![EXCLUSIVE: Former First Lady Michelle Obama steps out with friends Bruce Springsteen and wife Patti Scialfa at celebrity restaurant Polo Bar in New York City. The two families have been friends since The Boss campaigned for Barack Obama during his successful run for the White House in 2008. Michelle famously told her President husband he needed to spend more time with Springsteen. Both men have talked about their friendship — fortified in part by the bond between their wives, Michelle and Patti. In the first episode of a podcast, called Renegades, Obama, 59, said he and Springsteen, 71, "grew to trust each other" based on conversations in which they reflected on feeling "invisible" throughout their childhoods. Springsteen sang with a gospel choir at the newly elected president's inauguration in 2009 and later recalled how he thought Obama had the wrong number the first time the Chicago Democrat called him. "And I said, 'OK, let me figure this out. I am a guitar-playing high school graduate from Freehold, New Jersey. And — OK — you want me to do what?" Springsteen said. Over the years, both have realized they had more in common than they initially realized. Namely, that they both felt like outsiders. "I always kept one foot in sort of the blue collar world and one foot in the counter culture world," Springsteen said of growing up in New Jersey. "And I never truly belonged completely in either of them, you know?". 28 Sep 2022 Pictured: Michelle Obama. Photo credit: ZapatA/MEGA TheMegaAgency.com +1 888 505 6342 (Mega Agency TagID: MEGA902427_026.jpg) [Photo via Mega Agency]](https://hollywoodlife.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/michelle-obama-nyc-mega.jpg?quality=100&w=293)
Michelle Obama‘s Netflix documentary, Becoming, focuses on her successful 2018-2019 book tour for her memoir of the same name. But there’s plenty of intimate family moments within the film, as well. Along with husband Barack Obama, the former First Lady’s eldest daughter, Malia Obama, 21, makes a particularly touching appearance. At one point in the documentary, Malia is seen greeting her mother backstage during a stop on her Becoming book tour. “You’re so good, I love you too much. I cried again,” Malia says. Michelle asks Malia, whom she adorably calls her “little potato,” why she’s “always crying.”
She explains that it’s because of how much of an impact Michelle has on her audiences! “It’s always so… This has demonstrated in a way — it’s just like, damn, those eight years [in the White House] weren’t for nothing. You know?” Malia tells her mom. “You see that huge crowd out there and that last kind of speech you gave about — people are here because people really believe in hope, and hope in other people.”She adds with a little eye roll, “and also every time you guys play Stevie Wonder, I don’t know, I cry a little bit.” Slick recovery! Malia also makes a brief appearance elsewhere in the documentary with her younger sister Sasha Obama, 18.
The siblings sit down for a rare interview, recorded in 2018, and praise their mother for her post-White House endeavors. “I’m excited for her to be proud of what she’s done,” says Sasha. “Because I think that that’s the most important thing for a human to do, is be proud of themselves.” Malia adds that their mother is “no longer facing that same scrutiny—being able to let all of that leave your mind, creates so much more space.”
Sasha and Malia just wrapped up their freshman and junior years at the University of Michigan and Harvard, respectively. Well, technically. Like other students across the United States, the sisters had to finish their semester while quarantined at home during the coronavirus pandemic. Michelle actually joked with Ellen DeGeneres that it was tough having them in the house again!
Becoming premieres May 6 on Netflix.