The Idol Is Just A Prestige Television Remake Of Tommy Wiseau's The Room
In television's long and storied history of pumping out oversexed content for audiences, no series has tried so desperately to hide behind the thin veil of creative transgression as "The Idol."
"I'm loving it," said co-creator Abel "The Weeknd" Tesfaye to GQ, regarding the show's abysmal reception from critics and viewers alike. He continued, "We knew we were making something dark and controversial but true to what we want to say." At a press conference for the series, Tesfaye's creative partner Sam Levinson (who is behind the HBO hit "Euphoria") opined "Sometimes, things that might be revolutionary are taken too far."
As far as marketing strategies go, "The Idol" is transparent: dismiss detractors as cultural luddites while aligning yourself and your product with some vague, "pure" artistic movement. In between self-satisfied insistences about how real and transgressive "The Idol" apparently is, Tesfaye regularly defends the show's awkward sexual imagery, forgettable music, and dreadful pacing by comparing their work on the show to that of Brian De Palma, Prince, Pink Floyd, David Bowie, and of course, "Basic Instinct" director Paul Verhoeven. It often feels as though he believes that those who don't appreciate "The Idol" have yet to truly appreciate any of the influences it claims.
In reality, neither Verhoeven nor De Palma nor Bowie are true counterparts to "The Idol." If Tesfaye and Levinson truly want to name an artist whose most prominent work they've earned a comparison to, there should be only one name on their lips — Tommy Wiseau.
Let's remember what The Room is actually about, and consider it next to The Idol
Despite being perhaps more mystery than man, Tommy Wiseau needs little introduction. Known for his unique yet unplaceable accent and vampiric sense of style, Wiseau attempted to force his way into the film industry by writing, producing, directing, and starring in an ambitious, self-funded $6 million romantic drama called "The Room." Despite being critically panned and regarded as one of the worst films ever made, it holds unparalleled cult status for its unintentional comedic value and chaotic production.
Though it's likely you've at least seen clips of the film online or perhaps the star-studded James Franco biopic, "The Disaster Artist," you'd be forgiven for not remembering the specifics of its ... well, complicated plot. The main story follows Johnny (Wiseau), an infallibly generous man with a promising career, a passionate love life, and a circle of loyal friends. His near-perfect life begins to unravel, tragically, when his misanthropic fiancee Lisa (Juliette Danielle) begins having an affair with his best friend Mark (Wiseau's real-life best friend and former roommate, Greg Sestero).
Now, we hear you — this brief synopsis shares little in common with Jocelyn's (Lily-Rose Depp) tale of trauma and stardom. But it's not the plots of "The Room" and "The Idol" that make these two projects mirror one another. Instead, it's in their examinations of sex, relationships, and human behavior that "The Idol" and "The Room" are bizarrely identical.
In both The Room and The Idol, sexuality is survival
As a bunch of pseudointellectuals misattributing a quote to Oscar Wilde once said, "Everything in life is about sex, except sex — sex is about power." As a maxim, it's too reductive to be practical, but as a narrative philosophy, it defines the worlds of "The Idol" and "The Room."
For all her wealth, talent, and resources, Jocelyn seems to feel immediately trapped by the paradox that is her commodified sexuality. Her industry handlers aim to sexualize everything about her — from her music to her mental health struggles — while stifling any personal, natural expression of sexuality from Jocelyn herself. This dynamic is actually depicted quite effectively in the show's first major conflict: when an explicit photo of the star is leaked online, her team seems less worried about the non-consensual dissemination of intimate material than they are about their product's damaged image. In many moments, they even seem to be furious with her for taking the photo in the first place.
However, while this sequence deftly depicts the sexless sexualization forced upon most young female music stars in order for them to achieve mainstream success, it doesn't take long for the broad edge of "The Idol" to lay waste to whatever goodwill it earned. Just after the establishment of this storyline, a subplot emerges which sees manager Chaim (Hank Azaria) lock an intimacy director in a bathroom when they refuse to let Jocelyn show her breasts during a photoshoot per a previously negotiated nudity rider. From the way the scene is staged, performed, and written, it seems as though Levinson and Tesfaye believe these relatively new and entirely well-meaning additions to the entertainment industry deserve the same ire directed toward exploitative businesspeople and online creeps. They're all just obstacles in Jocelyn's vague journey for sexual liberation.
Johnny and Jocelyn represent trite sexual norms
In the same way, no amount of personal success can save "The Room" protagonist Johnny from his lack of sexual self-determination. Everything that once made his life fulfilling — his work, his friends, his fiancée — comes so easily undone once Lisa begins sleeping with Mark. Despite leading an unrealistically decent life, he is in large part brought down by someone with no agency in any realm but the sexual: Lisa is depicted as being unhappy, lonely, and essentially dependent on Johnny for everything but physical intimacy.
In their own ways, Johnny and Jocelyn are both testaments to how empty one's life can apparently become without a self-determined sexual identity. By placing them at the center of their respective universes, everything in "The Idol" and "The Room" revolves predictably around obvious, well-established sexual politics tropes. Making the artistic statement that women hold all the power in the bedroom is about as transgressive as stating that they're easily manipulated by older, confident men. Both tropes ring as dull at best, and lazily sexist at worst — though at least "The Room," unlike "The Idol," doesn't attempt to cultivate a feminist patina to excuse itself. Meanwhile, it's notable how both Levinson and Wiseau, in their roles as directors, show an equal amount of imagination when it comes to emphasizing sexuality: their creative strategies essentially boil down to the inclusion of excruciatingly long sex scenes accompanied by vapid, ponderous music.
It's genuinely a shame how close "The Idol" specifically comes to saying something at least coherent — and even potentially interesting — about sexuality in the music industry before the ham-fisted introduction of Tedros' (Tesfaye) hackneyed conspiracy plot. Then again, if it weren't for such a traitorous storyline, "The Idol" wouldn't be able to pay tribute to "The Room" in another way.
The Room's theme of betrayal makes Tommy Wiseau the real star (& in a more raw, realer sense than The Idol)
Though Lisa's infidelity is the catalyst for Johnny's emotional downward spiral, its Mark's betrayal that ultimately drives him over the edge — as the character says himself close to the film's tragic climax, "Everybody betrayed me! I'm fed up with this world!" Witnessing this scene, even in the context of the story, it's unintentionally hilarious. For it to hold anything close to the dramatic weight that Wiseau desired, one must look past the film itself to the man behind the camera.
It's generally theorized and accepted that Wiseau drew deeply from his own life experience while writing "The Room." While lines of dialogue applauding Johnny for his selflessness certainly read... optimistic, his engagements with trust and betrayal feel strangely raw. In the forward to the original screenplay, Wiseau is particularly preoccupied with those subjects, writing, "Human behavior and betrayal applies to all of us. It exists within ourselves. You love somebody. Do you? What is love? You think you have everything, but you don't have anything."
It may not be the most relatable sentiment, but it's hard to call it dishonest. As a reflection of Wiseau's views on human behavior, "The Room" states that we can ultimately trust no one — not even our best friends. As he wails about being "fed up with this world," what sympathy one gathers from the scene isn't found within Johnny, but the man who felt so hurt he forced Johnny into existence.
In this way, "The Room" comes as close as it can to being accepted as a dramatic tragedy, if only by communicating a very singular, painful perspective that seems viscerally real to the person trying to communicate it. The same is almost true for "The Idol." Almost.
Is The Idol an equally honest exploration of betrayal from Tesfaye's perspective, or does The Room do it better?
"It's almost educational, that this is what comes with being incredibly famous," Tesfaye mused about the nature of betrayal in "The Idol" to Variety. "You're surrounded by people who you're not sure what their true intentions are, even if it seems like they're good. You just never know."
With this statement in mind, "The Idol" makes a strange sort of sense — at least momentarily. Even without reading the quote, it would be natural for viewers to assume that similar, Wiseau-style autobiographical aspects would appear in "The Idol." After all, Tesfaye (like Wiseau) wore every hat possible during production, serving as co-creator, story writer, executive producer, and musical contributor. Even subconsciously, parts of him are sure to be present in the series — why not in one of its most central dramatic ideas?
Keeping this stubbornly in mind — that "The Idol" is at the very least a vulnerable statement about one artist's singular experience with the music industry — the show can at least be sympathetic. Strange instances like when the voice of The Weeknd croons about having been manipulated while his character manipulates Jocelyn can seem intentional instead of awkward or distractingly vain. This changes when you read the second half of his Variety quote: "But of course, I've been very fortunate to have people around me that I've known almost my entire life, which is important, and is a gift."
Taking this statement as fact, it's hard to see anything vulnerable about "The Idol." Whatever experiences Tesfaye is sourcing for his contrived plotting — real or imagined — they certainly aren't his own. Thus, it's hard to find sympathy for anyone in "The Idol" — certainly not the duo who forced it into existence.
The Idol struggles with what Tommy Wiseau achieved in The Room on accident
In one episode of "The Idol," Tedros and Jocelyn have a tense conversation about the idea of "the right risk" — a term used to describe an artistic endeavor that, despite being fairly safe and overly calculated, is presented to consumers as something risky.
Despite their many similarities, thematic and otherwise (we don't even have time to delve into their joint cliche fetishizing of red dresses, or the vampire symbolism used for both Tedros and Johnny), it's admittedly unfair to compare "The Idol" and "The Room." One is a deeply misguided yet undeniably passionate vanity project; the other is a cynical product. The only thing their conceptions share is desperation.
In the weeks leading up to the global release of "The Idol" (and in the wake of its critically panned festival premiere), an article from Rolling Stone magazine reported based on over a dozen inside sources that production on the series was plagued by grossly mishandled sex scenes and a disturbing creative shift once Levinson stepped in as director (allegedly to reverse the early drafts' fixation on the "female perspective"). HBO, Depp, Levinson, and Tesfaye deny any issues during production. When Levinson specifically heard the contents of the article, he claims proudly that his reaction was: "'I think we're about to have the biggest show of the summer.'"
Apparently, he'd hoped edginess alone would create enough buzz to make "The Idol" a critic-proof hit. Unfortunately, audiences are still the most decisive critics of all — viewership has only continued to hemorrhage since the premiere. The spectacle of controversy is no longer enough, if it ever was. Especially when Levinson and Tesfaye are overworking themselves merely to recreate what Tommy Wiseau accomplished through passion alone.