On Making Your Own Bed In The White House

With staff on hand to make your breakfast order each morning, Sasha and Malia Obama had no ordinary upbringing – Sasha was just seven when her father was elected 44th President of the United States. Yesterday she turned 19. As mother Michelle says in documentary Becoming, “I was a child of the South Side, now raising daughters who slept in rooms designed by a high-end interior decorator and who could custom order their breakfast from a chef.” And yet, both Sasha and older sister Malia had to make their beds every day – at Michelle’s insistence, even in a home with 132 rooms, butlers and housekeepers. 

If you haven’t yet read Michelle Obama’s memoir, Becoming, it’s an insight into where the former US First Lady’s work ethic comes from and her perspective on her husband’s two terms. But if you haven’t had time to scour the 421 pages – or you just want a snoop at the production it takes to take a book on a stadium tour – the show is your next dinner party cheat sheet.

The doco gives the nosey among us a chance to see her off the stage, dancing backstage with her Chief of Staff, a friend since way back, getting in the zone with music in the car, the friendly rivalry with her brother, giving you a sense of what life’s been like for the three perhaps lesser-known members of this ambitious Chicago family. 

Super watchable, it’s a sweet glimpse into the kids’ unique childhoods, like the titbit that on the last night in the White House, the girls begged for a final sleepover. After all, they were just a couple of kids growing up in an extraordinary place.