Here's My Take on 'The Idol' (Max Series)

A lot of the daily grind in show business is business - it’s all about branding.

The routine meetings at a major Hollywood packaging agency are typically about building the star’s brand - as manifested in her artistic genre and style, makeup and hair, couture - and especially her public persona. The persona is a crafted thing, a product identity, and may be no closer to the star’s private personality than The Joker is to Joaquin Phoenix (whose private life these days is said to be more about wildlife conservation and veganism).

Be cautioned, but only if you’re squeamish about such things. The Idol includes incidents of brutality, rape, and torture. Although celebrity life stories have at times included all kinds of bad behavior, I’d suggest that the daily business of show business is often downright-dull business.

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Much of the time, these celebrity-management discussions are no more interesting than it would be to decide on a new product label for a bottle of ketchup.

But the products of showbiz must never be boring to their consumers. So a fictionalized insiders’ look at the biz must have the volume control on excitement turned way up.

There’s also—no surprise—lots of skin, mostly the star’s.

The title role of this recent streaming series on Max refers to the rising, twentysomething pop-music star Jocelyn (Lily-Rose Depp). In this story, her previously stunning singing career could quickly tank after a traumatic episode in her personal life has made her cancel a stadium concert and a roadshow. She’s debilitated by the death of her overbearing stage mother and a consequent crisis of confidence.

Into her life comes Tedros (Abel “The Weeknd” Tesfaye), a sleazy nightclub owner with a hustler rap sheet whose own self-confidence is off the charts. He fancies himself a star-maker, and he’s surrounded himself with a posse of truly talented, hungry-wannabe performers, who seem to be both his drug clients and his sex slaves.

So it would seem the stage is being set for an updated Trilby-seduced by-Svengali plot (or Christine and the Phantom). However, the first episode hints at an older, darker archetype. When Jocelyn is being interviewed about her comeback by a reporter from Vanity Fair, the reporter admits that her editor is pressuring her to emphasize a recent scandalous incident. The star shrugs that we must all answer to someone. Which makes the reporter ask whether Jocelyn thinks she’s accountable to anyone. After a moment’s hesitation, she answers, “To God.”

Now it seems the star might secretly have a Bible under her pillow. In a later scene, in the gloom after sundown, the huge electric gate at Jocelyn’s estate opens slowly to reveal the eerily backlit figure of Tedros, dressed in a long, black frock coat, striding menacingly toward us.

The imagery suggests the model for Tedros is not Svengali—but Satan—come to claim Jocelyn’s soul. She is to be, therefore, a latter-day Faust. The Evil One will make her an earthly god—then destroy her in the afterlife.

[Spoilers follow…]

But this exalted theme does not play out—at least, not in the five episodes of Season One. Tedros does indeed coax her to perform with more passion and virtuosity. As she reaches a new level of artistry, we assume she has become his slave in exchange. She is obviously his willing partner in intimacy. He seems brutal, but we can tell she likes it rough.

Then, twist upon twist, and all in Episode Five: She dumps Tedros, marches onto the concert stage at the 70,000-seat SoFi Stadium, and then—deus-ex-machina in reverse—she publicly takes him back. She has the power now. Professionally, at least, her evil master has become her slave.

Reviews of the series have been mixed, many of them negative. Admittedly, the story is dotted with gaps in logic. Jocelyn’s character at first seems weak-willed and easily manipulated, then it’s suggested she’s been playing Tedros all along, for which there is almost no setup. On the contrary, throughout the first four episodes, her managers and backers seem to be jerking her around, fine-tuning her branding and continually repositioning her for maximum consumer appeal and commercial success. Eventually, those pros think they’ve outfoxed Tedros, then, just before fadeout, we’re made to think Jocelyn has prevailed against them all.

In the end, in fiction as well as in the real business of show business, anyone who can sell out stadiums and hit the top of the charts with her albums will get everything her own way.

But will she answer to God?

Yes, at least in her speech when she holds a Grammy.

FREE Kindle ebook today (July 30, 2023) on Amazon.

My romantic comedy Mick & Moira & Brad tells the story of an ambitious young woman’s rise to stardom, but there the similarity to The Idol ends.

Click the player to hear me read the first chapter of Mick & Moira & Brad.

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