Yesterday I saw Frost/Nixon, a new Broadway play, originally produced in London, about David Frost’s interviews with Richard Nixon, three years after Nixon resigned. The most famous line from those interviews: “[W]hen the president does it, that means that it is not illegal.”

Nixon died thirteen years ago today, and coincidentally (or not), the play officially opens on Broadway tonight.

From the show’s producers: “How did David Frost, a famous British talk-show host with a playboy reputation, elicit the apology that the rest of the world was waiting to hear from former President Richard Nixon? The fast-paced new play shows the determination, conviction and cunning of two men as they square off in one of the most monumental political interviews of all time.”

It has a classic structure: a dual character study. Two characters meet in a confrontation, and we get to see both of their motivations. Frost actually seems to be the more important character than Nixon here — after all, Frost’s name comes first in the title. I was fascinated by the play, even though it was hard to hear Frank Langella, who portrays Nixon. He mumbles and swallows his words. Fortunately, the mezzanine wasn’t very full, so at one point I got up and moved closer, and after that I could hear him better.

The play set my mind going, and I started to think about how an ex-presidency has a life of its own. I realized that even on January 20, 2009, we won’t have heard the last of George W. Bush. He’ll be 62 when he leaves office. Will he pull a Gerald Ford, never to be seen again except at golf tournaments? Will he pull a Carter or Clinton, setting up a foundation and trying to change the world – in his case, by spreading Christianity or trying to export democracy abroad? I doubt he’ll pull a Nixon, writing memoirs and trying to rehabilitate his reputation. In his mind, he probably has nothing to atone for.

I wonder if he’ll ever sit down with an interviewer like Nixon did with Frost and try to explain himself and his actions.