Is there a TV feud going on between Power and Empire?
Starz's Power is about to debut its second season, while Empire just premiered to some pretty promising numbers, and both shows have a similar premise involving a drug dealing operation that launches a successful business. But when Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson posted some negative comments to Instagram about Terrence Howard and Taraji P. Henson's new Fox show, Henson shot back some of her own on Twitter.
Jackson defended his comments about Empire during the 2015 Winter TCA Press Tour panel for Power.
"That show is…the artwork was very similar and they used 'power' in the tagline [for] Empire," Jackson told the room of reporters. "They didn't have to do that."
Jackson says there's no bad blood between the two shows since he has "a lot of friends in that program."
"But Taraji, I've seen her a few times but I don't really have a real relationship with her or anything like that," Jackson said. "You know women. They're going to say what they're going to say! Can you say something back when they say something to you and not be inappropriate? So I just laughed about it and brushed it off. I think there's room for more television shows. I don't think it's necessary to have one show at a time. There's room for everybody."
But then he added with a laugh, "I just need a lot of the room for this show."
When asked for her opinion on the similarities between the two shows, Power creator and executive producer Courtney Kemp Agboh didn't want to compare them.
"I don't have an opinion," Agboh said. "A comparison does not do a favor for either show. I think that it's not fair to them and it's not fair to us because they've been in development for a long time and we were in development for a long time. To me, it's very simple. Their show is music driven and it's just different. We're doing two different things."
Agboh explained that the reason the shows are so different are because of the networks they're on.
"Broadcast is so hard," Agboh siad. "You don't have the advantage of being able to show your violence and your sex and all those things that I get to do. Power has this amazing thing where we get to do whatever we want. It's awesome. I don't think about [the comparison], frankly. I don't think it's an interesting comparison."