True Believer: Face to Face With Martin Sheen

The West Wing's President Bartlet talks about his deep faith, his working-class roots and his Oval Office role.

A Moral Frame of Reference

When the President is late, nothing much happens. Martin Sheen, who plays President Josiah Bartlet on "The West Wing," is snarled in Los Angeles traffic, which means his colleagues -- actors Rob Lowe and Allison Janney, and executive producer Aaron Sorkin among them -- can only sit and wait. The instant Sheen arrives, though, the vibe of the whole cast shifts. The task at hand is only the read-through of a new script, but it's as if the real Commander in Chief just stepped into the room. The President is here. Let's get going.

Sheen isn't the President, obviously -- he only plays him on TV. But he provides the glue that holds together NBC's top-rated Oval Office drama, now finishing its third season. The show was a favorite at the Clinton White House, and the Bartlet Administration's politics led pundits to dub it "The Left Wing."

Sheen's personal politics are even more liberal than those of his TV alter ego. His positions, the actor says, come from his deep Catholic beliefs. His is the faith-in-action of a true believer, devotion to a vision of social justice that goes way beyond once-a-week Mass. In the last 20 years Sheen has been arrested more than 60 times, during protests supporting the United Farm Workers or gun control or opposing nuclear power or U.S. foreign policy.

His personal history is a classic American success story. Both parents, Francisco Estevez and Mary Ann Phelan, were immigrants, he from Spain via Cuba, she from Ireland via Ellis Island. They raised a family of ten in a three-bedroom house in Dayton, Ohio, getting by on Francisco's salary as an inspector at National Cash Register.

After high school the kid born Ramon Estevez left for New York City, adopting the name Martin Sheen in part because he admired fiery preacher Bishop Fulton J. Sheen. He married his wife, Janet, in 1961, and early experimental theater parts led to steady work on Broadway and TV. By the '70s Sheen was a top Hollywood star. Then came Apocalypse Now, Francis Ford Coppola's sprawling Vietnam epic. Sheen was a military operative sent to assassinate a rogue American officer, played by Marlon Brando. On location in the Philippines, Sheen, then 36, had a heart attack and nearly died.

The attack set off alarm bells about nearly every aspect of his life. He was working -- and drinking -- too hard, and spending too much time away from his family. Searching for a way to get his life on track, he found himself heading back to the Catholic faith of his parents. That, in turn, led to a spiritual awakening that sustains him still. To interview Sheen, 61, we chose Presidential historian Michael Beschloss.

RD: Your politics began unusually early on. Were your parents political?
Sheen: Not actively. My mother was only 48 when she died of a cerebral hemorrhage, and I was around 11. So I didn't really get a good sense of her. I do know her uncle was big-time IRA, right in the center of the Republic, right in the heart of the Troubles.

My dad thought politicians were all crooks, but he had a great love for America. He came from abject poverty and no hope, and he knew most of the world did too. He'd bitch about the economy and politicians, but you couldn't say a word against the country. You'd get a look from him, man, you'd never open your mouth again.

RD: What was your relationship with him like?
Sheen: He was my first image of God, as our fathers should be. I left home when I was 18 and came back for the first time when I was 21, and I was surprised -- he was only five-seven, and I could look over the top of his head. We would be in public and I'd slouch down. How can you be taller than your father?

We also learned our politics from our association with the upper crust. My brothers and I were caddies at a local country club. I started in 1949. The pillars of the community belonged -- some of them were very nice people, but the majority of them were unconscious. They didn't know your name. You were a servant. You were called caddie.

RD: Did this breed class anger? Did it lead you to think, Why is it that these people are inside and other people are outside?
Sheen: They were all, obviously, well-to-do. They told the most obscene jokes. Jokes that -- I mean, we'd be embarrassed to share. About women and blacks and Jews. So for nine years I was schooled by these people, and I learned what not to do, how not to be. So my conscience was formed, in a moral kind of frame of reference. And I never had any great respect for the rich. Even today, my wife gives me the business. Because if I'm with a wealthy person, I always pick up the check. I always go out of my way to pay my way.

RD: Demonstrations are so much a part of your life now. Were you moved at the time to protest?
Sheen: The only demonstration I ever led was a caddie strike, about 1953, for higher wages. I founded a union, which lasted 48 hours. We picked Ladies Day, Tuesday morning. The ladies had never carried their own bags. They crushed the union and the only members left were my brother and I. He would have stuck with me to the end, but I finally let him off the hook. And he said okay, and we went back to work.

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