“This show was a real jigsaw puzzle,” Lyn Paolo told me. We’d met on Zoom to talk about her work on The Residence, a Shondaland murder mystery you can stream in its entirety on Netflix right now. The eight-episode limited series is a variation on more than a few classic tropes from the detective genre, but I cannot quite figure out how to explain exactly how stylish the whole thing is. Every frame is impeccable, especially when the show aims for high camp.

“I keep rewatching it, I don't often do that, rewatch and rewatch, because I'm so disparaging of my own work,” the designer explained. “But this show, because I love the actors so much, and because the whole team, from production design to props, hair, makeup, all did such an unbelievable job. You know, sometimes you work on a show and things aren't quite getting right. Everyone's not on the same page. But Paul Davies, who created the series, was there every day and spoke to all of us. I think it built a bigger, stronger community. So the work is better and that's what you want on a production.”

This Netflix series (PLEASE give us a second season) is a bit meta, it is about archetypes, a story about storytelling told by an expert cruciverbalist. And even though this is a murder mystery, one which takes place in the living quarters of the White House during a fictional American president’s term, it is delightful at every opportunity. Whenever a series or film feels effortless, it reminds me of the naked makeup look; the simplicity is deceptive and actually achieving it requires an insane amount of work.