“This is not a work of fiction. Any similarity to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events, is intentional.” The first words plastered across the screen in Amazon Prime’s new satirical thriller series from Donald Glover and Janine Nabers are just as fearlessly uninhibited as the modern fan culture that Swarm places under a microscope. The parasocial relationship between fan and star has never seen an indictment of this caliber in media. Swarm‘s take on the phenomenon is just as critical as it is captivating, and every moment is delicately crafted with specific intent. It would be understandable if the news of Billie Eilish‘s inclusion was met with hesitation, with the success of singer-to-actor stints varying so widely over the years, but trust that the choices of Glover and Nabers are made with a clear vision. It’s fair to be weary of stunt casting, but this is so much more than that. By the time Swarm reaches its fourth episode, it has well-earned the right to pull any stunt it pleases. Enter Billie Eilish, making for a brilliant meta moment.
What is ‘Swarm’?
Swarm follows Andrea “Dre” Greene (Dominique Fishback) during her lonely, trauma-fueled journey to find her place in a passion-driven world. Her outright obsession and borderline worship of pop star Ni’Jah (Nirine S. Brown) have set her off on an odyssey of carnage that seemingly no force can obstruct. Ni’Jah, glaringly evoking the aesthetic and status of Beyoncé, boasts a sea of cutthroat followers known as “The Swarm” — much like the “Bey Hive,” the moniker of Beyoncé’s fan base. As Dre walks along her uncertain path, no transgression demands swifter punishment than an insult, or even a snide remark, toward Ni’Jah. By the time Billie Eilish arrives midway through the season, not even her beaming, gentle charm can settle the buzz of violence within Dre.
Billie Eilish: Stage to Screen
The singer-songwriter superstar, born Billie Eilish Pirate Baird O’Connell, grew up in Los Angeles, California. She began writing songs at 13 years old, with her brother and collaborator Finneas, and in only a few short years has grown from a homeschooled talent to a worldwide mega-icon. With multiple Billboard Top 10 hits, seven Grammy wins, and an Academy Award for Best Original Song under her belt, Eilish has garnered a passionate, loyal following. Idolizing Eilish for her relatable candor surrounding her music, style, body image, and relationships, the self-titled “Billie Eilish Army” projects a level of devotion not entirely dissimilar to Swarm‘s Ni’Jah, sans the violent dramatization.
In January 2023, Billie Eilish: Live at the O2 hit theaters across the world for a limited one-day event. Billed as an immersive concert experience, showcasing the entire performance of Eilish’s “Happier Than Ever Tour” at London’s O2 Arena, the screening sold out cinemas all over. At face value, it wasn’t a wholly original stint; organizations like Fathom Events have been putting on concert screenings for years. However, with Live at the O2, theaters were hit with a brand-new kind of beast. Social media was quickly hit with firsthand accounts of attendees’ experiences. Instagram, Twitter, and especially TikTok saw a widely mixed array of differing viewpoints, with a viral majority conveying a chaotic, unhinged environment. The performance itself: high caliber bravado, skillfully shot and brimming with life, but the social feeds told tales of young fans rushing toward the screens, screaming over the sound systems, and forming makeshift adolescent mosh-pits. In some cases, cinema staff paused the show to issue warnings or even ended screenings altogether. Case studies could be made (or at the very least a docuseries) dissecting the event as a rare breed of 21st-century entertainment. Nevertheless, it can actually serve as a prime example of why Swarm made the right call.
Why Eilish Was the Right Choice
Stunt casting is when a production takes a player from one industry (usually a widely-known star) and casts them in another. It comes in many forms — the Broadway musical Chicago is notorious for hiring anyone from reality television stars to game show hosts for its long-running New York production. Sometimes an “influencer” of social media fame scores a Netflix gig and audiences can’t help but wince, and sometimes Olivia Colman closes her acceptance speech at the Academy Awards by marveling with admiration that she’d been nominated alongside Lady Gaga.
With Swarm, you could call it stunt casting to place Billie Eilish in the role of Eva, the soft-spoken leader of a women’s empowerment cult, but you could also call it the first of surely many opportunities for Eilish spread her wide wings of talent. Her billing lasts for one episode only, but not a moment of it is wasted. Dre finds her way bounding toward Bonnaroo to catch her idol Ni’Jah in person. By the grace of the writers’ dour cleverness, Dre is taken in by a group of women that simultaneously mirror her concerning devotion and contrast her selfless focus. Opposite Eva, Dre seems to momentarily meet her match. Eva challenges her outward aspects, correcting the manner in which she responds to minor conversations, and she digs deep through her walls, drawing out a level of honesty that Dre would have never given up freely. The penultimate confrontation between Dre and Eva, though devoid of the show’s signature blood and terror, presents one of the show’s most tense, weighted sequences. Accompanied by the unrelenting power of Dominique Fishback’s performance, Eilish delivers a soft, entrancing cadence that draws the audience in as effectively as it does Dre. The careful nuance she manages would have been impressive for any actor, superstar or otherwise.
Swarm is centered around consumption. The moments between the bouts of violence and obsession are often punctuated by literal gluttonous feeding, mirroring the insatiable needs of fandom. “Stan corrected,” reads the tagline of one of Swarm‘s promotional posters. “Stan” is the rather recently adopted term for overzealous fans of celebrities. It’s fitting, though, that the term for a fan should require an evolution, for fandom itself has seen an evolution. By casting Eilish, we are forced to be blatantly aware of what stardom truly entails beyond Swarm‘s narrative. The entire episode with Eilish becomes a multi-layered meta-depiction of fame and all that it consumes.
