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“Who among us has not had cum on their face?” So asks indie darling Jane Adams (star of She Dies Tomorrow, directed by her close friend Amy Seimetz) in the opening episode of The Idol, the latest ode to excess from Euphoria's Sam Levinson. She steals many of the pilot episode's early scenes, reeling off such outrageous one-liners to a celebrity entourage played by Hank Azaria, Da’Vine Joy Randolph, Dan Levy, Hari Nef, and Rachel Sennott. They trip over each other in satirical farce — not dissimilar to the executive chorus of Succession — forced to deal with a semen-soaked scandal involving pop star Jocelyn (Lily-Rose Depp).
No doubt Adams signed her contract, along with other cast members, when Seimetz was set to direct the series – a takedown of LA toxic masculinity in the music industry. Seimetz had reportedly filmed 80% of The Idol before exiting and being replaced by Sam Levinson. It sets the mind racing as to how much has been kept from Seimetz’s version, which may explain the tonal shift from light comedy to light bondage.
Depp looks like Meryl Streep next to Tesfaye’s derisible limpness.
According to Abel 'The Weeknd' Tesfaye, Seimetz was “leaning too much into a female perspective.” Well, that’s certainly not an issue with the version Levinson and Tesfaye have concocted together. At the end of the first episode, pop star Jocelyn has no perspective at all, her eyes covered as her new lover Tedros (Tesfaye) asphyxiates her with a robe. There’s an uncomfortable lack of communication involved, but Jocelyn appears to be consenting – when her assistant Leila (Sennott) expresses concern that Tedros is “so rapey”, Joceyln responds, “Yeah, I kinda like that about him.” As we see when Jocelyn masturbates with an ice cube and chokes herself, this is (at least, in the writers’ minds) what women want.
By contrast to the anti-woke antics around her, Depp sits in repose, smoking more Vogues than she pulls facial expressions. And she looks like Meryl Streep next to Tesfaye’s derisible limpness. Whatever it was that Seimetz was setting out to critique with The Idol, this is probably it.