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The West Wing was truly something special.
It’s been nearly 20 years since the political drama concluded after seven seasons, but its stars, which include Bradley Whitford, Allison Janney, Martin Sheen and Rob Lowe, remain as tight as ever.
“It is a truly wonderful thing,” Whitford tells PEOPLE of the cast’s enduring bond.
“As actors, you had these episodic communities, no pun intended, but The West Wing was the better part of a decade of very intense workload,” he says. “And we have this permanent family from that, which is a really wonderful thing, outside of any showbiz crap.”
That feeling is one that Janney, 65, who Whitford reunited with onscreen in The Diplomat season 3, shares.
“Brad and I have spent more time together over the last 20 years than I have with my actual siblings,” she tells PEOPLE.
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“On West Wing, [we] were shooting 18-hour days. We had no cell phones. We actually talked to each other,” she says.
“I spent so much time with him, so he feels like my brother.”
Whitford, 66, adds that The West Wing cast would all “love to act with each other” again.
“Remember Martin used to talk about how we should go off and do a play together?” he says, to which Janney says that “of course” she remembers.
“I think they would love to act with each other and us and everybody all together.”
Reuniting for The Diplomat, which saw Whitford join as husband and First Gentleman to Janney’s President Grace Penn, was a welcome challenge for the longtime friends.
“If there was one thing that surprised me, it was the ease of taking the history we have together and shooting it down a different road,” Whitford says. “It felt very comfortable.”
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Janney agrees. “It was really fun and easy and comfortable with Brad because of our history together. I think it would’ve been more difficult with someone I didn’t know. It was surprisingly really easy and really fun.”
“And I was just excited for everyone on Diplomat to get to meet Brad and experience everything that is Brad, which is fabulous and joyful and just — he’s the dream.”
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The Diplomat season 3 is now streaming on Netflix and The West Wing can be streamed in full on HBO Max.
