A Woman in the White House -- For 24 Hours

"No, that is the reality, because I'm from Wisconsin" interjected Lindsey Shaw, who plays the mom.

"I wanted to play this role so desperately because I felt this was my tribe. I grew up with this. . . . I really wanted to express that small-mindedness."

Doyle, finally sensing the danger, rushed to do damage control:

"You may be drawing too much of a conclusion about the series from the pilot," he billed and cooed.

"You know, the story in the pilot is this young man's arrival in this town, so it's very natural that the fish-out-of-water aspect and people's reactions to it are going to be played up for the comedy initially. But that's not going to be the series in the long term," he continued.

"The immigration debate in this country is getting not only fierce, but kind of ugly. Are you afraid your show is going to plunge into the middle of that, not to its profit?" one critic asked rhetorically/ominously.

"He's just an exchange student -- he's not coming to take your jobs," Doyle said, finally getting tough.

"You are dealing with people . . . from a part of the world that aren't always very tolerant, you know -- the Danish cartoon thing and everything. Do you have a technical adviser to keep you from getting Salman Rushdied?" another critic said.

We'll pause here so you can reread that question.

"When we sort of talk about small-mindedness, there is a billion people in the world who practice Islam and they are really not out to get anybody," Guarascio said.

"That being said, we did have an adviser on the pilot. We happen to have a writer on our staff who is a Muslim and of Pakistani descent." But Guarascio insisted the "Muslim community" so far has reacted to the show very positively. They are very excited to see a Muslim character in a comedy, he said, and "hope to use a little humor to create a dialogue."