Alan Alda: From Hawkeye to Senator Vinick
Alan Alda is still most famous for his 11-year stint as Benjamin Franklin "Hawkeye" Pierce, the idealistic antiwar doctor on M*A*S*H — so famous, in fact, that when he visited the White House years later, the Prime Minister of Singapore went up to him in a reception line and shouted to his wife, "Hey, honey, look, it's the M*A*S*H guy!" But in 2004, Alda found another iconic role as Republican Senator Arnold Vinick on The West Wing. Although the show's creators repeatedly insisted that the fictional Senator was not inspired by a real politician, even the New York Times couldn't ignore the similarities between Alda's character and John McCain, describing Vinick in 2008 as a "white-haired Senate stalwart with an antitax message ... [who] is deemed a threat to Democrats because of his ability to woo moderate voters." That's a far cry from the Korean War doctor who made moonshine in his tent. Hawkeye Pierce would never have voted Republican.