Olivia Rodrigo’s New Album Is a Brilliant Study of Child Stardom (2024)

“Who would have thought that a girl like me would double as a superstar?” That question, once posed by a barely teenaged Miley Cyrus, has resonated with young people more in the last 25 years than ever before, thanks to the teen starlet boom of the late ’90s, the Disney tween machine of the mid-aughts, and the seemingly endless child and teen influencer waves. The allure of child stardom has particularly been sold to girls, who are inundated with teen idol after teen idol—those paragons of glamor and femininity who use their coolness to sell everything from lunch boxes to lip kits.

History has shown that the reality of becoming famous as a young woman is often far from the ideal of having the “best of both worlds,” as Cyrus once put it. But the emotional reality of that experience is generally not heard by the public until the star in question is well into adulthood. Enter Olivia Rodrigo, who has recently demonstrated her commitment to being an on-the-ground anthropologist of child-to-adult stardom with a three-song story about fame told across her new sophom*ore album, GUTS.

On GUTS, wedged between bedroom pop ballads and angsty rock anthems (and satisfyingly placed at the beginning, the midpoint, and the end of the album) is a three-act ode to the complex trajectory of the teen starlet. “All-American Bitch” (track 1), “Making the Bed” (track 6), and “Teenage Dream” (track 12, the finale) chart Rodrigo’s own teen idol journey: The first expresses an enraged self-awareness of her role in celebrity culture, the second is a resigned reflection on what she’s sacrificed for her music and for fame, and the third culminates in her fear of what lies beyond the teen idol wheelhouse.

Up first, “All-American Bitch” starts off sweet before spinning into a cyclone of angst, as Rodrigo sardonically assures all of her young adult (and former young adult) fans that yes, she does belong to us, and yes, we can see ourselves in her, and no, don’t worry about projecting onto her, because she really does understand us. She’s the everygirl; light and soft and powerful, depending on what we need her to be. A crucial element of celebrity culture is the ability for the masses to see themselves in the rich, talented, and famous; an aspirational simulation of the American Dream. And for young women, the desire to feel seen is that much greater in a world that constantly demands you to clearly label yourself for the ease of others, and to pick a side between madonna or whor*.

On “All-American Bitch,” Rodrigo draws a comparison between herself and the Kennedys, which couldn’t be more fitting, as John F. and Jackie fashioned the blueprint for the “celebrity president.” Under them, the notion of a commander in chief became about not only what they did in the Oval Office, but how they fit into the pop culture of their time—just as musicianship itself is just a tiny slice of what makes a superstar in the music industry in any given era. To be the “perfect all-American bitch” is less about Rodrigo’s craft and more about her ability and willingness to personify the current id of young women the world over.

But we not only demand our stars represent us, we demand a level of indebtedness from them for making them famous. On “All-American Bitch,” the 20-year-old exclaims that inside, she screams to deal with the pressure of it all, and she does just that—only to bookend the song by switching back to a soft, sweet tone and insisting that she is indeed “grateful all the time.”

In a recent conversation with Phoebe Bridgers for Interview Magazine, Rodrigo reflected on her conflicting feelings about fame, saying, “Anytime something bad happens with my career, I’m like, ‘Wow. I’m so lucky that I get to do this.’ You have to be grateful. So many people would love to be in this position. But you still have to acknowledge trauma.” It's hard not to think of another “lucky” ex-teen idol who once questioned, “If there’s nothing missing in my life / Then why do these tears come at night?” Indeed, every generation has a set of girls who are fashioned as the standard for girlhood, and who we thus expect to joyfully and dutifully fulfill that standard. As she reflects on her carefully calculated irresistibility to her adoring public, Rodrigo concedes her album opener with a screech: “I know my place, and this is it!”

After “All-American Bitch,” it’s back to our regularly scheduled programming, with four songs full of exes, jealousy, and social anxiety. But then, at the exact midpoint of the album, Rodrigo yet again breaks the fourth wall and continues reflecting on fame with “Making the Bed.”

It’s startling to hear the Grammy winner take a moment, right in the middle of her triumphant second album, to admit that music is “another thing I ruined I used to do for fun.” Songs about fame are far from rare, but ones where young celebrities examine their own role in maintaining their quasi-gilded cages are. Rodrigo’s musings on fame are certainly in conversation with Billie Eilish, who on 2021’s “Getting Older,” similarly claimed that “things I once enjoyed just keep me employed now.” But Eilish’s ascent to fame, unlike Disney alum Rodrigo’s, was never of the picture-on-a-lunch box variety; that kind of young adult fame sold by big companies that demand sanitization and rigid image-making.

Along with the aforementioned “Lucky” by Britney Spears, most songs about fame by polished teen idols are more focused on external influences than the interiority of these stars’ notoriety. Lindsay Lohan’s “Rumors,” for example, is a proto-“Piece of Me” where an 18-year-old Lohan laments the paparazzi and tabloid culture that threatens her freedom. Then there’s Backstreet Boys’ “Larger than Life,” which takes the opposite approach by recognizing the rabid teen fandom that fueled their careers, as they tell fans, “all of your time spent keeps us alive.” But in its sly double meaning, the lyrics also convey the sinister nature of fame as a lifeline for celebrities, and the craving for mass adoration and attention. As they go on to ask, “All you people, can’t you see, can’t you see / How your love’s affecting our reality?,” it’s debatable whether that effect has been for the better or worse.

On “Making the Bed,” Rodrigo sheds all double meaning and delivers a frank reflection of how fame has changed her life. She describes feeling alienated from her own success (“another perfect moment doesn’t feel like mine”), feeling alienated from normal life (“push away all the people who know me best”), and feeling a general lack of control (“I can’t swerve off the road”). Her references to not knowing what exactly she was getting herself into by pursuing this kind of career calls to mind recent discourse around the ethics of child stardom—but Rodrigo has repeatedly said that despite mourning the childhood she sacrificed to music and fame, she wouldn’t have it any other way. It’s this hyper-self awareness that elevates “Making the Bed,” as she admits, “I’m playing the victim so well in my head / But it’s me who’s been making the bed.” She bridges the stereotypical messages of songs about fame by critiquing the forces shaping her life while acknowledging her complicity in order to achieve her dreams (“They’re changing my machinery and I just let it happen / I got the things I wanted, it’s just not what I imagined”).

After five more songs about sex, lies, and social and self-image struggles, the album concludes with “Teenage Dream”: a callback to “Brutal” from Rodrigo’s debut album, Sour, on which she demanded, “I’m so sick of 17, where’s my f*cking teenage dream?” GUTS’ “Teenage Dream” reckons with the consequences of achieving it. Peaking in high school is a neurosis that spans the American cultural consciousness, but when your high school is substituted for global adoration, Grammy Awards, and blockbuster critical and commercial success, the stakes clearly feel far higher.

“Teenage Dream” speaks to the culture of disposability among child stars and particularly young women, as Rodrigo expresses her fear that the public “already got all the best parts of me.” It complicates the usual child star narrative of demanding to be taken seriously and be seen as a real Adult (see: Janet Jackson’s “Control,” Spears’ “Overprotected,” and Cyrus’ “Can’t Be Tamed”) by openly spilling her fears about what lies beyond being a teen prodigy. The culture of disposability rings true across teen idols, as their youth, femininity, and (often problematic) sexualization are key components of their appeal. But for Rodrigo, there is the added element of her artistry. Spears and Cyrus, and the vast majority of child stars, had less control over their creative output as teens, and looked forward to breaking free and taking the reins as they grew into adulthood. Rodrigo stands apart from her teen idol peers by having assumed far more creative control of her music from the start, and subsequently being lauded for her maturity and refinement “beyond her years.” But what happens when her years catch up?

On “Teenage Dream,” Rodrigo worries, “When are all my excuses of learning my lessons gonna start to feel sad? / Will I spend all the rest of my years wishing I could go back?” The folly of youth is often used as a built-in reason to be given grace, but adulthood is often used as a built-in reason to not give women grace. She’s old enough to know better, she should think about the kids watching, she should be growing with age, she’s so immature. Rodrigo is attuned to the added pressure of being known as an exceptional young person—and once the public has built up a “generational talent,” any misstep or flop could lead to a re-evaluation or expulsion from the public’s good graces. She concludes by wondering, “It gets better, but what if I don’t?”

After all of the recent talk about how society has historically wronged young women in the media, Rodrigo’s analyses of her own role in the pop cultural firmament are undeniably a time capsule in the making. As one of the very few new pop stars substantively lasting beyond their 15 seconds of fame, it’ll be interesting to see what her experience as a young woman at the height of stardom will say about 2020s pop culture. One can only hope that the girls of the present and future are given more room to breathe and grow than their predecessors, and that the women they become are afforded the same peace. The viral phenomenon of being a “teenage girl in your twenties” epitomizes the age-based anxiety currently wracking young adults of all levels of fame and anonymity. Hopefully we all won’t always be sorry about not being able to remain teenage dreams.