The Weeknd said Tuesday he hopes The Idol will spark a wide range of emotions and reactions when it premieres June 4 on Crave.
At a press conference in Cannes, the Canadian singer said he and Sam Levinson wanted to create “something special, daring, exciting, fun” and to “make people laugh, piss some people off.”
In The Idol, Lily Rose Depp plays a pop star trying to stage a comeback following a mental health crisis who falls for The Weeknd’s character, a charismatic nightlife impresario named Tedros.
The Weeknd told reporters his goal was to make “a dark twisted fairy tale about the music industry and everything I know about it, and heighten it.”
(Asked if he has ever encountered someone like Tedros, The Weeknd replied: “I don’t f**king think so, no. I feel fortunate that I haven’t run into anyone like him. The first thing I can think about is Dracula. He’s Dracula.”)
Even though the show makes a reference to Britney Spears in the first episode, Levinson insisted the six-part series is not based on her.
“We’re not trying to tell a story about any particular pop star,” he said. “We're looking more at how the world perceives a pop star, and the pressure that it puts on that individual. It's a lot of pressure to constantly have to be on, and to have to be what everyone wishes you to be. I also think that it's a lonely life.”
The Idol premieres June 4 on Crave, whose parent company owns this website.