Paul William Davies: Hi, I'm Paul William Davies, creator, writer, showrunner, and executive producer of ‘The Residence’. And these are things you might've missed.

[TITLE CARD] ‘THE RESIDENCE’: THINGS YOU MIGHT’VE MISSED

[CLIP] Susan Kelechi Watson (as Jasmine Haney):  In the White House Residence, there's 132 rooms, eight staircases, six floors, and two mezzanines.

Paul William Davies: This is kind of a locked-room mystery, so you have to figure it out within the four corners of the building. And the White House is the most famous building in the world. I really wanted to show the audience all the rooms, and each of them has a history. So we picked the version of it that we liked, and then sometimes embellished it slightly. 

[CLIP] Randall Park (as Edwin Park): We set up three interview areas. One in the State Dining Room, in the China Room, and in the Green Room, which is where we started.

Paul William Davies: It was a lot of fun, but also challenging, because we wanted it to feel real, but also ours.

[upbeat jazz music plays] 

Paul William Davies: Almost every detail you see in the White House we tried to get as right as we could. In the China Room, we really carefully selected all of the plates, the china in that room, just like we cared about everything that was in the pastry kitchen.

[CLIP] Bronson Pinchot (as Didier Gotthard): It is a gingerbread. Your feet are licorice.

Paul William Davies: The paintings in the rooms, even the books in the Library. 

[CLIP] Susan Kelechi Watson (as Jasmine Haney): The Library. Mr. Wynter's favorite room.

Paul William Davies:  And to kind of honor A.B.'s love of books, we really curated as much as we could from the actual Library. 

[CLIP] Uzo Aduba (as Cordelia Cupp): Did Wynter have an office? 

[CLIP] Susan Kelechi Watson (as Jasmine Haney): Yes. On the mezzanine. 

[CLIP] Uzo Aduba (as Cordelia Cupp): Show me. And take the long way.

Paul William Davies: We built all of the architectural detail in the actual house, like a spiral staircase that goes from the pastry kitchen down to the basement. And actually, there's a little window in the Chief Usher's office, almost like a mail slot that you look out over the Grand Foyer. That was fun for the show. 

Paul William Davies: When I first wrote ‘The Residence’, I made a list of interesting, funny anecdotes, little pieces of history. 

[CLIP] Susan Kelechi Watson (as Jasmine Haney): Nancy Reagan had an astrologer who set the presidential schedule. People think the Cold War ended because of containment, but really it was just a New Moon in Libra. 

Paul William Davies: It kind of summed up the show in doing something that was both authentic and also funny. 

[CLIP] Paul Fitzgerald (as President Perry Morgan): Weak. Weak! A dribble. A mist. A rumor. 

Paul William Davies: It absolutely is based on a real set of interactions between LBJ and an engineer who worked tirelessly on the water pressure and temperature. This was one right out of the gate that just cracked me up.

[CLIP] Susan Kelechi Watson (as Jasmine Haney): The Morgans didn't want anyone else staying overnight in the House, so they pretended there were renovations in the only guest room left. Jackie Kennedy did it once. I think they got the idea from her.

Paul William Davies: Room 301, where she kind of faked a renovation so that somebody couldn't stay there. The minute I read that, I was like, "I'm definitely gonna use that."

[CLIP] Ken Marino (as Harry Hollinger): I can't believe this.

[CLIP] Barrett Foa (as Elliot Morgan): Jackie Kennedy did it. 

Paul William Davies: It really became a bigger story point in the show. 

Paul William Davies: The McCutcheon's were actually inspired by the Ficklin family. Nine Ficklins worked in the White House over multiple generations. I thought there was humor in that because some of them shared the same name. 

[CLIP] J.D. Hall (as George McCutcheon): There's Big George and Little George and me. And there were two other George McCutcheons before any of us. 

Paul William Davies: I liked the idea of paying tribute to the people who worked there. 

[CLIP] Al Mitchell (as Rollie Bridgewater): Waist level. Up, very good. Thank you. 

[CLIP] Susan Kelechi Watson (as Jasmine Haney): Didier wanted to make desserts that Calvin Coolidge would be excited about.

Paul William Davies: Somebody asked me if I wanted to be in the show, and I was like, "You know, that'd be fun." 

[CLIP] Paul William Davies (as President Calvin Coolidge): Ooh! 

Paul William Davies: It was fun to be Calvin Coolidge for that short of a period of time. It's a funny story point in that episode, so I enjoyed it. 

Paul William Davies: Part of the fun of the show and the genre is often to pay respect to predecessors. I was influenced by so many movies and books. I wanted to weave that in throughout the show. And each episode, I reference famous murder mysteries. Some episodes, the connection is more obvious. Sometimes you have to look for it a little. I think people who really love the genre do appreciate that history. 

[CLIP] Ken Marino (as Harry Hollinger): I don't care if she's Miss Marple or Sherlock Holmes or whoever Daniel Craig is in that movie.

[CLIP] Dan Perrault (as Colin Trask): Benoit Blanc.

[CLIP] Ken Marino (as Harry Hollinger): I don't care. 

[CLIP] Uzo Aduba (as Cordelia Cupp): You know the amazing thing about birds? It's not that they're just good at hunting for food. They literally filter out things that are not food.

Paul William Davies: When I came up with Cordelia Cupp, I didn't set out to make her a birder from the start. The deeper I got into the story, I realized it was one of the defining characteristics of the way she approaches her job.

[CLIP] Randall Park (as Edwin Park): I asked Detective Cupp if there was anything she really wanted to see. 

[CLIP] Uzo Aduba (as Cordelia Cupp): The falcon. It's not a rare bird, even here in D.C., but it would be amazing to see one at the White House.

Paul William Davies: She really appreciates the falcon. For this particular case, it had the most salience for her because the way that it hunts and looks out over its prey, so to speakCordelia uses as a way to identify one of them in a large group of people. The falcon also has a particular connection to the White House. So that was a detail that was a fun part of the show.

[CLIP] Jane Curtin (as Nan Cox): You're smarter than the rest of them.

[CLIP] Uzo Aduba (as Cordelia Cupp): I am.

[CLIP] Randall Park (as Edwin Park): Why?

[CLIP] Uzo Aduba (as Cordelia Cupp): Because I'm Cordelia Cupp.

[dramatic music swells]

[thunder crashes]