because you would trust him to be the leader of the free world. You look into his eyes and you see somebody who has command of a room, who has the wherewithal to lead people through either an alien invasion or his son’s invasion of his home.

And I think with Jenna there’s this absolute sense of inner calmness and inner strength but an outer flurry that is excitable and that is all of these wonderful things. And I think that that character absolutely resembles the inner and outer version of what you get from the brilliance that is Jenna Elfman.

JENNA ELFMAN: Well I’m your biggest fan, Josh. So I’m happy to discuss everything about you. And you’ll have to cut me off because I could go on forever. But Josh...

JOSH GAD: And moving on.

JENNA ELFMAN: Josh has one of the best senses of humor and timing of anybody I’ve met in a very long time combined with a true sense of joy. And it’s rare in my experience that I find actors who are men who are truly joyful, who are really freaking funny. And you either get one or the other or none or neither.

But what I love about his character is that in all of the craziness and all of the mis-estimation that is Skip he brings - there’s always a little - even if it’s one billionth of a fraction of truth and a magic and honesty and realness and humanity to our family on this show. And so while being very annoying at times or confounding he inevitably has a piece of humanity and heart and magic that ends up bringing the family together.

And this is the strangest analogy but he kind of reminds me of Curious George.

JOSH GAD: I don’t know where this has gone. This has gone off a fiscal cliff for me.

JENNA ELFMAN: No, Curious George always gets into trouble but his mistakes always end up leading to something good.

JOSH GAD: Well, good. You remind me of Babar the Elephant.

BILL PULLMAN: And for me, this is my first time doing a series. And I imagine you probably as journalists have all heard, “Oh, we love each other on the show” and everything.

But actually I’m a newbie and I get to say that for real as an honest thing. This is a great group of people that are incredibly respectful of each other and the whole process has been a great gift. You know, all of the other actors are family, too.

It seems that there is not a level - and I think that’s reflected in the episodes. There isn’t that modern snarkiness in the characters, and I think it comes from the fact that all these people aren’t that way in life.

JOSH GAD: I think that there is a cynical approach to a lot of comedy today. And some people will love the fact that we’re taking the opposite route and some people won’t.

But that is what Bill said is that’s an absolute truth to this show. This is not a cynical world. This is a very optimistic family. And they love each other. And we as the cast have truly fallen in love with each other.

QUESTION: Josh, I just want to get more details on how and why you came up with the idea for the show.

JOSH GAD: Essentially it was an opportunity for Jason Winer to exploit me. He saw my character in The Book of Mormon and loved it and wanted to take that kind of thing and bring it to television.

And interestingly enough, when we were first discussing this project what intrigued me so much about it [was] the idea of this family like my own family or like a lot of dysfunctional families who has their warts and under the constant scrutiny of being under this microscope.

I didn’t - I originally didn’t want to play Skip. Because I was afraid there was a broadness on the page for the character that I was genuinely afraid of, that this is a character who as Jenna said can come across as annoying. And it’s a dangerous thing to play.

And it was only after I realized that if anyone else played the role I would be very upset with myself because I would be jealous every week that I decided that I really wanted to dig into it. And when I could find that humanity and bring it to the character it felt like it came to life.

And that’s how it all started and the intention was we really wanted to dissect what it meant to be a family in the most extraordinary of circumstances. And what’s more extraordinary than your father being the president of the free world and then you being the first family of the United States of America? And that’s what intrigued us into the whole project.

QUESTION: Jenna, your experience in sitcoms has traditionally been with three-camera setups or four-camera setups. What has it been like for you doing single camera? How has that changed your performance or what is the vibe like for you?

JENNA ELFMAN: Thanks for asking that. That is a great question. I love it. And one of the reasons I love it is the cast. Everywhere I turn in any scene at any given time there’s totally strong cast members right there. And that’s so important in comedy.

And also we have the most amazing director of photography named David Jones. And he makes this single camera show look so beautiful and like a movie.

And one of my hesitations for a few years - I wanted to do single camera but I had felt so hesitant because so many of the single cameras that I saw on TV, I hated the way they looked. They just all looked the same. They looked bright and they had music running through every single moment of every scene. And I just didn’t want to fall into some generic trap of bad single camera comedy.

And I just feel so lucky that this is my first one as a series regular and it looks so beautiful. And I’m surrounded by such strong talent and I think that’s - in every department but I think that really makes the difference.

QUESTION: (Unintelligible)...studio audience?

JENNA ELFMAN: I know. It’s like doing a movie and you just get a sense of - I’ve done comedic films where there’s no audience so it’s not like a foreign territory for me. It’s just different.

And I’m really enjoying it. I’ve done of plenty of multi-camera and I’ve really got a good dose of that and I’ll always love it. But there’s something a little bit more sophisticated in a way about this and the timing is different, but I don’t feel like I’m in a foreign place with it. I really feel at home and I love it.

QUESTION: Bill, what is like for you to transition from movies to the weekly schedule of a television series? How are you adjusting to all of that?

BILL PULLMAN: Well, I think it proceeds at a pace but it’s still a lot like an independent film in that you’ve got to get your day’s work done. But I think also in this multi-camera/single-camera thing it’s been great to be able to – this is the story that involved both heartfelt things. And it’s nice not to have that live audience going, “Aww” every time. So you can have many more colors about.

I just find that in that multi-camera thing when that audience gets to a sensitive moment and they all throw it into one place it’s just dangerous for the life of a fully-nuanced show. And then also for cutting purposes you can get the farce better I think with single-camera because you can cut and jump and make things happen and also make small things happen. You can throw away a line a lot easier, I think.

So I’m liking all of this. And it feels familiar to me. It’s a lot more like film.

QUESTION: I was wondering how important do you feel it is for Americans to be able to identify with the first family? I know you mentioned how the Obamas almost seem supernaturally perfect. And I can only imagine that maybe the office of the presidency might make it more difficult to portray the American family than your average sitcom. So could you talk about how easy or difficult it is to identify with the first family in a show like this?

JOSH GAD: Yes. It was interesting because when we set out to do this one of the first decisions that we had to make was figuring out who our president and first lady were going to be. And when Bill and Jenna fell into our laps it set the rest of the show afloat because we knew that this president and first lady couldn’t be goofy. If they were in any way goofy nobody would buy them in the office and therefore we wouldn’t have a show.

Because the axis is so wobbly when it comes to the children the centrifuge, which is the president and first lady, needs to be as strong as possible. And I think that that’s what gives us the freedom to sometimes go a little crazy with some of the other characters.

And there’s an absolute necessity for people to relate to this family. Because if they don’t relate to the family then what are you watching it for, what are you really tuning in for?

And I think especially as the episodes go on you’ll find most of the characters relatable, if not all of the characters relatable to you or somebody that you know I think it’s safe to say.

What about you guys?

JENNA ELFMAN: It’s certainly entertaining.

JOSH GAD: Yes, it’s certainly entertaining.

JENNA ELFMAN: What I get to play with my character specifically is that she does have these moments where she’s a fully capable lawyer and political consultant and she does have a sharp wit. But when it comes to the family as the stepmother, that’s her Achilles heel. And that’s where she falls off balance and is grasping for straws and gets a little bit nutty.

And then when the two worlds collide, when her necessity to please or win as a stepmother collides in the political realm, it gets a little crazy for her. And I’m having fun trying to - having those moments where I get to play like I know how this is supposed to go but not when there’s a family involved. And that’s when there’s an inner conflict within my character and I get to fall off balance and find a comedy.

QUESTION: Since we see a lot of shows, especially in recent years, set in DC, is there a certain tone that you’re trying to capture about the city and DC itself or is the show just really about the family dynamics, or a combination?

JOSH GAD: I think that it’s absolutely not a political show. And I can’t emphasize that enough because we never set out to make a political show. There are so many great political shows out there. There really are - from The West Wing to Veep, these are wonderful political shows.

We wanted to make a show about a family that happens to live in a world where they are surrounded by politics. And while we do engage in those storylines it’s not really a commentary on that necessarily, if that makes sense.

It happens to be set in a house like any other house except that it’s an address that everybody knows. And I think that that’s the thrill of what we’re doing. And that’s what’s exciting to us. And that’s the unexplored territory that we’re looking at.

And so this idea of trying to comment on the politics of the time, that’s not really something that comes into the equation. But it’s always an underlying element in the comedy.

And I think that’s the genius of Jon Lovett and Mike Royce, who comes from the world of Men of a Certain Age and it’s our characters responding to some of those things but not those things wherein our characters have to live their daily lives.

JENNA ELFMAN: And there’ll be a drop of a political thing which is only there to then spark the family story. br />
BILL PULLMAN: But I also think you might be [asking] – and having spent a bunch of time in Washington, a city I love – a lot of specificity about different locations and streets and avenues. But we don’t cover that. We’re so much in the White House. It’s a domestic story so we don’t get to show a lot about Washington, DC.

QUESTION: Josh, if you had been on Modern Family, were you’re going to be Cam or Mitchell? And I also wanted to ask you what it felt like you sit at the president’s desk even the fake president’s desk, how it feels. And the third thing is just talk about that sense of joy a little bit. Do you feel that you do have a sense of joy in real life and isn’t that something that Skip has a lot of, too?

JOSH GAD: Yeah, great questions. To answer your first one: no comment, but I think you can look at the archetype of both of those characters and figure out which one I was up for.

The second question - what was the second one? I’ll answer the last one because that’s the one that I remember. I have an unbelievable sense of joy in my life. I look at every day with a “glass is half full” approach to life. I’m blessed with an incredible family. I have a daughter that I cherish.

And it’s that joy that I bring to the character on a day-to-day basis, it’s that joy of coming into a workplace the likes of which I have only experienced once before with Book of Mormon in that sense where everybody has this incredible pride in the work that they’re doing. Everybody is looking toward the same goal. This show is very special. It really is. The episodes as they progress will become more and more extraordinary. And having been able to see a few more episodes than my castmates I can tell you that this is definitely one to be very proud of.

So yes, that joy is something that I feel. Am I as joyful as Skip? I don’t know that that’s possible. I think he’s running the gambit of being a little too joyful for his own good.

And then I’m sorry, what was your second question?

QUESTION: What does it feel like to be sitting at the presidential desk - even a fake presidential desk?

JOSH GAD: It’s an absolute boost to the ego. And it’s not a fake presidential desk. Those scenes we actually shoot in the White House, but don’t tell anybody.