Yesterday, Lady Gaga announced to the world via Twitter that she will be joining the cast of American Horror Story Season 5, simply entitled Hotel. The reactions have been mixed but, as an avid fan and reviewer of the show, here is my outlook on the situation.
American Horror Story has never strayed from the strange and unusual. In fact, Ryan Murphy and the shows writers tend to seek those things out in order to disturb and entertain us on a weekly basis. Knowing this, why wouldn’t they go directly to strangeness personified? Gaga is the modern day source of weird and we all need our dose.
Jessica Lange is out, we have known this for over a year and, pending some huge surprise announcement, we need to prepare ourselves for a new start without her. As awful as that idea is, Gaga isn’t a horrible replacement. She will bring in viewers, we already know that she can pull off the weirdest of the weird and she can sing, which we all know is a huge plus in show creator Ryan Murphy’s eyes. At the very least, we should get a few good songs out of next season. In fact, I am curious why they didn’t bring her in for Freak Show. “Born this Way” would’ve been an excellent song choice for one of the freaks to sing. After all, is that the anthem for any person out there who has ever felt different?
For those worried about whether or not Gaga can act, fear not because she can. She has had recent roles in both Machete Kills and Sin City 2: A Dame to Kill For. Robert Rodriguez raved about her acting saying “The camera loves her. She’s a great performer. She’s performed twice for me now and I was blown away by her discipline.” For me, if Robert Rodriguez is willing to sign off on her, so am I.
As for the hotel theme of next season, I am curious as to what the horror part will be. They could take the insane killer route a la Psycho with The Bates Motel, the haunted hotel route like they do in The Shining with The Overlook Hotel, even just the haunted room like in 1408 with The Dolphin Hotel or they could take a historical stance, which they tend to do, by playing off a real life mystery filled hotel such as the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel, where both Marilyn Monroe and Montgomery Clift supposedly haunt.
With so many excellent directions to take, I am sure American Horror Story: Hotel will not disappoint and that Murphy and Gaga will prove to be a match made in Heaven. Now we just have to patiently (I’m going crazy!) wait until October.
http://youtu.be/NvxqOWfEnZk
American Horror Story returns to FX this October.
========================================================================================================= Ann Hale is the horror editor for Pop-Break.com and a senior contributing writer, reviewing horror movies and television shows. She is also the American Correspondent for Lovehorror.co.uk and writer for Geekandstuff.com. Ann attended East Carolina University, majoring in English Literature. She is a collector of Halloween (the film) memorabilia and is a self-admitted opinionated horror nerd. You can follow her, her collection and her cat, Edward Kittyhands on Twitter and Instagram @Scarletjupiter
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