Actor Bradley Whitford, best known for his role as Josh Lyman in "The West Wing," spoke to WGBH's Morning Edition about his new role in "The Handmaid's Tale," the current political climate, and diversity in Hollywood. The transcript below has been edited for clarity.

Joe Mathieu: Let the binging begin. Season 2 of the award winning Hulu series "The Handmaid's Tale" is out today and has a major addition to its cast. Emmy award-winning actor Bradley Whitford, best known for his role in "The West Wing" as the president's chief of staff, Josh Lyman. He was recently in Arlington, Mass. for a fund raising event, there with his brother who lives locally, and I caught up with him to talk about a number of things, including one topic he's very passionate about — of course, politics. And I began by asking him what he makes of the age of Trump and the current political climate in Washington.

Bradley Whitford: It's a horrible situation. It's like a civic, you know, demolition derby we're watching. And you know, the currency on our outrage gets so cheap. I think it's dangerous.

JM: So Jed Bartlet is still your president.

BW: Yes. Jed Bartlet — (laughs) I realize Santos would be out by now. I'm mean, I'm going to Texas for the dedication of the Santos library.

JM: Do you look back on "The West Wing" now and think it's like another era ... or, like, another planet?

BW: I avoid watching it.

JM: It or you?

BW: It's just creepy watching yourself, frankly. So there's maybe two-thirds of it I did not watch.

JM: They're pretty good by the way.

BW: Listen, what Aaron [Sorkin] did, no other writer will ever do. He wrote 22 episodes — the equivalent of 11 very complicated feature films — a year for four years. Nobody will ever do that again. And it was one of those shows that, sort of, became part of the, you know, cultural discussion.

JM: Speaking of feature films, you were in one of the biggest movies of the year, "Get Out" and you did not play the guy people wanted to hang out with after.

BW: Mhm mhm.

["Get Out"Clip]: 

JM: Considering the the racial and cultural implications of this movie I wonder what it was like for you on the set doing some of those scenes.

BW: It was a little creepy doing the scenes. I mean, the one thing you have to understand is none of us had any idea that this movie was going to be seen. I knew, I love Jordan [Peele] as a performer and as a comedian. I heard he was interested in me, and I said, 'I don't have to read it. Yes, yes, yes.' And I walked out of the room and said to my fiance, 'This is a really dangerous script.' (laughs)

And I said, 'It's like one of the best things I've ever read, but it was dangerous.' Like if you don't pull that tone off, I mean you knew that you were kind of playing with fire. I mean, I'm just glad none of us had any idea that the movie was going to take off the way it did, because I think we would have been a lot more self-conscious. And you know, tighter.

JM: Yeah. So you're now onto "The Handmaid's Tale" which is going into a new season on Hulu — a story essentially about women in subjugation. Coming off of what we just heard from you on "Get Out," are you building a theme here?

 BW: Yeah. I'm building a career that I'm basically playing the wrong side of history.

JM: It seems like it a little bit. What's the role?

BW: The role is, if you're familiar with the show, I am a commander. My name is Commander Lawrence. And you know the commanders are the ones, are the men who run the home. And I take in one of the handmaids. And it's a notoriously — Bruce Miller who runs the show, is an incredibly kind, joyous guy. It's a very loose, sweet, fun set, and then these scenes that you're doing are really incredibly dark.

JM: And in this #MeToo world, what's it mean to be a middle-aged white guy in Hollywood these days?

BW: I don't know. I mean I don't know what, you know, what to compare it to. I think Hollywood is certainly realizing the insanity of the sort of homogenized voices that have been coming out of Hollywood, and I think that's really opening up. But the frustrating thing about Hollywood, in my experience, what audiences truly respond to is originality. And the problem with Hollywood is they do all this development based on what worked before. And I think with the whole discussion of, sort of, diversity, there's an incredible opportunity to get, you know, new voices in there.

JM: That's award-winning actor Bradley Whitford joining us on WGBH's Morning Edition as season 2 of "The Handmaid's Tale" premieres today.