GLADIATORS SAY GOODBYE

The battling is near an end as the ‘Scandal’ team looks back before the series finale

Glancing inside stage 12 at Sunset Gower Studios in Hollywood on a recent mid-March day, a person could be forgiven for thinking a phone service ad was being shot: The smartphones are out and in serious use. But this is what’s it’s like during a lunch break on the set of “Scandal,” which, as the show that helped fuse TV watching and Twitter thumb-tapping, has as deep a relationship with the personal device as any tech company. And this isn’t an ordinary early spring afternoon — just five days from now, this freight train of a political drama will screech to a halt when filming wraps, forever. As of Thursday’s finale, crisis manager Olivia Pope (Kerry Washington) and her band of cohorts will hang up their white hats. So it’s little wonder that the cast is intent on keeping its digital scrapbook stocked. Selfies are being taken, and quick videos are being shot. Created by prolific producer Shonda Rhimes, “Scandal” is a thoroughly modern nighttime soap. Centered on Pope, the first black female character to lead a network drama in nearly 40 years (and her heart-thumping love affair with President Fitzgerald “Fitz” Grant played by Tony Goldwyn), “Scandal” premiered to little fanfare and middling reviews in spring 2012. But the decision to wed whiplash storytelling with the cast’s early adoption of social media, particularly Twitter, made the show a bona-fide hit and a symbol of hope.

Where: ABC When: 10 p.m. Thursday Rating: TV-14 (may be unsuitable for children under age 14)

Jay L. Clendenin Los Angeles Times THE CAST OF ABC’s “Scandal,” led by Kerry Washington, center, on the Olivia Pope & Associates set during the final week of filming. The series ends on Thursday.