Time for the remix. Jocelyn (Lily-Rose Depp) has gathered her team poolside so that they can hear the new version of her upcoming single, “World Class Sinner / I’m A Freak”, which she worked on with local club sleaze bag and likely cult leader Tedros (Abel Tesfaye). (You can listen to that song on Spotify right now, where it has 1,100,000 streams.) Loud-mouthed handler Nikki (Jane Adams) hates this new effort, heavily edited with sexy breaths, and berates Jocelyn and finally demands that she “appear grateful”. Any tension is punctured by exposition about Jocelyn’s mother and the pop star’s breakdown, through which Nikki claims to have guided the aspiring musician. Everyone else stays silent. In the background, her assistant Leia (Rachel Sennott, still great) bites her nails.
Later, all alone, Jocelyn is reliving her experiences with Tedros from last week, playing with her music and ice cubes. On a phone call, he’s surprised that she played her team their new song. Maybe she needs a new team. Meanwhile, Tedros’ assistant/employee (it is hard to define anyone’s relationship, and The Idol is the better for it) Izaak (Moses Sumney) is chatting Leia up. Their plan, bleakly nefarious, is slotting into place. In a later cutaway scene, Tedros appears to be giving Izaak thrusting lessons via electrical shocks, which, uh, sure!
That day as come for Jocelyn to film the music video for her new song. Who says that particularly art form is dead? Well, everyone might after this shoot, which starts badly and only plummets. Creative director Xander (Troye Sivan) has arranged the set, though the sight of scantily-clad men gives Jocelyn pause for thought. “It’s ironic in a way that fans can’t really understand,” she says, including this writer who cannot quite find any irony in the set design. It’s too late anyway: she approved it all before.
The entire sequence is pleasingly frenetic, as Jocelyn struggles to nail a right take and her entourage provide a bitchy chorus moment. Destiny (Da’Vine Joy Randolph) spills to Jocelyn’s manager Chaim (Hank Azaria) that Tedros (whose surname is also… Tedros) is from Hawaii and owes a bunch of people money. Other worrying revelations: Jocelyn has cuts on her thighs. Vanity Fair journalist Talia (Hari Nef) continues her streak of great access by acting as therapist to the various hangers-on. Is Xander creatively fulfilled? (No, but he loves Jocelyn.) Will she go easy on Jocelyn in this profile? (Sure! Jocelyn is a human!). What the show does best is to highlight that none of these people seem particularly good at getting results. When things do go right, and Jocelyn murders a take, the camera malfunctions.
Jocelyn, broken by that final take, crumbles onstage, calling out for her dead mother. With her cut feet and injured thighs, it’s an uncomfortable sight, though one you can imagine taking place somewhere in Los Angeles, in part because Depp sells the Britney vulnerability so well. Finally, they call it a day, though Nikki organises some behind-the-scenes shenanigans with dancer extraordinaire Dyanne (Blackpink’s Jennie Kim, who we later learn is in cahoots with Tedros).
The next morning, Chaim has some real talk with Jocelyn about her bills (he is covering half her mortgage) and the urgency to release “commercial music”. His tough love – praising her “gift” while also telling her to get a grip – is one of the better written relationships here. But what Jocelyn really wants to do is call Tedros up and invite him to come over. Which he does, with Izaak and mystery, airy-fairy blonde Chloe (Suzanna Son, brilliant) in tow.
Their group-hang is paint-by-numbers sordid: naked swimming, cocaine in the living room. In a poolside chat, Tedros aims to restore Jocelyn’s confidence, gesturing at the mansion (the Bel Air pad actually belongs to Tesfaye) and telling her how it all depends on her. “You’ve been a star your whole fucking life,” Tedros tells her. “You’re going to forget how to do that now?” The jury is out on Tesfaye’s acting, but in truth, you only need to believe that Jocelyn would fall for it, and in some of these quieter moments, there is a possibility you might. In another bed, Izaak lays it on thick with Leia, though she questions him on some of Tedros’ mysteries: He’s a manager? He has his own label? How does he seduce so many women?
Okay, she doesn’t ask that, but it’s what you’ll be thinking the next scene, in which Tedros gives Jocelyn orders as she writhes naked on her bed. In an unseen corner, Chloe watches. Lying in bed later, Tedros has a proposition: it would simply be easier if he moved in so they could create music together. Jocelyn is very down for that, almost as down as she is for Chloe’s piano singalong, which closes out this episode.
The double fantasy that gives this episode its name could refer to many things: the symmetry between Jocelyn and Chloe, or even the dual-seduction of Jocelyn and Leia, or perhaps just the fantasy of Jocelyn herself: mega pop star with a McMansion? Or burnt-out pop star with a crippling mortgage? But it might resonate with viewers, both drawn to this show and repulsed by it in equal measure, and not entirely sure if any of that is intentional.
‘The Idol’ is available to watch on Sky Atlantic and NOW
Henry Wong is a senior culture writer at Esquire, working across digital and print. He covers film, television, books, and art for the magazine, and also writes profiles.
