Currently: The Idol

This week’s Currently will be covering a piece of media that has not even been released yet, but the series has already been so hotly debated that I had to cover it. Let’s break down “The Idol,” an upcoming HBO Max TV series that is a collaboration between huge music artist The Weeknd and “Euphoria” creator Sam Levinson.

I remember the first time I saw “The Idol” announced on Twitter. I was excited, as I’m a big fan of the art direction and production design that goes into “Euphoria” and I was sure we would get to see an even bigger budget, slightly aged, version of it. While the storyline of “Euphoria” has gone slightly awry in its most recent season (WHAT HAPPENED TO KAT??? AND MCKAY??), the beauty of the show onscreen cannot be denied.

“The Idol” promised to be a tale about an upcoming music superstar, played by Lily Rose Depp, and her complicated relationship with a manipulative cult leader, played by Abel Tesfaye of “The Weeknd” fame. Recently, The Weeknd has taken a more artistic and thematic approach to his music, with his most recent album “Dawn FM” including “radio announcer talk” by Jim Carrey and a complicated public relations rollout that included multiple costumed live performances at award shows. Most of you can remember seeing a swollen, bandaged, The Weeknd, even during his Super Bowl halftime show. His fame has given him the opportunity to have more of a creative license and he ran with it.

This is why I was so excited to see him bend into the world of TV, and not just any TV, the world of “Euphoria” TV, where costume, makeup, and symbolism are king. It felt like a flawless collaboration, one that audiences were excited for and that would send Abel Tesfaye another level up in stardom. However, the show slowly collapsed. Although HBO Max still has not released an official date for the show’s release, it was initially supposed to fill their post-House of the Dragon TV slot, meaning it would already be out right now. Obviously, that isn’t the case, so Rolling Stone took it upon themselves to do some investigating, resulting in one of the most notable journalistic exposes of this year: “‘The Idol’: How HBO's Next 'Euphoria' Became Twisted 'Torture Porn.’”

Twitter went wild. My entire home page was tweets about “The Idol,” Sam Levinson, or The Weeknd for several days. I don’t want to go into detail about, more specifically, the scenes Levinson wanted to include but wasn’t allowed to since they were too explicit to film. Please take my word for it—it’s twisted, it’s disgusting, and abhorrent, and it doesn’t give women any kind of room for opinion. If you were to simply watch the show when it comes out, you might wonder at the disgusting portrayal and lack of female agency in the story. However, as Currently likes to do, it’s imperative to understand the story behind it.

Originally, the tale of “The Idol” was the story of a female pop star who overcame powerful men and an enigmatic cult leader to find her own pathway (the story of many women in the industry and an increasing theme in real life, with both Taylor Swift and Megan Thee Stallion taking back their power from the men in the industry who manipulated them). It was set to be directed by Amy Seimetz, known for shows like “Atlanta” and “The Girlfriend Experience.” In fact, she directed all but the last episode before she was ousted by The Weeknd in favor of Sam Levinson having more direct control. It turns out the Weeknd thought the show focused too much on Depp’s female character and wanted to drop the “feminist lens.” Even more, he wanted a show that was all about him. One source, a member of the production team, shares, “What I signed up for was a dark satire of fame and the fame model in the 21st century,” but since the changes, “It went from satire to the thing it was satirizing… It was like sexual torture porn.”

WOW. During Women’s History Month, no less. I’ll admit, I thought we were finally reaching a new rhythm in the industry—one where women’s stories were maximized and emphasized. One where women were encouraged to tell their stories the way they want to. It’s heartbreaking to discover that a show on so many of our tongues, and one that will likely still be streamed, would choose to go down this direction. For me, it really makes me question what we consider art and who we consider artists in today’s world.

After all, Levinson has been praised by the industry for “pushing the envelope.” The nudity featured in “Euphoria” broke records and he has been highlighted as an industry mover-and-shaker, someone who does things that are fresh and new. His art direction and cinematic style in “Euphoria” has certainly pushed the envelope by bringing us a drugged-up kind of glamorous take on high school, and “The Idol” promised more of that. But the most recent headlines beg the question: “Is pushing the envelope always a good thing?” Just because something is new, fresh, and innovative doesn’t make it a good thing. Change and growth can take place in a negative direction too, and can we really call Sam Levinson a genius just because he’s willing to bring his twisted mental fantasies to life?

The strongest pushback to critiques of the show is that “this is real life.” Young and vulnerable women often get taken advantage of, especially in big money industries like music and film. Shouldn’t we be portraying those things? For “Euphoria,” many of the situations can be “real life.” Kids in high school suffer from serious drug addictions and the politics of high school such as those that play out between Cassie and Maddy don’t feel too different from reality. But, I want to argue that just because something bad happens “in real life” doesn’t mean we need to watch and expose ourselves to it. It doesn’t mean we need to spend money to create it, either.

During the Agora this week (check out my News article!), Professor Elizabeth McCree mentioned how, during her time as a prosecution and defense attorney, she has been exposed to all kinds of traumatic stories and children or people who were severely traumatized. During the pandemic, she underwent a brain scan that discovered her brain had changed due to the trauma she was exposed to. Although the things in the horrific cases she was handling didn’t necessarily happen to her, the constant exposure to the traumatic experiences of those around her actually changed her brain. She realized that she had to take steps to protect her brain and distance herself from such intense trauma (she was spending 5 days a week in court on various cases and her exposure to the trauma was almost constant).

We don’t know exactly yet what exposure to TV can do to our brains, especially TV featuring a man’s most depraved ideas. But we can certainly assume that it won’t have a positive effect on our brain matter. I think it’s time for the industry to take a step back and realize why it matters which stories we choose to tell—and which parts of those stories we choose to show. Violence and sexual assault, drug use, etc- they are all realities of our world today, but that doesn’t mean we need to expose ourselves to depictions of it any more than we must. TV certainly shouldn’t be a place where men are encouraged to let their worst, most violent, ideas play out on screen for anyone to see. Personally, I hope HBO thinks twice before releasing this show and I know I’ll certainly be thinking twice before watching it. What about you?