The Adventures of Luke and Larry
Britney’s next hearing is scheduled for Wednesday, so I’ve been passing the time by looking into other young, female celebrities stuck in bogus legal traps.
For example, news broke last week that Amanda Bynes’ 2013 conservatorship (which I’ve highlighted before), has been extended for at least another two years. The decision comes after she graduated from the Fashion Institute of Design & Merchandising and announced her engagement - not exactly signs of someone who needs a legal guardian…
In fact, the court ruled that, since she’s been doing so great, they won’t need to see another report on her care until January 2023.
As sketchy as that is (we’re coming for you Amanda!), today I’m diving into the more widely covered legal battle between Kesha and her producer, Dr. Luke.
Are you sitting down? The doctor is in.
What’s Up Doc?
Though she’s not in a conservatorship, #FreeKesha has been trending for years. In 2014 Kesha filed a lawsuit against Dr. Luke for allegedly drugging and sexually assaulting her in 2005. At the time she was 18. Kesha further claimed that he emotionally abused her for years, causing “severe depression, post-traumatic stress, social isolation, and panic attacks.”
Her mom has corroborated the story saying,
“[Kesha] was a prisoner. It was like someone who beats you every day and hangs you from a chain and then comes in and gives you a piece of bread. Luke would say, ‘You look nice today,’ and send her into hysterics of happiness because she was programmed to expect nothing but abuse.”
Ultimately the lawsuit was created to dissolve her contract with the producer. Kesha wants to make her own music, as far away from her rapist as possible.
Makes sense to me.
Even before the allegations. Dr. Luke was a notorious name in pop music. He frequently collabs with the heaviest hitter of hits, Max Martin (the mastermind of early Britney, Backstreet Boys, and honestly probably every pop song you’ve ever enjoyed). Together their first major song was Kelly Clarkson’s “Since U Been Gone,” forever solidifying their status as white women whisperers.
By 2014 Dr. Luke had 16 No.1 hits, many coming from his work with Katy Perry.
Immediately after Kesha’s lawsuit was filed, Dr. Luke countersued for defamation. He claims she made up stories to boost her career after a decline in popularity. I’m not sure how many people can say that being raped helped their record sales, but whatever you say.
I guess that’s just the gospel according to Luke...
In 2016 the court dismissed Kesha’s request to be freed from her contract. They didn’t rule on if Dr. Luke was guilty of the rape but deemed it irrelevant in whether the contract should be upheld. Kesha’s lawyers had claimed that the assault was a hate crime based on gender. According to the judge, “every rape is not a gender-motivated hate crime.”
Yes, you read that quote right…if there was ever a crime motivated by gender, it’s rape. What else would this be if not an attack on her as a woman? Someone tell me because I truly do not understand.
That aside, Kesha’s legal team decided to try again. In 2017 both she and Dr. Luke amend their arguments to go back into war. Kesha likens her motion to dissolve the contract to a divorce. Dr. Luke finds old texts she sent to Lady Gaga and uses them as further proof of defamation. The text claims he had also sexually assaulted Katy Perry, though Perry denies this ever happened
Ultimately the judge stands firm and won’t allow Kesha’s new arguments in court. Even worse, in February 2020 Kesha lost the defamation case and was ordered to pay $373,671.88 to Dr. Luke’s company for royalties on music she had released during the legal battle.
As it stands, Kesha needs to release at least one more album with Dr. Luke’s involvement to satisfy her contract. Even then, she still won’t be “free.” Anyone who has undergone this level of trauma needs time to heal. The court has denied her the ability to make music without the approval of her assailant. All of her past success is now tied to abuse.
What does a Kesha concert look like when you know TikTok is making Dr. Luke royalties and perpetuating his status in the industry? Can you ever fully be freed of past experience?
Similarly, I worry that Britney will be accosted by the media the moment she’s released from her conservatorship. A mistake, overspend, celebratory party, or weight gain all run the risk of scrutiny. When someone has been in our periphery for so long, how do we ever let them fully be free of our gaze?
Silly Songs With Larry
The bigger concern is that these stories aren’t unique. Kesha, Britney, and Amanda are all young women controlled at the hands of people who knew how to exploit them early on. Even scarier is that these villains worked in tandem.
The main pillar of Dr. Luke’s defamation argument is that Kesha was making up stories to draw attention to her dwindling career; however, court documents were recently leaked showing that Kesha had reported being drugged and assaulted by Dr. Luke in 2005 and 2006. At the time she asked if it was possible to terminate her newly signed contract based on the rape and his repeated drugging.
As of last month, newly unsealed documents from Kesha’s case in 2011 also suggest Dr. Luke forced her to sign a management deal with Larry Rudolph instead of David Sonenberg. Sonenberg testified that he believed Larry Rudolph was "a shield for Dr. Luke"
Larry is a common denominator (demon-inator?) in both Kesha and Britney’s cases. He’s been working with Britney since she was 13 and many consider him to be a main factor in the over-sexualization of her brand as a teenager. Larry also helped Miley Cyrus shed her Hannah Montana image with the notorious foam finger dance of 2013.
Britney dropped Larry in 2004, and sources reported to TMZ that she hated him. Her dad immediately reinstated Larry as her manager when he gained control over her life and estate in 2007. According to Jamie Spears, Larry was instrumental in getting Britney to rehab, a feat that is much more sinister now that we understand the level of control Britney was under at the time.
While not an official part of the conservatorship, Larry was involved in less tangible ways than Jamie Spears. In 2019 #FreeBritney was becoming more widespread, and Larry told The Washington Post her “conservatorship is not a jail. It helps Britney make business decisions and manage her life in ways she can’t do on her own right now.”
“Business decisions” like her forced IUD, I guess….
When the movement started gaining steam, Larry was quick to accuse the fans of overreacting. He said
“I understand how much these fans love her and support her and I love that. The part that concerns me is that it has no factual basis. The personal issues that Britney is dealing with are highly complicated and the conservatorship is there for a reason. The courts of the State of California take this very seriously.”
Only the courts don’t. Britney has reported herself as a victim of conservatorship abuse, spoken out about her father’s alcoholism, and was initially conserved without due process and paperwork – none of which were ever issues for the court.
After the June 23rd hearing, Larry gave up the charade and resigned. On his way out, he made sure to be EXTREMELY clear about his lack of involvement in the conservatorship. In his words:
“Earlier today, I became aware that Britney had been voicing her intention to officially retire. As you know, I have never been a part of the conservatorship nor its operations, so I am not privy to many of these details. I was originally hired at Britney’s request to help manage and assist her with her career. And as her manager, I believe it is in Britney’s best interest for me to resign from her team as my professional services are no longer needed.”
Although what “services” he’s referring to aren’t overly specific. In a 2016 interview about revamping the “Piece of Me” show in Vegas, Larry shared that he had “no specific job description” as her manager. He claimed there was always mutual respect when they disagreed on creative decisions, but Britney thinks otherwise. While she never said his name outright, she was crystal clear in June when she told the judge,
“Ma’am, my dad, and anyone involved in this conservatorship, and my management, who played a huge role in punishing me when I said no — Ma’am, they should be in jail.”
Britney accused her management of forcing her to perform and lying about her mental health. At one point she shared that her manager spoke to her therapist and accused Britney of not taking her medication after she disagreed on choreography. According to her statement, she was also threatened with lawsuits if she didn’t follow through with tours.
That’s all kinds of fucked up.
Involved or not, Larry stood a lot to gain by allowing the conservatorship to take place. He managed the work of someone deemed too incapacitated to take care of themselves, allegedly using control tactics to force her into certain dance moves and contracts. While we know Larry wasn’t involved in Amanda’s conservatorship, her guardianship is closely modeled off of Britney’s. Without one, you don’t get the other. Larry bore witness to a legal experiment built to remove human rights while simultaneously maximizing the profit of his top-performing client.
That level of control is unacceptable and has now been repeated with other young women.
Britney aptly pointed out that, while she’s subjected to forced medication and rehab stints, Miley Cyrus, another one of his clients, is allowed to smoke weed on stage at the VMAs.
Larry was part of Miley’s management team until 2017. Since they split Miley has become an avid Britney supporter. She often changes “Party in the USA” lyrics on stage to include a #FreeBritney chant (love you Miley!).
Are you ready for a fun twist? “Party in the USA” is coincidentally produced by Dr Luke. It all just feels so icky….
Of course, Larry has his own opinions on the Kesha legal battle. He says,
“There’s the court of public opinion and then there’s the court of real opinion. Public opinion is often based on little-to-no facts, more emotion-driven. Then there’s the court system that’s based on real facts. If you look at what happened in the court system, I think you’ll find a very different result then what he got caught up a bit in.”
That’s a reasonable opinion for Larry to have considering how much he benefited from the court’s decisions to grant a conservatorship over Britney Spears without a capacity declaration….
But hey. That’s showbiz, baby.
#FreeKesha
Pop Culture
The fact of the matter is that these characters skulk around recording studios en masse. Dr. Luke and Larry Rudolph’ aren’t special kinds of monsters, they are reflections of an industry that sees women as commodities – it’s just pop culture.
We often hear about the R. Kelly’s and Jacob Hoggard’s who abuse their female fans. Turns out that behind the scenes is just as manipulative. Manipulative, and forgiving.
Dr. Luke’s career slowed after Kesha’s allegations, but, as we’ve seen time and time again, even the most brutal of accusations can’t stop a man’s dream. Dr. Luke made his comeback with Doja Cat’s “Say So” in 2020. Yes, that ABSOLUTE BANGER of a track is his. He wasn’t loud about its success. In fact, he pulled a sneaky on us by using a new stage name, Trevor Trax.
Like Kesha, Doja Cat’s contract mandates that a certain number of her songs need his involvement. Her cryptic tweets about the deal have led fans to assume that she’s riding out her contract. We’ll see if the success they’ve seen together sways her decision in the future.
In 2018 one of my favourite new pop stars, Kim Petras, signed with Larry Rudolph, and now she’s also working closely with Dr. Luke (under aliases, of course). Kim is an LGBTQ+ icon and progressive pop star who saw lots of media attention for undergoing gender reassignment surgery as a teenager.
She also puts out spooky bops that I can’t get enough of.
Many fans have tried to encourage a boycott of Petras’ music. The thinking is that anyone who knowingly works with an abuser isn’t someone to celebrate. That said, the royalties on her songs aren’t really the issue at stake. Dr. Luke is deeply embedded in the music industry and has been for decades. His profit won’t disappear because we decide we don’t like one pop star, who, for better or worse, is making strides for the trans community.
A New Yorker piece from 2013 quoted the head of Sony Music in saying that Dr. Luke “… is just one of those brilliant people who comes along once every five years.” Personally, I would have been more than happy to wait around for the next brilliant person who doesn’t feel the need to drug and rape 18-year-olds. I guess that’s just me.
Larry Rudolph likes to say that he’s “in the star business,” seemingly referring to the industry of young, talented women. The tragic part of the “star business” is that it often discredits the stars themselves. Larry Rudolph is often credited for creating Britney Spears, like she wasn’t involved in the process whatsoever.
Unsurprisingly, it’s the fans who see the person more than the puppeteers pulling the strings. #FreeKesha started as a fan-led movement about Kesha’s creative freedom. They pointed to unreleased tracks as proof that Dr. Luke was stifling her artistic vision as well as her safety. Similarly, fans have also been the spearheads of #FreeBritney and #FreeAmanda, pointing out huge red flags in the treatment of these women.
These women, who, lest we forget, are extremely talented. Without them, there is no “star business” for men like Luke and Larry to profit off of.
I hold out hope that all three of these women will have a chance to tell their stories from a safe vantage point. In the meantime, I’m going to borrow words from Kesha’s song “Praying” about her experience with Dr. Luke. I know this depiction of forgiveness towards an abuser has given me peace, and I hope it has for her, Amanda, and Britney too.
I hope you're somewhere prayin', prayin'
I hope your soul is changin', changin'
I hope you find your peace
Falling on your knees, prayin'
I’m also praying for the day Britney releases her diss tracks because holy shit I will die….
