The D.N.C. on TV: Don’t Go, Michelle!

On the first night of the Democratic National Convention, Michelle Obama delivered the night’s most inspiring message.Photograph by Philip Montgomery for The New Yorker

Michelle Obama, who provided us with our purest moment of levity last week, provided us with our purest moment of sanity last night. She also delivered the night’s most inspiring message. The Obamas have been a bittersweet presence in this campaign season—a poignant reminder, for the many of us who love and admire them, that while we duke it out to choose their successors, the family currently occupying the White House cannot be surpassed. Michelle Obama has been the ultimate FLOTUS—funny, wise, wholehearted, down to earth, even in the moments when we’ve suspected that she wouldn’t mind some privacy or freedom.

During the misery and surreality of the Republican Convention, FLOTUS was a presence in two significant ways. The first was during the Melania plagiarism flap. For a few hours after Melania’s speech, before the story broke, some of us thought, Ah, not bad! One of the few vaguely sane speeches we will hear this week. To realize later what had inspired it was heartbreaking. When videos of Melania and Michelle’s similar lines were edited to play side by side, Obama showed warmth, heart, conviction. To see those words melted down into a speech promoting Donald Trump only enhanced the sense that we are living in a dystopian novel.

The second was when Obama showed up on Carpool Karaoke, on “The Late Late Show with James Corden.” I’m wary of this sketch, and of late-night-TV viral-video shenanigans generally, but when Corden picked Michelle Obama up at the White House and began driving her around, and the joyful descending notes of “Signed, Sealed, Delivered” began, it got me. “Did you know that Stevie Wonder’s my favorite?” Obama said, happily. She started to clap. “Like a fool I went and stayed too long,” she sang. “Now I wonder if your love’s still strong.” That was it: I teared up. Unlike many people in the political realm, Obama gives the impression of being both a mature adult and a real person. She enjoys music and knows how to sing and dance. She gives the impression of being, you know, alive. Thrust into this public role, she dutifully uses comedy to advance initiatives from eating vegetables to promoting education for girls worldwide. She reminds us of what we need to do for our children. She exemplifies and speaks to our better selves. And sometimes this involves dancing to Stevie Wonder and Beyoncé in a car.

It wasn’t a surprise that her speech last night, on the first night of the Democratic National Convention, was the best of the bunch. (Read my colleague Amy Davidson on the speech’s key theme of trust.) And the lineup was all heavyweights—Monday at the D.N.C. was not a Scott Baio-equivalent opener. The speakers included not just Elizabeth Warren; not just Bernie Sanders, trying to simultaneously inspire, redirect, and placate the fervor he has stoked; not just Cory Booker, invoking Lincoln, Obama, King, the Founding Fathers, J.F.K., and Bill Clinton in ’88, to the obvious delight of Bill Clinton; but Senator Al Franken’s welcome, if hit or miss, return to comedy and Sarah Silverman’s stunning appeal to both passion and common sense. As Silverman and Franken prompted cheers and noisy Bernie angst, Silverman looked around, dismayed, and said, “Can I just say, to the Bernie or Bust people, you’re being ridiculous.” The crowd went nuts. She fixed the screaming hordes with a look of strength and loving disappointment. “Thank God they can fix this in post,” she said. Paul Simon, warbling along after this, gave everyone a chance to calm down.

The only person who could inspire listening and focus in that setting was Michelle Obama. “It is hard to believe that it has been eight years since I first came to this Convention to talk with you about why I thought my husband should be President,” she said. “Remember how I told you about his character and his conviction, his decency and his grace? The traits we have seen every day that served our country in the White House.” We certainly do remember that speech, because we watched it last week. As she spoke, Obama made a strong case for Hillary Clinton, exemplified the grace and dignity of the Obama years, and, while taking the high road—they go low, we go high—pointedly referred to Trump without mentioning his name. “You can’t have thin skin or a tendency to lash out,” she said. “You need to be steady and measured and well-informed.”

Obama’s speech was both subtle and direct. She appealed to our maturity, talking about hardworking, idealistic Americans of all backgrounds. I wish the night could have ended after this speech, which invoked everything from police shootings to Orlando to segregation and sexism, foregrounded the greatness of our national ideals, and inspired us to continue fighting for change.

Last week, in the car, Corden picked up Missy Elliott, who got in and sang along with “This Is for My Girls,” a song whose proceeds go to Obama’s initiative Let Girls Learn. Watching this, we had some fun; we were reminded of the long road ahead, for Americans and for the world; we may have joined in when they sang and danced to “Get Ur Freak On,” with hand gestures, wiggling, and a fierce sense of joy. When it was over, Elliott and her hosts exchanged cheerful, loving goodbyes. Elliott reached for the door handle, then popped back into the frame. “I don’t want to go!” she said. “Can we ride around again?” Missy, I hear you.