As the real life inspiration for the show Scandal, Judy Smith has a lot of incredible stories about her career in crisis management. As one of SASS’s events for this year, Judy came to Bryant to tell us about the show, her career that inspired it, and the lessons she learned along the way to achieving her success. To some people’s disappointment, Judy started her talk by telling us that she did not, in fact, have sex with the President. Not quite as scandalous as our beloved Olivia Pope, then.
For the second half hour, Judy opened the floor to questions from the audience. One of the interesting things we learned was that she actually does dress like Olivia Pope (which was obvious from the power suit she was wearing). Before making the show she even sent the producers pictures of her clothing for them to build Olivia’s wardrobe off of! She also gives the producers a lot of input on the show, and offers ideas for crises at the beginning of each season. The entire audience got a good laugh when Judy said her sons use her fame from Scandal to pick up girls. Students also asked Judy questions about how she became so successful in her career, and the overriding theme of her answers was that she stays true to herself and her ethics. Although she couldn’t tell us the really juicy details of her real cases or spoilers for upcoming Scandal episodes, everyone can keep their eyes open for her as a character in a future episode. She hopes to be in the show before it ends!