At HBO they were convinced they had a big hit on their hands with ‘Idol’since it was the new series of sam levinson after his overwhelming success with ‘Euphoria’. However, the dream has gradually turned into a nightmare that has exploded with a Rolling Stone article full of incendiary revelations about ‘The Idol’.
Created by Levinson with Abel “The Weeknd” Tesfaye and Reza Fahim, ‘The Idol’ tells the story of a young girl who yearns to become a pop star who is forced to cancel her concert tour after suffering a nervous breakdown. However, she will not hesitate to do everything possible to recover her status, in parallel starting a complicated relationship with a self-help guru who is also the leader of a secret sect.
problems from the start
Since HBO gave the green light to ‘The Idol’ in 2021, practically everything has been a problem, since in April 2022 it was announced that the director Amy Seimetz (‘She Dies Tomorrow’) left the series when filming had been completed for the vast majority of its six episodes. Shortly after it was learned that the series was going to have to face big changes and the only explanation we were given were some statements by Tesfaye pointing out that ‘The Idol’ she was getting too feminine a perspective.
A priori, everything seemed to have straightened out, since filming resumed shortly after and the promotional campaign for the series started in July of last year. In fact, HBO’s initial plans were for ‘The Idol’ to be the replacement for ‘The House of the Dragon’ when its first season came to an end. In October we saw some more progress and since then everything has been silent.
Now 13 members of the series’ crew and cast have revealed that the changes led to a nearly-made series being thrown away at a cost that could have reached as much as $75 million for Levinson to completely rewrite and rewrite. roll it Levinson took advantage of having absolute control to raise the amount of sex and nudity to the same level as ‘Euphoria’ or even above what is included in the series starring zendaya.
A member of the series did not hesitate to describe this entire process as “a disasterwhile another claimed that “went from being a satire to those it was satirizing“. That meant that the series became the story of a decadent love with a message so superficial that some members of the team do not hesitate to describe it as something offensive. This is how one of them describes it:
It was like a rape fantasy any toxic man would have on the show and then the woman comes back for more because she makes her music better.
The truth is that there were already problems during filming with Seimetz, but because they handed over the half-finished scripts with the season finale yet to be written. The struggle to shape the series was constant until everything exploded and she left. That pause also meant the departure of several members of the team and the arrival of new members to its cast such as Rachel Sennott, Dan Levy or Hank Azaria.
Everything was even worse afterwards, with a member of the series stating that “I can’t have a job that makes me cry every day because I only have two hours to sleep, and they take me in 100 directions because no one knows what they’re doing or what they want because we don’t know what we’re recording.“. AND another describes Levinson as little short of a divo that he knew that he was going to get everything he wanted if HBO wanted him to do a season 3 of ‘Euphoria’.
Since the scripts were constantly changing, no one is really sure what we will end up seeing in ‘The Idol’, but at the time Scenes were even considered, such as one in which the protagonist put an egg in her vagina and if it fell or broke it, he would refuse to rape her.which sank her and made her end up begging to be raped because she believed that this was something key to her success, something that a worker from the series summarized: “It was like sexual torture porn“.
For his part, lily rose deppdaughter of the unforgettable protagonist of the ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’ saga who gives life to the main character of ‘The Idol’, has not hesitated to point out that Levinson “He is the best director I have ever worked with.” and “I have never felt more supported or respected in a creative space.“. However, the truth is that there were already similar problems during the filming of the second season of ‘Euphoria’, which were denied by HBO, but now it is hard to believe.
now remains to be seen when will we see ‘The Idol’Well, on HBO they continue to promote it for this 2023, but without a specific date, so there are no surprises if it continues to be delayed. Of course, to deny the accusations made in the Rolling Stone article, they have been much faster from the chain:
The initial approach of the series and the production of the first few episodes, unfortunately, did not meet HBO’s standards, so we decided to make a change. Throughout the entire process, the creative team has been committed to creating a work environment that is safe, collaborative and mutually respectful, and last year the team made creative changes that they felt were in the best interest of both production and the cast and crew. We are looking forward to sharing ‘The Idol’ with the public soon.
Even more striking has been The Weeknd’s response releasing a clip from the series that almost seems recorded expressly to respond to Rolling Stone:
.@RollingStone did we upset you? pic.twitter.com/Uyx06lyRgx
— The Weeknd (@theweeknd) March 1, 2023
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