Yesterday, I ended my blog with a pitch for an upcoming C-SPAN documentary on the White House, which will anchor a week-long bloc of programming on the First Family’s residence. Here is my promised Q & A with Mark Farkas, the executive producer of history programming at C-SPAN, which I might remind my loyal readers is not a government agency, but a non-profit entity funded by the cable industry.

Q: You had privileged access to the White House, including the private spaces of the First Family. What kind of a working relationship did you have with Laura Bush to make this documentary possible?

A: Before we began this project, we didn’t have any special relationship that we were aware of. After our series on the U.S. Capitol came out, we went and talked to Gary Walters, who was then head usher at the White House, and told him, ‘We’d like to do a feature-length film on the White House.' He said, ‘Let me check with Mrs. Bush.’ He came back pretty quickly and told us that she had watched The Capitol, and wants to do this for the White House.

Click the play button above to watch the video

Q: Did Laura get into it?

A: Very much so. One of the first things that happened was we met with her in the Blue Room, and there were a bunch of artisans who had helped refurbish the Lincoln Bedroom, and she introduced us to them and told us within earshot of everyone who was there, “This is something I’m fully supportive of—because the history of this house is so important.”

Q: So she gave this her personal imprimatur?

A: Yes, and that was important. Her staff put a lot of time into it—everything we did went through Mrs. Bush’s office.

A: You are not alone. One of the press officials with the First Lady’s staff told us, “I’m so glad to be working on this with you—I’ve never been up here myself.”

Q: It sounds as though everyone was quite cooperative.

A: We got incredible access, not only to the people who live there, but to the people who work there.

Q:  Were you able to shoot footage of the residence?

A: Yes, and that’s pretty rare. There are little bits of it here and there, but not much.

Q: Did you get into the Lincoln Bedroom?

A: We did, and we have an entire night on Lincoln. We also made a documentary on Lincoln’s cottage at the Soldier’s Home in Northwest Washington, and we have an hour-and-a-half interview with Lincoln scholar Harold Holzer. You’ll be taken inside the Lincoln Bedroom and made to understand what it was like in Lincoln’s time—and see what it is like today.

Q: I don’t suppose it fits C-SPAN's style to show pictures of wealthy Clinton donors jumping up and down on the bed in the Lincoln Bedroom where they got to sleep in return for making political contributions.

A: (Laughs nervously) One of Laura Bush’s achievements is refurbishing the Lincoln bedroom back to the way it was at the time. She and her staff consulted photographs from the period, and they’ve returned the bed and the carpet and the drapes to the color and style of Lincoln's era. It takes you back to a feeling of what it was like when it was an office and cabinet room. Mrs. Bush found a portrait of Andrew Jackson that hung there when Lincoln was president, and it is there now. So is an original copy of the Gettysburg Address, one of five still in existence.

Q: There is so much history in that place.

A: You could do a 100-part series on the White House and not get all the family stories, all the anecdotes, all the pivotal events that have happened in those rooms. It’s a museum as well as a home. You do get the sense when you’re in the residence that you’re in a home, but it’s a special home.

Q: What moved you the most while making this film?

A: You get a sense of who has lived there—and died there. You think of Lincoln’s son Willie, who passed away at 11 years of age. You just know you are in the presence of the past. The solarium, where Ronald Reagan recuperated after the assassination, is now a television room. It’s also a respite. It was built by the Coolidges. And whose portrait does Reagan put up there? Calvin Coolidge. It’s a place that, everywhere you go, there is a connection like that. Harry Truman is famous for walking those halls, looking at those portraits, and gaining strength from the pictures of his predecessors—and from the knowledge that he was living in the house where they had lived. I think they all do.