Empire Takes on Music Industry Ageism, Cookie Shows Her Ass
EntertainmentThe peak moments of last night’s Empire were undoubtedly Cookie’s gif-able ass flash and the surprise cameo in the final scene. But this episode also tackled a very real phenomenon: the dilemma of the aging artist. Enter Courtney Love.
In a shrewd casting choice, Love plays drug-addicted singer Elle Dallas, a vet in the game who’s in danger of being dropped from Empire Records. While Anika thinks her career isn’t worth saving, Cookie’s willing to bring Elle out of the dust of irrelevancy by managing her and overseeing production on her next album. “I won’t sleep until you’re back on the charts,” says Cookie.
At first, there’s pushback from Elle, who requests Hit Boy or Timbaland as collaborators because she only works with top talent. She doesn’t want her career “handed over to an ex-con.” Lucius reminds her that she hasn’t had a hit in ages, which is what we call real talk. How long can one cruise through on legacy? It’s clear from the beginning that Elle could easily be stand-ins for artists like Mariah Carey or Whitney Houston or Toni Braxton. Love herself says she drew from Carey, Houston and Stevie Nicks for the role.
Elle makes a true-to-life statement that the music industry too flippantly discards its older artists, which reminded me of the scene in Knocked Up when Leslie Mann’s character tries to get in the club and the bouncer (Craig Robinson) tells her, “I can’t let you in ’cause you’re old as fuck. For this club, you know, not for the earth.” Labels make this assumption that “selling” an aging pop star is more difficult because they’re too old for this.
It’s tougher when said artist is in denial and clinging to their past self. It turns out that Cookie is the only one who can relate to Elle on an emotional level and chip at the facade because they’re in similar comeback positions. Still, Elle gets antagonist when Cookie visits her at a hotel where Elle’s shooting up with a junkie, a familiar storyline for Love. Elle tells Cookie she’s “been clean for years.”
Cookie’s able to knock sense into her, but once Elle gets in the studio, her voice is shot. (It’s hard not to compare her struggling notes to Houston’s attempted comeback and the Voice that never bounced back.) Elle’s vocals are so bad that the engineer says he can make it work if he splices together separate sessions.