Ilene Chaiken runs 'Empire' while co-creator Lee Daniels develops his next music-related show for Fox, "Star"; the SxSW Interactive Conference is getting heat for canceling two sessions related to sexism in the gaming industry; the Hammer Museum will benefit from UCLA's purchase of the Occidental Petroleum building.
Ilene Chaiken on what it's like running the hit show 'Empire'
The Fox show “Empire” follows hip hop mogul Lucious Lyon and his family’s rise in the music industry. And if you’re one of the very few who hasn’t seen the show, it’s basically a soap opera in which everyone is backstabbing each other, but looking extremely fashionable doing it.
The show, created by Lee Daniels and Danny Strong, has become a huge hit for Fox. The season one finale attracted more than 17 million viewers and became one of the most watched television shows of this year.
Reviewers and fans have praised the show for tackling issues of race, gender and sexuality on a massive platform like primetime TV, but the show has also received some backlash for its subject matter as well.
“Empire” is now in its second season. Show-runner Ilene Chaiken — who previously created and directed “The L Word” on Showtime — talks with The Frame's John Horn about what exactly a show-runner does, having that role in a heavily male dominated industry and the beef that rapper 50 Cent has with "Empire."
INTERVIEW HIGHLIGHTS
If people are unfamiliar with the business of making television, what do you think they would be most surprised by in terms of what a show-runner actually does?
I think they would be most surprised by how many pies a show-runner has her hand in. We are responsible for the stories. That means conceiving of the stories and getting the scripts written, which is a lengthy and painstaking process. On a show like "Empire," there's also the music.
There's meeting with the music teams, making sure that we're getting the music produced that we need in the show, making sure that it's getting done in a timely way because all of the music on the show is original, which means we have to get out ahead of it. We have to say, In this episode, these three artists are going to be performing. This is what the song is gonna be about or the role it's going to play in our storytelling.
Then there's the responsibility of hiring the directors, making sure that each director — many of whom are guests on the show who don't know the show the way that we do — really understand what we do. The numerous meetings throughout the week that have to do with production ... I'm talking fast because there's so much involved that you almost have to talk fast or we would be doing a three-week interview.
How much, as a woman, has the industry changed in terms of your ability to have positions of authority and to become show-runners?
A lot and not nearly enough.
Say more about that.
I don't know what the statistics are, but I know that the statistics in our business overall are still poor. With regard to representation of women — both in front of and behind the cameras — [there are] still very few women show-runners, relatively speaking, and even fewer creators of shows. Probably the number of women on writing staffs is shamefully poor.
I make an effort to always have a lot of women and a lot of people of color on any project that I work on. It's even harder to find women directors to direct episodes of television. There are relatively few and it's an incredible uphill battle because you then have to defy all kinds of rules because you have to say, I'm going to break a new director. I'm going to hire somebody who hasn't done it before. And that's scary to the studios and networks for understandable reasons, because they need people who can deliver shows, who are going to do work, who are going to come on time. So you have to really be willing to advocate in order to change the status quo.
"Empire" sparks a huge conversation on social media. Are you guys aware of those conversations and do they affect the way that you approach and talk about the show? Even very recently, the rapper 50 Cent mocked the show, saying that the decline in ratings was because of all the "gay stuff" on the show.
We're very aware of the conversation on social media. All the writers live-Tweet every week, many of the cast do as well, and we love it. We relish the conversation, both the good and the bad, the outrageous, the outraged. That's what makes it fun and it's what lets you know that you're doing something that actually is having an affect.
So the fact that 50 Cent says what he says is positive, or do you think it's actually bad?
I don't think it's either. I think 50 Cent is welcome to say whatever he wants and whatever he thinks, and we just take it all in.
“Empire” airs Wednesday nights on Fox.
Lee Daniels hints at an untold personal story in his new show, 'Star'
“Empire" has slipped slightly in the ratings from last year, but it’s still a powerhouse — so much so that Fox has given the green light to another music-related series from "Empire" co-creator Lee Daniels.
The Frame's John Horn recently spoke with Daniels at the Middleburg Film Festival about the inspiration behind his new music-themed show, “Star,” and if it follows the storyline of "Empire."
INTERVIEW HIGHLIGHTS:
Well, it doesn't follow "Empire" at all, ironically — that's weird. But it comes from my sisters singing on the stoop, watching uncles sing doo-wop on the corner. You know, The Temptations, The Supremes, a little bit of "Dreamgirls," a little bit of TLC, a little bit of that documentary that was about the backup singers.
So, it's a little bit of all of that, but it's about girls that are struggling and it's about survival — what it takes to get to the top. And then when you reach the pinnacle of Mount Everest, then what? Are you soulless? What's left of you?
You always put a little bit of yourself in the stories you're telling. Is there a little bit of Lee Daniels in "Star?"
Oh yeah. There's a whole lot of bit of Lee Daniels in "Star." You know, I've talked about most of my life through my work, but I haven't talked about when I first landed in Hollywood and what happened. They know that I had that nursing agency and everything, but what happened before I had that nursing agency? [laughs]
What did happen before that nursing agency?
You'll find out in "Star." You'll find out through Star's character.
'An avoidable mess': Gamergate target Brianna Wu on SxSW cancellations
The South By Southwest Interactive conference in Austin is where gamers, tech innovators and journalists convene to talk about big ideas and, of course, socialize.
It takes place in March alongside the South by Southwest music and film festivals, so it gets a lot of attention. But now it’s getting a lot of heat.
The conference has just canceled two panels that would have addressed what’s come to be known as Gamergate — a movement that concerns sexism and progressivism in video game culture. The cancellations were due to what organizers called “numerous threats of on-site violence.”
The canceled panels include SavePoint: A Discussion on the Gaming Community, which was viewed as pro-Gamergate, and Level Up: Overcoming Harassment in Games, viewed as anti-Gamergate. It's important to note that neither panel explicitly mentions Gamergate in their descriptions, but panelists on both sides have ties to the issue. (You can read their responses to the cancellation here,
and
.)
In response, both Buzzfeed and Vox have threatened to pull out of the conference if the panels are not reinstated.
The decision to cancel the panels ignited a firestorm of criticism, with several panelists saying that the conference buckled under the same kind of trolling threats that women are often subjected to online.
South by Southwest organizers did not respond to our request for comment.
To talk more about the controversy we called Brianna Wu, a software engineer and head of development at game developer Giant Spacekat. She has been a prominent target of violent Gamergate threats.
Interview Highlights:
The Frame: What did you think about SxSW's decision to cancel these panels?
It's a mess. What I think is most frustrating is it is such an avoidable mess. We have been working with them in back channels for months, out of the public eye, trying to basically make SxSW a venue where we can talk about harassment. And from the beginning, all of us involved were trying to get harassment of women in tech as a topic in SxSW. We've been tremendously frustrated working with the organizers to make this happen.
Let's step back for a minute. For people who don't know what Gamergate is and what the threats have been like online against women, can you explain broadly what the issues are?
Sure. Gamergate is a criminal operation to harass women. [I've received] over 180 death threats. There are some men that are very threatened by the fact that women play games nowadays. And because of that, video games are changing. We're trying to move away from these hyper-sexualized depictions of women. We're trying to have a few more women heroes. For reasons that are very mysterious to me, this is very threatening to a certain group of gamers, and they react in violent, illegal ways. Literally threatening any woman that speaks up.
In your case they actually sent out your home address?
They did. They told me they were going to murder my entire family, threatened some very specific violence against my husband. It was so bad they actually made a "Law & Order" episode about those threats. So it's hard to overstate just how much emotional damage Gamergate has caused to the women that develop video games. It's been a very frightening place for women to work this year.
The concern from the SxSW perspective seems to be safety. They say there have been threats and I'm sure there have been. What is the nature of the threats and what can the festival do to protect the people who are at the panel?
This is what's very confusing to me. I've gone and spoken at conventions all over the world this year, some of them much much smaller than SxSW. There have been bomb threats or threats to me as a person at those panels. What they've ended up doing is just providing security and sweeping the venue for bombs before it's started. I've never had anyone just cancel a panel because of these threats. So their decision to do this is very strange to me.
I actually get the sense that what they're trying to do is step out of this situation altogether. And they're so invested in being neutral that they're choosing to not give women a voice ... What is really troubling to me is the larger message that SxSW is sending. So, from now on, Gamergate has a message: If they threaten enough violence against a venue where a woman is speaking, now they have a precedent for nobody getting to speak whatsoever. So SxSW is choosing to deal with women getting harassment by silencing women [who are] getting harassment, which is a terrible precedent.
Today, Buzzfeed said they are uncomfortable covering SxSW if this action continues. I've announced on Twitter that I'm uncomfortable attending SxSW if they don't reverse their decision. I'm just really shocked by how badly this has been handled.