“Daisy Jones and The Six” shatters expectations

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Photo courtesy of @daisyjonesandthesix on Instagram

A photo of a stage performance for the fictional band Daisy Jones and the Six. Eddie Roundtree (played by Josh Whitehouse), Warren Rhodes (played by Sebastian Chacon), Billy Dunne (played by Sam Claflin), Daisy Jones (played by Riley Keough), Graham Dunne (played by Will Harrison), and Karen Sirko (played by Suki Waterhouse).

By Paige Tasin, Social Media Manager

Taylor Jenkins Reid’s books have become incredibly popular over the last few years. Now, one of her books has been turned into a long awaited film adaptation. “Daisy Jones and the Six” has been turned into a limited series on Amazon Prime and has delivered everything fans hoped for.

The show is about an up-and-coming 70’s band, The Six, as the member’s lead singer, Billy Dunne, battles an addiction. They come into contact with the free spirited vocalist, Daisy Jones, who embodies everything Billy is trying to recover from. As they state in the show “writing an album is an intimate thing”. This results in tension and conflict between the two lead singers, as Billy battles his addiction and his desire for Daisy while trying to remain faithful to his wife, Camila.

The show has ten free episodes released on Amazon, but the creators didn’t stop there. They released the show’s full album “Aurora” on Spotify as well. The album contains songs like “Look At Us Now (Honeycomb)”, “Let Me Down Easy” and “Regret Me”. The entire track is a coded message between Daisy and Billy and heightens the tension between the two.

The other members of the band Graham, Eddie, Warren and Karen also have interesting and heartbreaking storylines, especially between Graham and Karen who develop an intimate, but secret relationship.

The show stars Sam Claflin as Billy Dunne. He is famous for his roles in “Me Before You” and “The Hunger Games”. With his previous success in book to film adaptations, viewers had no doubt that he could succeed in the role as Billy. Although he does look a little too old to play a teenager in the original scenes, once the plot moves forward a few years he fits the role perfectly. With a simple glance he expresses how much chemistry exists between himself and Daisy.

Daisy Jones is played by Riley Keough who is the granddaughter of Elvis Presley. Until this role she had never considered singing. However, after intense training for the role it is clear that the Presley genes transferred over beautifully to her. Her voice is absolutely stunning and couples beautifully with Claflin’s on their album. She plays the adventurous role of Daisy beautifully and radiates her energy perfectly. Her character is haunted by addiction and she adopts this role well. It is clear that Hollywood is not kind to rock stars in the seventies and Daisy learns this the hard way.

The music produced in the TV show is wonderful. While Taylor Jenkins Reid wrote lyrics at the end of the novel, the producers of the show changed many of those lyrics. Luckily, all of the songs still have a similar theme and it is very easy to tell which song was which from the book. Much of the show highlights how the songs were written and takes viewers through that process. While this might not sound like the most interesting process, it is quite electric to watch. After understanding the context of the songs the actual listening experience becomes much deeper and entertaining.

The costume design pays very close attention to detail to the time period the show is set in. Each character has a different aesthetic and personal style that makes their outfits unique. The designers took a lot of inspiration from Stevie Nicks for Daisy, as the plot is loosely based on Fleetwood Mac’s love story between Stevie Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham. They even recorded their album, both on set and in real life, in the same studio where “Rumors” was recorded. The history behind the show is definitely present and viewers can easily appreciate how much effort was put into the development of the show.

Overall, the show is very similar to the novel and does not stray far from the original plot. In the last episode, there are many elements that almost make it appear as if the ending was drastically different but ultimately the show stays very true to the original story.

This adaptation was exactly what fans of the story had been waiting for. All of the actors involved in the band signed their contract with the understanding that they might have to go on tour after the release of the show. From social media, the actors have shown that they have had band practice even after the filming was finished. This leaves many viewers to believe a tour will be announced soon. This fictional band was truly brought to life with this show.