There are tons of books telling parents how to raise successful children, but raising a future president — that’s a different matter.
Looking at history, options include having them suffer multiple childhood bereavements and go to a school with no books (Abraham Lincoln); surrounding them with an atmosphere of wealth, culture and privilege (Franklin Delano Roosevelt); moving them several times in early childhood, making friendship difficult (Ronald Reagan); or subjecting them to an alcoholic, abusive stepparent (Bill Clinton).
There seems to be no formula for creating chief executives, with each one taking a singular route to the White House. This concept lies at the heart of the new WB Network drama “Jack & Bobby,” premiering Sunday. Despite the obvious Kennedy-esque sound of the title, this is not a parallel to JFK and RFK. It’s the story of two very different brothers in the present day, one of which will eventually win the presidency.
The idea began when director-producer Steve “Scoop” Cohen and novelist Brad Meltzer came to Tommy Schlamme — former executive producer of the presidential drama “The West Wing” — with the idea of following a boy who would one day occupy the Oval Office.
“That idea was just an idea,” Schlamme says. “It hadn’t really formed itself into what it would be. Scoop, who had worked for President Clinton, had been to Hope, Ark., quite a few times. He was walking down the streets of Hope, wondering, ‘How the hell did this town produce this guy? What was his journey to get there?’ “
Eventually, Schlamme and his colleagues settled upon the notion of someone not seemingly destined for greatness, but who achieves it nevertheless. “You start to believe,” Schlamme says, “that’s where visionaries come from, whether it’s presidents or statesmen or religious leaders. It wasn’t (someone saying), ‘At 10, I wanted to be president, and that is my life ambition.’ “
Schlamme, himself a father of three, started thinking about this person’s upbringing. “You start to think you have some sort of control to make (your children) what they might become,” he says. “Part of it, for me, is, out of failure and weakness come the things that, if you can embrace them, turn you into a richer and better human being.”
Warner Bros. Studios eventually paired Schlamme with Greg Berlanti and Mickey Liddell, who were already doing the successful family drama “Everwood” for The WB.
“I knew Greg’s plate was full,” Schlamme says. “But he was so interested in politics and so interested in this idea, and he has a strong way of doing a television show.”
Berlanti brought to “Jack & Bobby” his experience with doing family drama, and the skills of writer-producer Vanessa Taylor (“Everwood,” “Alias,” “Gideon’s Crossing”). The result is the story of the McCallister brothers, 16-year-old Jack (newcomer Matt Long) and 13-year-old Bobby (Logan Lerman, “The Butterfly Effect,” “The Patriot”). Raising them is their single mother, college professor Grace (Christine Lahti).
