by Gill Pringle in LA
Uzo Aduba and Kelechi Watson lead up the cast of the new whodunnit series The Residence, in which a murder rocks The White House in the middle of an Australian state dinner…where Kylie Minogue is the guest of honour.
While the quirky whodunnit series The Residence takes place exclusively in The White House in Washington DC, this new Netflix crime comedy has Australia’s finest at its heart. The murder actually takes place during a fictitious Australian state dinner where Kylie Minogue plays herself alongside Julian McMahon’s Australian PM, Brett Tucker’s Australian Foreign Minister and David Piggott’s diplomat.
View this post on Instagram
The Residence’s costume team were so thrilled to be working with Kylie that they selected a jaw-dropping 80 dresses for her to choose from before she ultimately opted for a shiny purple mini-dress. We see Kylie singing her heart out while, upstairs in the residential quarters, one of The White House staff has been murdered. If McMahon – Kylie’s former brother-in-law in real life – plays it straight, then it’s down to Brett Tucker to have wicked fun with his role as a randy, boozy diplomat. Starring Uzo Aduba (Orange is the New Black) as eccentric police investigator Cordelia Cupp, her wacky character bears more than a passing resemblance to Daniel Craig’s Benoit Blanc from the Knives Out franchise, with their initials CC and BB echoing the alliteration of both detectives’ names. A blood red knife used as part of The Residence‘s logo would further seem to underline the two shows’ similarities.
We will also discover that Aduba’s Cupp is just as unconventional as Craig’s Blanc. Dressed in a stylish tweed trouser suit, she has a reputation for solving the most complicated crimes, and will need her wits about her as she surveys the 112 rooms and 157 suspects, deeming them as “interesting” as opposed to “persons of interest”. Wry, funny, intensely focused, and an astute observer of human behaviour, we quickly understand that Cupp is the most sought-after detective in the world. But, as an avid bird-watcher, that supreme focus is seemingly distracted whenever she spies an unusual bird on The White House roof or lawn. If Aduba is our Sherlock, then Randall Park’s FBI Special Agent Edwin Park is our Watson, who is assigned to work alongside Cupp and – like most of the other police officials involved – is highly skeptical of Cupp’s unorthodox investigative style.
Produced by Shondaland – Shonda Rhimes’ TV company responsible for hit shows like Grey’s Anatomy, Scandal, How to Get Away with Murder and Bridgerton – the choice to sign on was a no-brainer for Aduba. “Working with Shondaland feels like a dream. I have been a fan of Shonda Rhimes and her world that she’s created for a very long time. Scandal is my jam, and working with the team has been everything you hope and dream it will be. The company is incredibly sound, supportive, intelligent, strong, inventive, creative, and a place I am very proud to be working with.”
Aduba was equally impressed with how her Cordelia Cupp was drawn on the page: “She is a fast thinker and an intuitive person. She is able to quickly filter out inconsistencies from many different areas all at once and figure out what is the important piece that is going to help her solve this puzzle and crack this case. I was also really drawn to the idea of coming into The White House in such a unique way. We’ve seen the world of The White House from The West Wing, but we haven’t really ever seen the roles or the politics that play out in The East Wing; through the people who live and exist within those walls. We’ve seen the political animals who come inside The White House, but we’ve never seen the greater, deeper, richer politics that play out inside the residential areas of the space in this way.”
Indeed, this is like no other White House we’ve ever seen, right down to its having a gay President whose husband is the “First Gentleman.” It’s a screwball whodunnit set in the upstairs, downstairs, and backstairs of the world’s most famous mansion. Showcasing an eclectic cast, the show also features Jason Lee’s “aura specialist”, Giancarlo Esposito’s White House Chief Usher and Susan Kelechi Watson’s Assistant Usher, impatient to ascend to the role of Chief Usher. Kelechi Watson – best known for her role in This Is Us – is in no doubt as to what makes Aduba’s Cupp stand out from the other detectives. “They all have to have that iconic thing that they do. And I think for Cordelia, it’s this stare that Uzo has coined, that will make anybody tell you all the secrets and where the bodies are buried,” says the actress.
While preparing to play Cupp, Aduba even took up bird-watching. “Cordelia is an avid birder and sees the world through the lens of birds and their unique abilities, and what it is that they represent in the world. Each of them represents how she approaches her cases and the people that she finds interesting. This also informs the way she approaches solving cases, and the kind of detective she is; Cordelia is like a falcon, the highest bird on the bird chain, the one who can see and filter out information really quickly, the one who can focus and concentrate on all aspects that are occurring around her, the one who can see up to 3,000 things happening at once and spark out the weakest animal. Her birding background also speaks to her memory, her eye for detail, and how she moves through the world. Birding is a solo sport, and she’s a solo player.”
Aduba surprised even herself with how helpful her own experience of bird-watching would become. “I understood why she loved it and I understood why she also loves her job through it. As quick as her mind works, and as fast as she speaks, she never rushes into anything. Everybody throughout the season is trying to get her to identify a suspect and she won’t do it. She’s very patient and takes time when it comes to big decisions. She does not have a problem waiting for anything. When I went birdwatching, I met with two birders who gave me a tutorial on how to effectively watch birds, and there was the lesson that you never raise your binoculars until you know what you’re looking at. There’s a real waiting that’s required in it. And once you see the species you’re there to see, not only do you have to wait to see them, but once you find them and you pick your binoculars up to look, you’re at their will. You have to move at their speed and birds aren’t ever really in a rush. They’re never in a rush to do anything. They’re just gliding along, be it in the air, along the water, what have you. They take their time. And in that time-taking, you realize you can take in all of the dimensions of who they are, from their bills to the feathers to the shape of their wings. All of these details and nuances that, when we’re just passing through and rushing, we take for granted and pay no attention to. But through that exercise I realized, no, that’s how she operates.”
In order to enhance Cupp’s unflappable qualities, the wardrobe team ensured she was always impeccable throughout the long night of the murder and interrogations, changing Aduba’s shirt throughout the day to make sure it always looked pressed while the rest of the cast start to look disheveled. And while the show was filmed in Los Angeles, all the cast went away with a far greater understanding of The White House, with the set designers going to great lengths to replicate everything down to the smallest detail. “I’ve never been inside of The White House, but I feel like I’ve been inside The White House because I’ve been in the L.A. White House, and it’s dope,” adds Kelechi Watson.
Aduba agrees. “I actually went to The White House a few weeks before we started shooting. And I remember how a member of the security department had made the comment as we were in the Grand Foyer where there are two flags positioned in the hallway between the state dining room and the East Room, saying, ‘A lot of times you’ll see shows with this exact shot, and there won’t be the two flags there.’ And he said he’d know whether our production designer was paying attention if he saw those flags there. And that was the first thing I went onto the set keeping an eye out for. And we have the two flags exactly,” Aduba says with a satisfied smile.
The Residence is streaming now
