Lee Daniels: ‘I wanted white people to feel good about being white’

Jan 5, 2017

Lee Daniels wants to explore race in a “new way” with his upcoming series, “STAR,” but his new way is probably not what you think.

“I really want to explore race in a way that we haven’t seen it before on a network series,” he told EBONY.com’s LaToya Cross.

In “STAR,” Daniels brings a white girl into a black environment, and he wants to examine race through that lens.

–Lee Daniels to actors of color: ‘Stop complaining and do the work’–

“We are in a very dangerous state right now in our country and I wanted White people to feel good about being White because right now, there’s a lot of hatred going on,” Daniels said.

He then went on to explain the origin of his idea: “It started out with this white girl that was just badass and would do anything: kill, rob, have sex, whatever to get to the top. Then, I realized as I was writing, that it was more about a girl group. Their whole world is about what happened to me when I left home and went to Hollywood and the struggles I went through. ”

Daniel said that he wanted to shake up the television world with this show: “I think we’ve gotten too politically correct with primetime. We’re just not in your face anymore. You can go to cable for that.”

“STAR” aired Wednesday night at 9/8C on Fox.