Is there a Euphoria crossover in The Idol?
It's a cameo that barely lasts even a few seconds, but the questions it leaves will keep us occupied for hours. Firstly, is this actually Maddy Perez? Taking into account what Levinson has said, we could reasonably assume so. While it wouldn't be out of the question to assume Maddy has enough confidence to get her into an exclusive club, how does she know what we're led to believe is one of the biggest pop stars in the world and her entourage? The Idol is basically just Euphoria with more publicists, and while LA will have you rubbing shoulders with the big-screen icons at your locals Starbucks, it's a bit of a head-scratcher to assume a regular high schooler is randomly best mates with Hollywood elite and has somehow never come up before.
Another strange connection between The Idol and Euphoria, bar their shared creator and penchant for full-frontal nudity, is Sharon Stone.
In Euphoria, Maddy molds her life around Stone's role of Ginger McKenna in Casino, and her ability to play with men in order to get the kind of life of luxury she wants. Even with abuse between McKenna and her boyfriend Sam Rothstein (Robert De Niro), which mimics her own relationship with Nate (Jacob Elordi), Maddy holds Stone's McKenna up as an idol (hey, just like the name of the other show!).
In The Idol, just before a scene that involves Tedros choking Jocelyn with a silk scarf as some kind of vocal teaching exercise, Jocelyn and Leia are sitting at home watching Basic Instinct. In a shot that lingers just a little bit too long, as if to say, “Hey, look here!” Stone's femme fatale Catherine and Michael Douglas's detective Nick are shown onscreen. Catherine says, “He falls for the wrong woman,” and Nick replies, “What happens to him?” Catherine answers, “She kills him.”
If the rest of the first episode of The Idol is anything to go by, there's nothing covert about Tesfaye’s and Levinson's laboring in this scene. Subtlety isn't really the name of the game here; in fact, it's frequently abandoned in favor of us being hit over the head with a hammer emblazoned with subtext. For example, when Jocelyn is dancing with Tedros, someone who we'll come to understand is a cult leader of sorts, Madonna's “Like a Prayer” plays.
As a referential filmmaker, maybe Levinson just loves using Sharon Stone as an Easter egg in his projects. However, it's more fun to suppose that perhaps Stone is a sort of all-seeing eye that arcs over his narratives. If Casino and McKenna and Rothstein's relationship is a mirror for Maddy and Nate's implosion, then what can we gather from Basic Instinct? If The Idol ends with Jocelyn and a female lover plotting to kill Tedros, maybe it will all be worth it.
This article first appeared on British GQ.
