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In Case You Haven't Been Watching TV Lately...

Mention of Smith College kept turning up on television shows this winter. A recent subplot of a "Boston Public" episode on the Fox network sent the vice principal of the featured Boston high school to interview for the coveted job of conductor of the "Northampton Symphony Orchestra."

The camera follows character "Scott Guber," as he drives west for his interview, along the Massachusetts Turnpike, then north on Route 91, passing signs reading "Smith College" and "Northampton 1 mile." Then he drives through downtown Northampton, past various Main Street landmarks including Thorne's, the Academy of Music and the Smith College gates.

In February, Warner Bros. Television, producers of the "The West Wing," requested a Smith sweatshirt-and permission to wear it- for character "Ainsley," who is a Smith alum. Ainsley is a Republican working for the show's Democratic president and White House staff. The script called for her to wear the Smith shirt while working in the set of her West Wing office, but producers later decided the wearing of the shirt would smack too much of product placement. So the sweatshirt went back to wardrobe, but a mention of Smith College stayed in the episode's script.

Here's how the scene went: Ainsley tells her boss "Sam" that she is traveling to Smith, her alma mater, the next day to be a speaker on a women's studies department panel on resurrecting the E.R.A. Sam asks, "You're going back to Smith College, the cradle of feminism, to argue in opposition to the Equal Rights Amendment?"

Ainsley replies, "And get some decent pizza, yeah." The episode aired in April.

The CBS television news program "60 Minutes" gave Smith more than a mention in its February broadcast of an interview with the college's departing president, Ruth Simmons. Morley Safer, the co-editor of the segment, interviewed Simmons in December at a variety of sites including her College Hall office, the president's house on campus and at a Boston alumnae event featuring the campus vocal group the Smithereens.

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NewsSmith is published by the Smith College Office of College Relations for alumnae, staff, students and friends.
Copyright © 2001, Smith College. Portions of this publication may be reproduced with the permission of the Office
of College Relations, Garrison Hall, Smith College, Northampton, Massachusetts 01063. Last update: 5/8/2001.


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