Amy Gardner

Amelia Gardner
Mary-Louise Parker as Amy Gardner
First appearance	"The Women of Qumar"
Last appearance	"The Last Hurrah"
Created by	Aaron Sorkin, Felicia Wilson, Laura Glasser, and Julia Dahl
Portrayed by	Mary-Louise Parker
Information
Occupation	Director of the Women's Leadership Coalition (Season 3), Chief of Staff to the First Lady (Seasons 4–5), Director of Legislative Affairs (end of Season 7)
Religion	Roman Catholic

Amelia "Amy" Gardner is a fictional character on the American television series The West Wing, portrayed by Mary-Louise Parker. Politically skilled and a strong advocate for feminist causes, she holds various jobs throughout the series' timeline, both in public-advocacy organizations and in government. The character is also a romantic interest for Josh Lyman.

Amy appears in 20 episodes during seasons 3, 4, and 5, and three more episodes during seasons 6 and 7.

Character biography

Amy attended Brown University and Yale Law School, where she befriended Josh Lyman and dated his roommate. Abbey Bartlet, the First Lady, used to babysit her. She is depicted as a prominent women's rights activist, first appearing in the third season as the Director of the Women's Leadership Coalition, a fictional advocacy group. She was also, at some point prior to her first appearance in the series, Issues Director for the National Organization for Women, Political Director of EMILY's List, and founder of the Democratic Women's Forum.

The flirtation between Amy Gardner and Josh Lyman, and their subsequent relationship, constitutes a major story arc in season 3 of The West Wing.

In the final episode of season 3, Amy challenges Josh, trying to defeat a welfare-reauthorization bill supported by the President. Josh wins this political skirmish, but his success means the end of Amy's Directorship of the Women's Leadership Coalition, and this causes Amy to end her romantic relationship with Josh, although they remain friends. As Amy says to Josh after some time has passed: "I fought you, I lost, I had a drink, I took a shower. 'Cause that's how it is in the NBA."

Amy returns in season 4 as an advisor to Senator Howard Stackhouse during his campaign for the presidency as an independent. After Stackhouse drops out and endorses President Bartlet, Amy provides unofficial assistance to the President's reelection efforts, working through Josh. She later serves as Chief of Staff to First Lady Abigail Bartlet, giving her opportunity to get back at Josh by outmaneuvering him, as he has gotten used to running circles around the First Lady's prior incompetent Chief of Staff. She also helps Deputy Communications Director Sam Seaborn fundraise in his failed run for a seat in the House of Representatives.

It was rumored that show creator Aaron Sorkin wanted to add Parker to the main cast, but she was unable to commit to the show because of her role in the film Angels in America.

When Parker became pregnant, Amy was written out of the show in the fifth season episode "Constituency of One". After coming into conflict with President Bartlet over funding for domestic violence prevention in an Appropriations bill for the Department of Health and Human Services, she realizes that her methods do not suit a position at the White House—she prefers to pursue her own agenda instead of furthering someone else's political career. She resigns as Chief of Staff to the First Lady and ends her relationship with Josh again.

Amy reappears in the season 6 episode "Freedonia" to help prepare Congressman Matt Santos for a debate between Democratic candidates for President. Josh, now Santos's campaign manager, fires Amy when he learns that she has been distributing the same policy advice to all the Democratic candidates. Josh later changes his mind, allowing her to remain as a consultant, but the character is not mentioned again in season 6.

In season 7, Amy lobbies President-Elect Santos to select a congresswoman from Florida as Vice President after the death of Leo McGarry. While Santos is not swayed by her arguments, he offers her the post of Director of Legislative Affairs in his new administration, telling her when she at first refuses "that it is easier to throw rocks at the building from outside, than it is to rebuild it from the inside". Amy subsequently accepts the role, and as the series ends she is firmly established as an important advisor to President-Elect Santos.

Season 1	"Pilot" "Post Hoc, Ergo Propter Hoc" "A Proportional Response" "Five Votes Down" "The Crackpots and These Women" "Mr. Willis of Ohio" "The State Dinner" "Enemies" "The Short List" "In Excelsis Deo" "Lord John Marbury" "He Shall, from Time to Time..." "Take out the Trash Day" "Take This Sabbath Day" "Celestial Navigation" "20 Hours in L.A." "The White House Pro-Am" "Six Meetings Before Lunch" "Let Bartlet Be Bartlet" "Mandatory Minimums" "Lies, Damn Lies and Statistics" "What Kind of Day Has It Been"

Season 2	"In the Shadow of Two Gunmen, Part I" "In the Shadow of Two Gunmen, Part II" "The Midterms" "In This White House" "And It's Surely to Their Credit" "The Lame Duck Congress" "The Portland Trip" "Shibboleth" "Galileo" "Noël" "The Leadership Breakfast" "The Drop-In" "Bartlet's Third State of the Union" "The War at Home" "Ellie" "Somebody's Going to Emergency, Somebody's Going to Jail" "The Stackhouse Filibuster" "17 People" "Bad Moon Rising" "The Fall's Gonna Kill You" "18th and Potomac" "Two Cathedrals"

Season 3	"Isaac and Ishmael" "Manchester, Part I" "Manchester, Part II" "Ways and Means" "On the Day Before" "War Crimes" "Gone Quiet" "The Indians in the Lobby" "The Women of Qumar" "Bartlet for America" "H. Con-172" "100,000 Airplanes" "The Two Bartlets" "Night Five" "Hartsfield's Landing" "Dead Irish Writers" "The U.S. Poet Laureate" "Stirred" "Enemies Foreign and Domestic" "The Black Vera Wang" "We Killed Yamamoto" "Posse Comitatus"

Season 4	"20 Hours in America, Part I" "20 Hours in America, Part II" "College Kids" "The Red Mass" "Debate Camp" "Game On" "Election Night" "Process Stories" "Swiss Diplomacy" "Arctic Radar" "Holy Night" "Guns Not Butter" "The Long Goodbye" "Inauguration, Part I" "Inauguration: Over There" "The California 47th" "Red Haven's on Fire" "Privateers" "Angel Maintenance" "Evidence of Things Not Seen" "Life on Mars" "Commencement" "Twenty Five"

Season 5	"7A WF 83429" "The Dogs of War" "Jefferson Lives" "Han" "Constituency of One" "Disaster Relief" "Separation of Powers" "Shutdown" "Abu el Banat" "The Stormy Present" "The Benign Prerogative" "Slow News Day" "The Warfare of Genghis Khan" "An Khe" "Full Disclosure" "Eppur Si Muove" "The Supremes" "Access" "Talking Points" "No Exit" "Gaza" "Memorial Day"

Season 6	"NSF Thurmont" "The Birnam Wood" "Third-Day Story" "Liftoff" "The Hubbert Peak" "The Dover Test" "A Change Is Gonna Come" "In the Room" "Impact Winter" "Faith Based Initiative" "Opposition Research" "365 Days" "King Corn" "The Wake Up Call" "Freedonia" "Drought Conditions" "A Good Day" "La Palabra" "Ninety Miles Away" "In God We Trust" "Things Fall Apart" "2162 Votes"

Season 7	"The Ticket" "The Mommy Problem" "Message of the Week" "Mr. Frost" "Here Today" "The Al Smith Dinner" "The Debate" "Undecideds" "The Wedding" "Running Mates" "Internal Displacement" "Duck and Cover" "The Cold" "Two Weeks Out" "Welcome to Wherever You Are" "Election Day" "Election Day Part II" "Requiem" "Transition" "The Last Hurrah" "Institutional Memory" "Tomorrow"

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 12/2/2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.

Amy Gardner

Character biography

See also