“The Residence” introduces Uzo Aduba’s Cordelia Cupp from a distance and in the dark, as she stares at a high, faraway point through binoculars, standing on the White House lawn. Cupp, a world-famous detective, is overdue for her latest consulting gig. A murder has taken place during a poorly organized state dinner for the Australian delegation.
But Cordelia is an obsessive birdwatcher, and that always comes first — even at night. A detective in the tradition of Benoit Blanc and other modern descendants of the Agatha Christie whodunnit, she knows she’s usually the smartest person in the room and has no time for idiocy. Besides, all bodies stay put. Most birds only stay still for moments.
Cordelia’s signature quirk keeps the tone featherlight while doubling as a whetstone; she constantly reminds us that training our focus on the tiniest details about elusive creatures unlocks puzzles.
What’s true of falcons and songbirds also applies to murder suspects. On the night of the foul play in question, Cordelia has a giant flock of suspects to sort, including a president, a prime minister, Kylie Minogue (appearing as herself) and Hugh Jackman (frequently referenced, never seen).
At a time when few of us want to think about the White House, this show reduces it to little more than an elaborate stage.
No luminaries figure as prominently in this story as Aduba’s tweedy detective or Edwin Park (Randall Park), the FBI agent she grudgingly relegates to sidekick status. Aduba’s expertise in traveling a broad expressive range within a single stare helps her own this role. Besides Park and the victim, the White House’s chief usher A.B. Wynter (Giancarlo Esposito), no other character feels especially essential.
Don’t get me wrong – her co-stars are the bonding agents strengthening this whimsical flimsiness. Who doesn’t love seeing Ken Marino be a jerk, Jason Lee portray another loser or Bronson Pinchot do his “loopy foreigner” act again, only this time as a chef from a real country? Wouldn’t we love to see more of Susan Kelechi Watson? Isn’t it nice to see Tilly from “Star Trek: Discovery” (Mary Wiseman) explode and dominate every room she’s in?
Why, sure. Each of these actors brings a special energetic libation to the party, as does Al Franken, who no longer works in Congress but is content to pretend he does on TV.
As for the house itself, it could be any place.
Maybe that puts “The Residence” in a different category than other shows set at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave., including “1600 Penn,” which you have probably forgotten about. (I wish I could.)
At a time when few of us want to think about the White House, this show reduces it to little more than an elaborate stage, thank goodness. Since its creator Paul William Davies based his mystery on Kate Andersen Brower’s “The Residence: Inside the Private World of the White House,” the narrative features the landmark’s support staff instead of the politicians who come and go.
From a TV storyteller’s perspective, this is an opportunity to center workers bound not by loyalty but to a sense of upholding the values and traditions of a famous place — notions the current administration entirely devalues, it bears pointing out.
(L to R) Giancarlo Esposito as A.B. Wynter and Bronson Pinchot as Didier Gotthard in “The Residence” (Jessica Brooks/Netflix)The president does not matter – I repeat, he does not matter, aside from the curious effect he has on his mother (played by Jane Curtin), who has a reflexive habit of gagging whenever he’s mentioned. But the people who bring his family carafes of vodka and fancy tumblers do. So do its housekeepers, engineers, painting crew and kitchen staff. They are the ones who hold official secrets or, as one explains, uphold the ancient dictum, “the servants have no ears,” and resolve not to hear them.
Instead, they have inner lives, passions and varied senses of humor — whereas the titular executive residence is only special in that it has six levels, 132 rooms and a lot of nooks and crannies to hide a body.
That also makes it just another building to be murdered in, like the Arcona, and that’s fine! Especially if you’ve released the antiquated and false notion of the president being the representative embodiment of America itself. We have certain feelings about every president whether we voted for that person or not, divorcing the concept of who and what we are from an office holder that changes every four years.
The White House itself is mostly unchanging. Despite its contradictory history as a symbol of democracy built by enslaved people, it is a blameless externalization of America.
That’s how Aaron Sorkin treated the place and its staff in “The West Wing,” the most poignant TV series about the presidency of our time. The White House was to his show what New York is to “Law & Order,” a silent cast member shaping the story.
Sorkin wrote Martin Sheen’s Jed Bartlet as the show’s heart and conscience, and the ‘90s liberal leadership ideal. His president is an erudite considerate man deeply concerned about the poor and marginalized.
Concurrently, the White House of the “The West Wing” is buzzing, frantic, vibrant and disciplined. “Two Cathedrals,” the second season finale, is widely considered one of TV’s all-time greatest episodes. In it, a grieving Barlet rages at God in Latin, cursing heaven for sinking a Naval tender ship, for spinning up a deadly tropical storm, for allowing a lifelong friend to be killed in a car accident.
That scene captures a version of leadership that never was but makes us yearn for saner times and a president who valued human life — both foreign and domestic — and could string together a coherent sentence.
From a TV storyteller’s perspective, this is an opportunity to center workers bound not by loyalty but to a sense of upholding the values and traditions of a famous place — notions the current administration entirely devalues.
Of course, “The West Wing” was born in the waning days of Bill Clinton’s presidency and hit its stride before Sept. 11, 2001, and the dawn of “24.” Nearly every non-period show and movie about the White House since paints the place as a den of conspiracy, home to crisis presidents who either need to be saved or do the saving themselves. That includes Netflix’s other recent release “Zero Day,” starring Robert DeNiro as an ex-president of questionable sanity.
“The Residence” isn’t the first to strip the romance from the place, is what I’m saying. Davies worked with his show’s executive producer Shonda Rhimes on “Scandal,” an Obama-era nighttime soap whose principals were a POTUS and his fixer engaged in a torrid affair spanning years.
Fitzgerald Grant III (Tony Goldwyn) and Olivia Pope (Kerry Washington) understood and even respected what the office represents. They still treated the White House like a collection of smash spots.
Maybe Rhimes considered some places in the joint to be sacred, or simply too typical to add spice to their marital transgressions. The latest show in her Netflix deal, though, portrays it as a blank collection of staircases and parlors not unlike others where all-star ensembles marry screwball comedy with murder. Think of the manors in “Clue,” or “Murder By Death.” This one simply has better branding and a reputation, whether accurate or not, that has recently taken a beating for failing to live up to what it stands for.
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The White House isn’t the only American emblem that’s been called out recently on the international stage. Raphaël Glucksmann, a French politician, jokingly proposed that the United States should return the Statue of Liberty to France, the country that gifted it to us in the late 1800s.
Donald Trump’s press secretary Karoline Leavitt, not exactly known for her sense of humor or intellectual discernment, harrumphed that wouldn’t be happening, tossing in the old jab about how the French would be speaking German if not for the United States’ intervention in World War II.
Glucksmann acknowledged that in a thread on X, adding that version of America “was far, so far from what your current president does, says and embodies.”
So too were the people living and working inside the Executive Mansion. “The Residence” allows us not to forgo thinking about that for seven episodes as Cordelia Cupp guides us through a tour of clashing personalities, dusty furnishings and a bit of light homicide. It is not at all like the real executive residence. With all the chaos issuing from other parts of the building, we’re fine if whatever is happening in there these days remains a mystery.
“The Residence” is currently streaming on Netflix.
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