Shondaland is ready for their mystery era.
In Netflix‘s new whodunit series The Residence, which began streaming on Thursday, Uzo Aduba leads an ensemble cast as Cordelia Cupp, a consulting detective for the Metropolitan Police Department enlisted to help with solving the murder mystery of White House chief usher A.B. Wynter (Giancarlo Esposito). With help from Randall Park‘s FBI Special Agent Edwin Park, the detective duo must team to find the culprit of the murder that occurred during the state dinner — and chaos brings laughs and fun.
The eight episode series from former Scandal writer and producer Paul William Davies comes amid Shondaland celebrating its 20th anniversary and marks a departure from the usual dramas audiences have seen from Rhimes such as How to Get Away with Murder, Grey’s Anatomy and Bridgerton.
“They were totally supportive of it. Even though there hasn’t been a kind of purely comedic show out of Shondaland, at least not that I can remember, I do think that they’ve always been interested in it,” Davies tells The Hollywood Reporter. “They’re funny people who like funny things. There is a rich legacy of comedic writing in the Shondaland world.”
After being given Kate Anderson Brower’s The Residence book, which tells the history of The White House and staff, Davies underwent research into the world. After watching hearings of a chief usher of the White House testifying before Congress during the Clinton administration and describing the White House rooms, Davies had a light bulb moment to bring the Clue board game to life. “It really was one of these kinds of epiphanies,” he says.
Already a murder mystery aficionado, Davies saw an opportunity to not only pay homage to the classic detective genre he’s always loved but also deliver a story that could honor and tell the “untold stories” of the White House staff that typically exist in the background, whether it be the Secret Service agents, chefs, butlers or the chief usher.
Following in the literary footsteps of iconic detectives like Sherlock Holmes, Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple is Davies’ detective Cordelia Cupp, portrayed by Aduba. A seemingly unconventional sleuth with a love for sardines and birding, Davies describes Aduba’s portrayal as “magnetic and funny and smart.” Then giving them a Sherlock-Watson archetype is Park, who partners with Aduba’s Cordelia to solve the crime, but not without some skepticism for her unorthodox methods. In an art-imitating-life moment, the duo and cast were even kept in secret for a period of time about how the mystery ended.
Though full of quirks and even some surprise cameos from Kylie Minogue and a Hugh Jackman, though not the real one (“We tried! You know, he’s busy,” Davies says), the series also marks what could’ve been the late Andre Braugher’s final onscreen roles. The actor was originally starring as the usher A.B. Wynter and filmed multiple episodes before passing away in December 2023 from lung cancer. Esposito stepped in to take over the role and refilmed the completed scenes. “It was challenging, but I really have all the love and gratitude in the world for Giancarlo for stepping in that situation and making that as comfortable as it could be,” Davies tells THR.
Below, showrunner Davies chats with THR about offering a modern comical take on the classic detective mystery, introducing a new onscreen sleuth and teasing that he already has ideas for where she could go next.
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You’re no stranger to a fictionalized world that exists within the White House having worked on Scandal. But The Residence offers a playful twist in that world by centering on a whodunit. Can you talk about what led you to creating this series?
I love murder mysteries. I’ve always loved them, and I read them religiously as a kid and watched them growing up. So it’s always been a genre that I’ve wanted to do, I just never really had the opportunity; it was lurking. It was kind of a weird situation, because Shonda and Betsy [Beers] gave me this book The Residence that was a history of the White House staff and of the White House. I read it and it’s great. It’s got all these great anecdotes and stories, but I didn’t quite know what to do with it in terms of a show.
Semi-randomly in the course of doing some research about the White House and staff, I was watching these hearings where one of the chief ushers of the White House was testifying before Congress during the Clinton administration, talking about moving some boxes around on the third floor in the library in the music room. I just had this light bulb moment of “Oh, it’s like a Clue board!” It really was one of these kinds of epiphanies. And I thought, “Wait, I could do a murder mystery in the White House” and I could do all this stuff with the staff and draw on all these great stories, but it would be in the service of a genre that I love. I wrote this typing in the middle of the night and that was it.
Shondaland isn’t necessarily known for doing much comedy. Was it a tough sell to move this idea through, or was Shondaland looking to branch out more and this idea came along?
They were totally supportive of it. Even though there hasn’t been a kind of purely comedic show out of Shondaland, at least not that I can remember, I do think that they’ve always been interested in it. And they’re funny people who like funny things. Even if you go back to the writers on Scandal, there’s a lot of comedic writers, myself included, who started in the world of comedy and then wrote on Scandal or Grey’s [Anatomy], so there is a rich legacy of comedic writing in the Shondaland world. They were totally game for it and they know who I am. It was not a hard sell.
Any fan of mysteries are aware of the great influence the classics have on mysteries today, serving as a blueprint for how a mystery is formed, the tropes that are explored or the idea of the twist, whether it be Agatha Christie or Sherlock. When crafting your own mystery, what were some of those classic elements you wanted to incorporate?
That’s a great question. Because of the nature of the house, I really wanted it to be focused on the White House. I came up with this idea early on of this state dinner and this murder happening one night. There’s a sub-genre of murder mystery-detective fiction, locked room mysteries, where something happens in a locked room, or, in this case, a locked house, and you’re given a finite set of clues, and nobody can leave or come and you have to figure it out. I love that genre, and I drew a lot of classic, locked room mysteries for this.
The other thing is having an iconic detective. That is part of what is really fun about this genre. As a fan of Poirot and Sherlock Holmes and Benoit Blanc, I love that. So creating somebody like Cordelia Cupp, who I thought could be very distinctive and iconic in her own right, was really important to me.
When writing, did you know how the mystery would end, or was it determined as you went?
Oh yeah, I knew it before I ever started writing the first episode. I knew right at the outset that I was going to have to outline this in a lot of detail, and really know at least every big element of it, because it was just going to get too complicated (laughs). It’s not normally the way that I do things, honestly. I tend to write my way through things more. But for this, I thought it was really important to understand every last element of it. I created a [show] bible at the start that outlined all the characters, their relationships to each other, how the White House worked, how the story was going to unfold. I left myself room to find things in the writing. It wasn’t so detailed that I couldn’t enjoy the process of finding relationships or having a twist here and there. I definitely changed things along the way, but the architecture of it was really in place before I started.
When I spoke with Uzo and Randall, they mentioned that they didn’t know how the mystery was going to end until maybe a few episodes in. Why keep it a mystery from them as well?
I felt like it was good for everybody to know as little as possible about how it ended and who the killer was. Because it affects how you do things and sometimes that’s good or important. I definitely had a conversation with the person who is the murderer before, so that person knew. I can’t remember exactly when or how I revealed that with Uzo and Randall, but I made a very deliberate decision to let this play out in a way that as few people knew until it really was kind of unavoidable.
Before even starting to watch, I was struck by the episode titles and homage paid to classics, and even a more modern one with “Knives Out.” Can you talk about the episode titles?
I really was influenced by the history of this genre, both in writing and film and television, and I really wanted to pay respect to that. In some cases, the title of the episode and the way the episode is constructed really does draw on that source. In other cases, the relationship is a little more tenuous, but there’s something to it. What I really respect so much about what Rian Johnson did with Knives Out is that he really embraced the history, and then took it in its own direction. I tried to do the same thing. They’re [episode titles] all connected to the stories they tell in those episodes and into the entire series. In some cases it’ll be really obvious, and in some cases you might have to hunt for it a little bit, but there is always a relationship there.
Can you talk about creating Cordelia and the conversations you had with Uzo in who you wanted her to be, and how you wanted her to be set apart from previous Shondaland protagonists?
Cordelia is definitely her own character. I think she is incredibly confident, self assured. She’s funny. The really remarkable thing about her is how she is comfortable in silence, and she doesn’t feel the need to make other people feel comfortable, and she gets a lot of information out of that. It’s an unusual quality in somebody that doesn’t feel like they have to fill the void, and it’s something that is really effective for her. Uzo and I talked a lot about that after she came aboard [the show]. I didn’t write Cordelia with anybody in mind — I didn’t write any of these characters, with anybody in mind — but I was so incredibly blessed that Uzo wanted to do this. She brought Cordelia to life. There is no Cordelia without Uzo. We had a lot of conversations about who Cordelia is and she’s more magnetic and funny and smart and everything that I wanted Cordelia to be than I could have ever imagined.
You can’t talk about Cordelia without mentioning her detective look, which can be instantly recognizable. What were the conversations like with how Cordelia would be presented?
Just thinking about iconic detectives, there’s always something you just immediately identify them with, whether it’s a hat or a suit or whatever. I really wanted that for Cordelia, but I wanted it to come out of who I thought she was. We had a lot of conversations, Uzo and I, and Lyn Paolo, who’s our genius costume designer and has a long history with Shondaland and is just an amazing creative force and mind. We went through a lot of different options. I’ll never forget the day that we ended up where we ended up, and we made some slight adjustments later, but [then it was] “Oh, that’s it. That’s Cordelia. That feels like her.” I think it really worked. I think it’s indelible in the way that I want.
Can you talk about the importance of Cordelia’s bird watching and what it represents for the mystery? How is it an essential part of Detective Cupp’s identity?
Her life as a birder is probably the thing that is most important to her, in a lot of ways, because she travels around the world, she birds constantly, constantly thinking about birds [and] bird behavior. It really does play a fundamental role in how she kind of views her work. There’s a lot of silence in birding. There’s a lot of watching, there’s a lot of interpretation. She talks a lot in the show about the question, “Why?” The birder is always asking, “Why? What is that behavior and why are those birds doing that?” And that really is something that’s ingrained in her and then just the actual behavior of birds themselves often lead her to revelations about things. It is something that is just core to who she is and also the way she processes information, in some cases, literally, like a bird.
I don’t really know that much about birding. Going into it, I was not a birder myself. I mean, I’ve come to love [it]. I’ve got tons of birding books. I’ve read a ton about birds. I’ve gone birding with my stepfather and stuff, but it has been eye opening for me as well, which is great.
So then how did you think of which birds to feature in the series?
Early on, me and my co-producer assistant Eileen did a deep dive on birds, just reading a ton. But then at some point not too far into the process, we connected with a man named Kenn Kaufman, who is a legendary birder and who’s the loveliest person in the world and such an incredible resource. We would then talk to him a lot about different scenarios for some birds that I, for whatever reason, wanted to use and I felt very attached to, and he helped me understand them in ways that I could incorporate some of that behavior or her [Cordelia’s] bird watching about them into it. In other cases, I would present Ken with ideas about things that I was trying to achieve, and he would kind of give me a bird or a selection of birds that were useful that way. It was great. He was really important to how the show developed. There was this real list of Teddy Roosevelt’s birds [that he] saw. And that was something I saw early on, and helped the whole birding thing snowball.
This murder takes place at a state dinner which easily results in chaos, especially given there are many guests in attendance. We are treated to a cameo by Kylie Minogue who performs at the state dinner. How did her feature come about?
I mean, just incredibly blessed that she was willing to do it. I settled on Australia early on. I thought it would be a fun group of folks to have and I liked the idea that there was this tension with Australia, which isn’t really a thing, but to me, it seemed delightful. Immediately I was like, who would be the kind of iconic Australian musical guest? It was Kylie. There’s a couple of really funny, kind of interesting, real stories about musical guests, or different folks at State Dinners who didn’t show up and were late or whatever. Like with so much of the show, I drew on some real history [with] the idea that Kylie was, like a last-minute person that was actually at the dinner, but was asked to perform. But she was game for all that. Once she came on to do it, she was game for more. So I wrote more and more for her. She’s Kylie, but she’s an actress. She’s got great comedic timing. She’s just great. She was so much fun!
Speaking of other cameos, Hugh Jackman is mentioned numerous times as also being a guest. Was the actual Hugh Jackman ever supposed to make an appearance?
We tried! You know, he’s busy. It was always going to be a long shot, and he was actually lovely about it. He sent a note back. If the schedule stuff would have worked out in a way, I like to think he would have done it. I hope he’s amused by it all. It turned into a fun thing. It would have been great to have him but it’s fine.
Giancarlo Esposito portrays A.B. Wynter, which this mystery centers on. But the late Andre Braugher was originally cast to portray him. In what way, if at all, did the vision for A.B. change when Giancarlo came on board? What were the conversations like with him in crafting this character to make his own while still honoring Andre?
It was obviously an incredibly difficult situation. Just on a purely personal level, we all knew Andre, and some folks worked with him for a long time on other shows and other environments before this. I only got to know him through the show, but he made an impact, and it was incredibly painful. We couldn’t have asked in a very challenging, emotional, difficult situation, to have had a better person come in to do this and Giancarlo knew Andre loved him [character Wynter], wanted to respect him in the work and the show, what Andre was doing with it. We talked a lot about that. The character stayed the same in the sense that I didn’t write [new] things, but Giancarlo’s a force of nature in his own right, and brought his own genius to it. I think it’s really worked out remarkably well given the circumstances. But Andre has stayed with us all throughout the show and it was really important for all of us to continue to honor him. It was challenging, but I really have all the love and gratitude in the world for Giancarlo for stepping in that situation and making that as comfortable as it could be.
The tone of this show is very fun, light and funny, whether it be due to the performance choices from the actors, the playful or almost theatrical cuts and transitions, the music, etc. I wanted to get your thoughts on the choices you made to make this show as fun and funny as it is while still maintaining that reminder that this is a high-stakes mystery.
It’s a high-wire act a little bit. It’s definitely lots of different tones, and that’s just kind of who I am at the core, and what I like to try to do. I really did want the show to be fun. That was the overarching goal. I wanted to create a show that people would enjoy. It would be entertaining. It’s a genre that I think I just have gone back to time and time again and whenever I just want to watch something fun so I wanted to kind of try to contribute to that. It is fun when it’s just funny, but also when it’s emotional. There’s some stuff that, it’s probably a little bit unexpected. I think so many of the actors involved in this are people that have that dexterity, who can do more than one thing. There’s comedic actors who can play really emotional stuff and there’s some of these people that you haven’t seen necessarily do stuff that’s this funny, do that. It is challenging sometimes, because you’re shifting gears fairly quickly but, to me, if you can do that, and I hope that we have, I think that’s all the richer.
When people think of the White House, they maybe aren’t quick to think of all of the different people involved behind the scenes. How did coming from the Scandal background play a role in the locations and people you wanted to explore further but in a playful way?
Obviously from Scandal, I knew the environment. Although in Scandal, we spent a lot more time in the West Wing and the politics of it all, which there is none of that here. I will say that Shonda always has loved, even on Scandal, the folks that are, quote in the background, [like] Secret Service agents. She’s always had an interest in those people and telling their stories and their perspective. I remember on Scandal, we had different episodes and arcs from the POV of folks that you don’t necessarily notice right away, or [who] you think of when you think of the White House. And that certainly made a mark on me. I think it’s probably one of the reasons I was interested in doing this. I think that there’s a lot of untold stories in there. So again, kind of going back to what you’re talking about in terms of tone, like it is comedic. Cordelia is front and center, there’s a murder mystery part of it, but I really wanted to tell those stories too as much as I could about the staff and their backgrounds and those relationships, because I wanted to honor them. There’s stuff with all of them where you really do learn about some of the motivations of people who work there and what they care about and why they’re there and that was important to me. I learned a lot in doing the research for the show about those stories.
Do you envision additional seasons with new mysteries for Cordelia to solve? What other settings do you dream of building a mystery in?
I have ideas! I can’t really say much more than that. First and foremost, I want people to love this show, fall in love with her, see all of those possibilities, and then we’ll see what happens after that. I have a lot of thoughts about it and, and I think there’s a lot of fun that could be had with her and so I hope people really embrace the show and that we’re able to to think more about that.
What do you think sets this mystery apart from the rest and hope that people take away from it?
I think Cordelia is a big part of the answer to that. She’s very distinctive, hopefully an iconic detective. To me, she makes all the difference, and the way she goes about her work, and what you learned from her and watching her is the main thing. There’s things that I play with in structure that I think are kind of, I hope, cool and original (Laughs.) And I do think the mystery itself is really tight. There’s lots of different tones that I hope that people really enjoy but I think probably the singular achievement is Cordelia.
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The Residence is streaming now on Netflix.
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