Lee Daniels Reflects on Making ‘Empire’: ‘Absolutely the Worst Experience’
Lee Daniels’ TV series Empire ran for six seasons on Fox, but the director has confirmed that the behind-the-scenes process wasn’t his favorite. In a new interview with The Film Stage, Daniels confirmed he “only did Empire just so I could see what that experience was like.”
As it turned out, it wasn’t great, with Daniels describing the making of Empire as “horrible.” He added, “Absolutely the worst experience. Horrible! But guess what? Fucking that money, money, money! I was able to put my kids through college and shit. So that in itself was worth it.”
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The show, which Daniels created with Danny Strong, premiered in 2015 and starred Terrence Howard as hip-hop mogul Lucious Lyon. The final season was shut down by the Covid pandemic and over the years the series encountered several obstacles, including the removal of Jussie Smollett from the show and accusations of plagiarism.
Daniels explained that he was interested in working for bigger studios after spending years making independent films. “When I got into television, I really just wanted to be able to answer to suits,” he said. “I wanted to know what that experience was like. All of my friends, they get notes and shit. And I’m like, ‘What is that like?!’ You know what I mean? Because every film of mine had been independent. All of my shit is independent.”
He added, “You know, my first movie was developed with drug money. Monster’s Ball. We won the first Black woman an Oscar. Every one of my films has been independently financed where I’m able to do my thing and nobody is in my head.”
The filmmaker has previously spoken about his frustrations working on Empire. After the show was canceled, Daniels told Vulture that he was called into HR “around the time of the whole Harvey Weinstein thing.”
“I think they said, ‘You can’t look people in the eyes too long. Be careful with touching,'” he recalled. “These are all things that I do in my room when I work. And then they said, ‘And you can’t say the N-word.’ I was shook. It led to a bigger conversation of me being afraid to be me on the set and how I make my movies. I said, ‘I can’t have this conversation. I need to know who I can call on you. Because you have me triggered. You’re not going to play these games with me.'”
Daniels’ new film, The Deliverance, is on Netflix now. The movie is a horror film about family living in Indiana who discover strange, demonic occurrences that convince them their house is a portal to hell. Andra Day plays a single mom named Ebony, while Glenn Close co-stars as her mom and Mo’Nique plays a social worker. The cast also includes Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor, Omar Epps, and Caleb McLaughlin.
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