Michelle & Barack Obama ♥ First Dance of First Couple of the Whole World! President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama, he in a white tie and tux, she in a white evening gown by Jason Wu, started the tour of inaugural balls tonight which cap the swearing-in of the 44th president. They started at "the Neighborhood Ball,'' which the president called one of the most important tonight.
"This campaign was organized neighborhood by neighborhood,'' said Obama, calling himself a neighborhood kind of guy - at a ball in the Washington Convention Center where tickets were dispensed for little cost to a lot of people. He cut his teeth on neighborhood work, he told the crowd.
"Ad if you think about it, neighborhood starts with neighbor,'' Obama said. "This ball is the one which captures best, I think, the spirit of this campaign... We are going to need you... because together we are going to change America.''
But for now, all the president and first lady were changing were hands as they took a turn on the dance stage.
They could have danced all night. They had several more balls to attend, including the Commander-in-Chief ball at the National Building Museum, where representatives of all the military branches turn out in dress uniform for the new commander. This, he said, was the other important one of the night.
Stephanie Allain of Homegrown Pictures confirmed to msnbc that an upcoming film, titled “Southside With You,” will recreate the president’s first date with the future first lady, during which they took in a screening of Spike Lee’s seminal movie “Do the Right Thing.”
“I took her to this new movie that everybody was talking about, directed by a guy that not that many people had heard of, but it was supposed to be pretty good,” Obama recalled last year during the film’s 25th anniversary celebration.
Michelle’s memories were a little snarkier. “We had lunch, and he had this bad sport jacket and a cigarette dangling from his mouth, and I thought: ‘Oh, here you go. Here’s this good-looking, smooth-talking guy. I’ve been down this road before,’” she told “Obama: From Promise to Power” author David Mendell. The future 44th president managed to win his fellow attorney over and the couple married in 1992.
According to Deadline.com, “Think Like a Man” actress Tika Sumpter has already been cast as Michelle and the hunt is on for an actor to fill Barack’s iconic shoes. In the past, the president has suggested that Will Smith would make a suitable film version of himself, and the Oscar-nominated rapper-actor has concurred.
“If I am ordered by my commander in chief to star in a film about him, I will do my duty as an American,” Smith said back in 2009.
The first lady has also weighed in. “Will Smith or Denzel Washington might be able to pull it off. Will’s got those ears, though, which might give him an edge,” she told PopSugar in 2012.
“Southside With You” is reportedly going to be structured in a vein similar to the indie classic “Before Sunrise” starring Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy. It will follow the two lovebirds over the course of one afternoon. Filming is set to begin in July on location in Chicago.
The shoot will likely include a pit-stop at Baskin-Robbins in the city’s Hyde Park neighborhood, where the Obamas’ first kiss has been commemorated with a plaque.
Richard Tanne, who also wrote the screenplay, will direct the film, which is being produced for Homegrown by former Warner Independent executive Tracey Bing and Allain. Sumpter, who helped conceive the project, will also executive produce.
“Stephanie and I are excited to produce this smart and timeless film that sheds light on one of the great love stories of our time,” Bing told Deadline. “Richard really captures the essence of that romantic connection between Barack and Michelle that is so evident in the way that they look at each other. We are looking forward to finding the perfect Barack.”
