The Business
'Empire's' Danny Strong on Writing Outside His Comfort Zone
When Danny Strong first pitched the idea for Empire, he got the green light right away. But then he actually had to write the show, set in a world he knew little about. He shares how he took the musical soap opera mega-hit from a blank computer screen to the TV screen.
By Kim Masters • • 29m ListenActor, writer and producer Danny Strong is the co-creator of the juggernaut hit Empire, which continued to grow in viewership numbers all the way through to its recent first season finale. Strong tells us about a versatile career that has seen him go from appearing on Buffy the Vampire Slayer to writing the award-winning HBO films Recount and Game Change, to creating a TV melodrama that's broken ratings records.
Photo: Taraji P. Henson as Cookie Lyon and Terrence Howard as Lucious Lyon on Empire, courtesy of Fox
In this episode
2 storiesHollywood News Banter
Matt Belloni, executive editor of the Hollywood Reporter joins Kim Masters to discuss top entertainment news stories of the week.
Read the story8 min'Empire'
Fox's Empire is a modern-day musical melodrama inspired in part by King Lear. The Shakespeare play is even name-checked in the pilot episode, when Terrence Howard as hip-hop mogul Lucious Lyon, pits his three sons against each other in a struggle for the throne. The plot thickens when Lucious's ex-wife Cookie, played by Taraji P.
Read the story19 min
