Jed Bartlet has been the reassuring fictional face of the American presidency for the past seven years, but come June his “retirement” will leave a large hole in the TV schedules. As The West Wing draws to a close, TV executives are searching for a political drama to fill the gap and, this week, the heir apparent, ABC’s Commander in Chief, makes its debut on UK TV.

Naturally, there’s a twist. This US President, Mackenzie Allen, is a woman. A Vice-President who makes it to the White House after the President’s unexpected death, she is an independent liberal and, naturally, a thorn in the side of Congress. Exit Martin Sheen and enter the statuesque Geena Davis — a president who combines motherhood with running the most powerful nation on earth. Not that it stops her from dealing with some sensational events of the kind that make the show sound closer to 24 than The West Wing.

Within four weeks of her presidency, Allen has saved Air Force One from being blown up by an angry war veteran, defused a potential nuclear showdown (after the North Koreans catch an American spy submarine) and helped to start a civil war in South America.

Playing the President has been a welcome challenge for the Oscarwinning Davis. Portraying strong female roles in such hit movies as The Fly (1986) and Thelma & Louise (1991) made her name. But it seems that the world wasn’t quite ready for a female all-action lead — both Cutthroat Island (1995) and The Long Kiss Goodnight (1996) flopped — and, soon after, so did her marriage to the Cutthroat director Renny Harlin.

Since then, aside from a benign dial-in role in the Stuart Little movies and a short-lived self-titled sitcom, she has concentrated her efforts on a hectic home life. She married a surgeon in 2001 and has had three children in her forties.

But winning the lead role in Commander in Chief has given Davis a ticket back on to the A-list. The show’s American debut attracted 16.2 million viewers and Davis’s personal success in the role was confirmed when she won a Golden Globe.

I meet Davis midway through filming while on a break, sitting in a dark, dank bunker at the studio in Los Angeles. “There is that classic question,” says Davis. “Do you think we will see a female president in our lifetime? That’s so last century. We really have to get this to happen. It should have happened a long time ago. America is 61st in the world so far as female representation and government is concerned. Americans think that we are leading the way, but we are so profoundly far behind in that respect. Many countries have had female leaders and female presidents and we haven’t. So, I certainly hope it will happen.”

The idea of a woman president would certainly seem to have become more appealing after the series’ US debut. The writer Naomi Wolf noted recently: “Just as male leaders seem in voters’ minds to be more reassuring in times of war and terror attacks, so women leaders are seen in polls as having the edge with domestic crises, the social safety net, policies of sustainable long-range planning, and resistance to corruption.”

Commander in Chief, however, has been viewed as a political tool to further Hillary Clinton’s White House ambitions — a claim hotly denied by both the show’s producers and by Davis.

“It’s not the intention of either the creator or the producer to pave the way for some individual,” Davis says. “It really was intended as entertainment. ABC doesn’t pick shows based on hidden agendas; it wants ratings. But if it helps Americans to get more used to the idea, because they can now picture it happening, then I think that is great.”

On screen, Davis delivers her speeches with a relaxed smile and a confident presidential air. Off screen, her similarly calm, authoritative manner belies the disputes that have taken place behind the scenes of Commander in Chief.

After seven episodes of the series had aired, its creator Rod Lurie — who wrote the movie The Contender (2000), featuring a female Vice- President — was relieved of his duties. ABC called in the TV veteran Steven Bochco to revive the series. Bochco, the man behind NYPD Blue, LA Law and Hill Street Blues, assembled a new team, rewrote scripts, and made some harsh decisions about the characters. He ditched the President’s HIV-positive, gay, Palestinian aide in favour of a young go-getter of a press adviser, and introduced the President’s mother.

But after four months Bochco was dispatched in March and the staff writer Dee Johnson has taken over the remaining episodes, as well as rewriting some of Bochco’s work.

The show is still in flux as the producers decide on its direction. Should it be a heavyweight political drama like The West Wing, or a domestic drama that blends politics with serious family issues? These discussions will be closely watched in the UK by the two channels that have bought the show. The first run will be on abc1, followed by a repeat showing on More4, which is hoping that it will fill the West Wing void.

Davis, however, is concentrating only on getting through this series, though she has a particular reason to hope that this role of a lifetime will run and run. “What am I going to do? Now that I have been the President, how am I going to top this? It’s going to be really hard.”

Commander in Chief‚ Tues, abc1, 9pm; and on More4 later this year

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