NOW ENTERTAINMENT March 00 16 -- 22, Month 00, 2025 2023
Your Weekly TV Entertainment Brought To You By Olean Times Herald & The Bradford Era
Det. Cordelia Cupp solves a White House murder in “The Residence,” premiering Thursday, March 20, on Netflix. Uzo Aduba and Randall Park star in “The Residence”
Cover Story Hail to the chief inspector: Uzo Aduba stars in Shondaland White House mystery series By Dana Simpson Shonda Rhimes is back in the White House. After the success of her hit political drama “Scandal” and her stately English period romance series “Bridgerton,” Shonda Rhimes and her prolific team are tackling a new project — and this one is taking some cues from famed mystery author Agatha Christie. “The Residence,” a new, eight-episode lockedroom murder mystery set in the White House, premieres Thursday, March 20, on Netflix. While the series falls neatly under the Shondaland banner, which also includes the two aforementioned series as well as “Grey’s Anatomy,” “Station 19,” “Inventing Anna” and more, “The Residence” is created and helmed by “Scandal” staff writer and “For the People” creator Paul William Davies. Excited for the release of his new series starring Uzo
Aduba (“Orange Is the New Black”), Davies told Netflix’s news site, Tudum, that “’The Residence’ is honestly a lot of things. It’s funny, it’s suspenseful, it’s clever, it’s totally farcical in places, it’s genuinely romantic in others.” Regarding the series’ plot and overall vibe, “The Residence” channels the Christie-era murder mystery and its recent descendants, such as Rian Johnson’s “Knives Out” (2019) and “Glass Onion” (2022) films, as well as the Hulu/Disney+ sensation “Only Murders in the Building.” Insofar as the official logline is concerned, Shondaland and Netflix have offered the following description: “132 rooms. 157 suspects. One dead body. One wildly eccentric detective. One disastrous state dinner. ‘The Residence’ is a screwball whodunnit set in the upstairs, downstairs and backstairs of the White House, among the eclectic
staff of the world’s most famous mansion.” Aduba shines in the lead role as consulting detective Cordelia Cupp, who is as awkward as she is intelligent — which is to say, very. Referred to by Netflix as “the most sought-after investigator in the world,” Cupp is “known for her unexpected humor, relentless pursuit of truth and sharp eye for human behavior.” It bears noting that Cupp is also an avid birder, demonstrating unmatched patience to accompany her keen attention to detail. Joining the “Mrs. America” actress on screen is, as Aduba puts it, “an amazing group of phenomenally talented, good, good, good human beings who are generous, thoughtful, fun, gifted, talented [and] just awesome. “It was straight jams every day with our cast,” Aduba later added. “We loved coming to work every day.”
More specifically, Aduba shares her screen time with “Fresh Off the Boat” and “WandaVision’s” Randall Park, who plays skeptical FBI agent Edwin Park. Agent Park is assigned to work the state dinner alongside Cupp, but does not exactly jive with her methods. All told, however, the pair’s conflicting views work wonders to balance each other’s biases throughout the series. Additionally, potential viewers learned very early in the show’s marketing that Giancarlo Esposito’s (“Breaking Bad”) character, White House chief usher A.B. Wynter, is the reason for the plot. The victim whose death kickstarts the series, the role was originally tied to “Brooklyn NineNine” actor Andre Braugher, but was recast following the actor’s sudden death in December 2023 (the series has been in production since 2022 and was postponed due to the industry strike).