Categories: News

'Glee' Creator Goes After Kings of Leon

Ryan Murphy is not too gleeful when it comes to people dissing his show.

The creator of the runaway hit, Glee, is grateful for all the famous singers who do want to contribute their music to his show, but he's a little less forgiving toward bands [like Kings of Leon] who openly snub it, he told The Hollywood Reporter in a recent interview.

"F–k you, Kings of Leon," Murphy said. "They're self-centered a–holes and they missed the big picture. They missed that a seven-year-old kid can see someone close to their age singing a Kings of Leon song, which will maybe make them want to join a glee club or pick up a musical instrument. It's like, OK, hate on arts education. You can make fun of Glee all you want, but at its heart, what we really do is turn kids on to music."

When asked to comment, Caleb Followill, who fronts the band, insisted that he meant no disrespect. "This whole Glee thing is a shock to us. It's gotten out of hand. At the time of the request, we hadn't even seen the show. It came at the end of that record cycle, and we were over promoting ["Use Somebody"]. This was never meant as a slap in the face to Glee or to music education or to fans of the show. We're not sure where the anger is coming from."

If Murphy had wanted to be more accurate, perhaps he should have attacked Guns N' Roses guitarist Slash, who recently made no bones about the fact that he would never license his band's songs to the musical series. "Glee is worse than Grease, and Grease is bad enough," he told Entertainment Weekly. Murphy's response? "Usually I find that people who make those comments, their careers are over; they're uneducated and quite stupid."

Murphy is much more optimistic about the near future of guest stars on the show, which includes Anne Hathaway, Gwyneth Paltrow in a followup performance, and rumored appearances by Jennifer Lopez and Stevie Nicks. —KIMBERLY STEELE