A few years ago, author Melissa London Hilfers was having lunch with her friend Gail Berman, a TV and film producer. Berman said Fox is considering doing a dramatic series based in the world of country music.
Hilfers shone. She grew up in a large Maryland family, where she liked to jam with friends in the living room, with her father leading the guitar. As she recalled in her recent video interview with her, she had an epiphany. Berman liked the pitch.
Hilfers’ idea has since evolved into a new Fox drama, Monarch, which premieres on Sunday. rice field. The Roman family has clung to their reputation as country music’s first families, leaving a trail of corpses. that awakening. Part of “King Lear,” part of primetime soap his opera, “Monarch,” like Fox’s hip-hop hit “Empire,” is performed by Stetson. Bad behavior competes with messy love at every turn.
Hilfers couldn’t have done it any other way.
“Lies upon lies,” she said. “Murder, sex, betrayal. I love the stuff.
At the top of the Roman family sits patriarch Dottie (Susan Sarandon), an emotionally manipulative superstar whose health is failing. Dottie wants to see her eldest daughter, Nicky (Anna Friel), who is central to the series’ story, inherit the crown. It used to be relegated to shadows, but now it’s ready for a move of power.
Their brother, Luke (Joshua Sasse), runs the Monarch label and sleeps with Gigi’s wife, Kayla (Meagan Holder). Meanwhile, father Alby (played by towering baritone-voiced country star Trace Adkins) drinks whiskey, records classic outlaw country songs for him, threatens his enterprise-minded son, and threatens to kill him or someone close to him. I just want to cover up my murder. He seems to have promised
pause. Take a deep breath.
It’s a busy family and a busy show. “A good page turner,” as Sarandon said in a recent call, or, as the country music veteran explained to Adkins in another conversation, “always need drama.”
“I like zero drama,” he added. His voice sounded a bit like Alby, he would rather just play music. and cock his shotgun. It happens a lot.
Fox found success with ‘Empire,’ which ran from 2015 to 2020. This was an equally soapy vibe, even with a vastly different soundtrack. Created by Lee Daniels and Danny Strong, “Empire” delivered prime-time hip-hop his melodrama and was a consistent ratings winner for the network. With its rough strokes and crime subplot, “Monarch” does something similar to the country. The last primetime country hit “Nashville” (which aired on ABC from 2012 to 2016 and on CMT from 2017 to 2018) plays like kitchen-sink realism by comparison.
Fox has long been considered the leader in music programming, with scripted shows like ‘Empire’ and ‘Glee’ and reality series like ‘American Idol’ and ‘The Masked Singer’. After examining the current state of affairs, including Paramount’s countryized streaming of his hit “Yellowstone,” Fox decided that now was the time to play country.
“Country music audiences are passionate, huge audiences, and the overlap between that audience and Fox’s audience is very important,” said Michael Thorn, Fox Entertainment’s president of entertainment, in a recent call. rice field. “We are very strong in the South, Southeast, Southwest and Central America in terms of connecting with our audiences and where our shows resonate the most.”
A country series had to succeed musically in order to seize the opportunity, and Adkins was a key factor in making that happen. As a member of the most prominent cast with experience in the industry, Adkins is known for his outlaw tradition of artists like Johnny Cash and Merle Haggard, as well as the more pop music that has garnered so much play on the radio in recent years. A bridge between styles.
One “Monarch” subplot finds Alby teaming up with a producer (Damon Dayoub). That means you can hear Adkins growl classics like “Mammas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to be Cowboys” and “Friends in Low Places.”
“When I saw the script, it seemed like something I might be able to contribute in terms of its authenticity,” said Adkins. has been in business for the past 25 years.”
But “Monarch,” a country-style cover version of a recent hit, has also made its mark on the pop charts. These include Ditto’s peppy cover of Lady Gaga’s “Born This Way,” perfect for her up-and-coming gay country her star her character. A duet his version of Harry Styles’ “Watermelon Sugar” is performed by Nicky’s son Ace (Inigo Dominic his Pascual) and his love. Interest, Ana (Emma Milano). The show’s executive music producer Adam Anders, who did the same job on “Glee,” is involved in everything, including choosing songwriters for the series’ original numbers.
Sarandon, whose musical tastes encompass anything she can dance to (Stevie Wonder, LCD Soundsystem), admitted she didn’t know much about the country scene heading into “Monarch.” But playing her Dottie made her willing to learn.
“It’s a lot of fun to play because whenever the characters are mean, they’ll say or do things I wouldn’t dare say or do. It was very engaging,” she said. “Learning so much about that world and working with Trace, whose life-defining experiences were far from mine, was awesome and very educational.”
If there is an eye of the storm in this country, it is Friel’s Nicky. Nicky has waited years to usurp the throne. Now she’s on the other side of her 40s and is feeling the pressure on her as her younger competitors are eyeing her heels. She also has a philandering husband – of course she does – and guilt over the deeds she committed in her first episode.
“Underlying her is anxiety and a great deal of pressure to carry on a legacy she doesn’t quite understand,” Friel said in a video call from her home in Windsor, England, just west of London. “When she was a child, she was always told that was what she had to do. Now she feels the pressure of being a mother and doesn’t think she’s good enough.” Not feeling and torn between continuing a legacy and wanting stardom and success.
Born to an Irish father (folk musician Desi Friel) and an English mother, Friel is one of many non-Americans experimenting with a Texas accent in stories about this seemingly all-American musical genre. is. Sasse, who plays Luke, is from London. Callum Carr, who plays young heartthrob and Nikki’s love interest Wade Stellings, is Scottish. (Adam Crossdell, who doesn’t do well with Nicky’s husband, is English, but so is his personality. He doesn’t have an American accent.)
Country music, as much as we love to wear the American flag, grew primarily from Irish and Scottish immigrants who brought the fiddle to America in the 19th century, and African slaves who brought the banjo. In fact, country music is a melting pot.
That said, accents can still elicit a double take on set.
“It’s kind of strange to hear these Brits taking a break and going out to a craft service in that accent. Then the director says, ‘Action!’ They’re from East Texas,” says Adkins, who’s from Louisiana. “I have no idea how they do that. Awesome.”
“Monarch” was originally scheduled to premiere on January 30, right after the NFC Championship. But Covid-19 invaded the show’s Georgia set just weeks before its debut, halting production. Some episodes were ready, others weren’t. Fox was faced with the decision of whether to release the episodes in separate chunks or wait for their debut.
Now with the premiere on September 11, the first Sunday of the NFL’s regular season, Fox can once again use professional football broadcasts to promote the series.
Fox Entertainment President Thorn said: “Now all episodes are locked and finished, and we were able to create a marketing and launch strategy to take advantage of extra time not normally available on many platforms.”
Fittingly, much of that strategy revolves around music. Streaming services already offer songs from the series, including “A Country Boy Can Survive,” sung by Adkins, and “American Cowgirl,” sung by Friel. More to come.
The creative team of “Monarch” hopes that audiences will come to hear the music, not to mention country couture, and stay with murder, sex and betrayal.
“All of this brings a lot of female audiences who want to fall in love with our sisters, root for Nicki or Gigi or both, and see themselves in the stories and emotions,” Hilfers said. I believe that
“This is the story of a woman facing a crazy family trying to live her dream under every imaginable pressure,” she added. think.”