The Substance and “Margaret”

While Lana Del Rey couldn’t have possibly intuited that a very specific line in “Margaret,” one of the songs from her 2023 album, Did You Know That There’s A Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd, would have an uncanny bearing on Coralie Fargeat’s The Substance, it most certainly does. Not least of which is because “Margaret” Qualley herself is the star…well, apart from the real star: the inimitable Demi Moore. 

Playing the part of “Sue” (a somewhat “old-timey” name for someone so “fresh-faced”), Qualley serves as the “younger, more beautiful version” of Elisabeth Sparkle (Moore). The version that’s “birthed” out of one’s “matrix” self with a single-use activator serum called, what else, “the substance” (unfortunately, an addiction to youth will find Elisabeth foolishly violating that “single use” rule). Because “younger” must automatically mean “more beautiful,” right? In fact, there ought to be a saying that goes, “‘Tis better to be young and ugly than old and attractive.” For, in this society, the latter two qualities automatically cancel each other out. Simply don’t compute together. Which works out quite profitably for various industries centered on “beauty.”

As for Del Rey, she wrote the lyrics to “Margaret” based on the latter’s now-husband (and Del Rey’s go-to producer), Jack Antonoff, and his love for Qualley. More specifically, Del Ry homes in on Antonoff’s first encounter with Qualley, describing how the two met on a rooftop (so cringily Brooklyn). Hence, one of the opening verses going, “He met Margaret on a rooftop, she was wearing white/And he was like, ‘I might be in trouble’/He had visions of the good life, he was like,/‘Should I jump off this building now or do it on the double?’” The intimation being that he’s ready to fall head over feet (or heels, if you prefer) into the abyss of this “love at first” sight type of feeling. The type of love where one can see themselves growing old with that person. Which would entail a presupposed level of non-shallowness that most people don’t truly possess. Particularly men. 

And yes, it’s worth noting that it’s probably easy for Antonoff to feel a “certain way” about Qualley now, thanks to a ten-year age difference. Needless to say, he’s the one on the “senior” side of it. Del Rey, too, has found herself in the cliché of being the younger woman in her own recent marriage to Jeremy Dufrene, a swamp/alligator tour guide based in Louisiana. Unsurprisingly, Dufrene is also a decade older than Del Rey (which is not all that “shocking” coming from her when considering her long-standing mention of “Daddy” love in her various songs). 

All of which is to say that “Margaret” (and the key players involved in it) adds another layer to the message of The Substance, with Moore’s character getting thrown over by Harvey (Dennis Quaid), the producer of her aerobics show, Sparkle Your Life with Elisabeth, the day she turns fifty years old. Symbolic indeed. Considering that Del Rey’s husband is almost fifty himself, it gives one pause to note that men have always been given more leeway—more of “a pass”—about their age (de facto, appearance) than women have. Particularly women in Hollywood. Which is why it was both accurate and prescient (vis-à-vis the advent of The Substance) for Del Rey to sing on “Margaret,” “‘Cause when you know, you know/And when you’re old, you’re old/Like Hollywood and me.”

While Del Rey may have only been wielding a reference to being “old” as a poetic way to express that, like getting old, falling in love is unstoppable, uncontrollable (even though that doesn’t really apply at all to getting old anymore, what with all the treatments and topicals available to those with the means [like Qualley and Del Rey]), it still sounds genuine. As though she really believes that, at thirty-seven (the age she was when she wrote this song), she’s “ancient.” And, if The Substance reemphasized anything about what it means to be a woman in today’s culture, it’s just that. Indeed, by skewed Gen Z standards of what constitutes being “young,” Del Rey was already “old” when she first drew international attention with “Video Games” at the end of 2011. The year LDR turned twenty-six. In fact, it’s almost unfathomable that Gen Z could “deign” to listen or relate to Del Rey at all considering how “aged” she is according to their dictums. 

Madonna, too, would be considered “haggard” at twenty-four, the age she signed her first recording contract with Sire Records. Which is something incredible to remark upon when taking into account that people have been comparing her to the “crypt keeper” since as early as the nineties. On that note, yes, there have been plenty of memes where Madonna is likened to Demi Moore (a good friend of M’s, actually) as Sparkle while watching Sue on late-night TV go on about how Elisabeth’s old show—the one Sue took over—was both “old-fashioned” and “Jurassic.” That it was in desperate need of an update. Depending on the fandom posting the meme, the Sue part might be billed as Lady Gaga. 

As for the period in Del Rey’s life when she wrote “Margaret,” one would be remiss not to mention that it was during her “zaftig” era. Or what some speculators might also call her “pre-Ozempic” era. In fact, ever since around the start of the pandemic in 2020, the discourse surrounding Del Rey’s weight gain continued to mount. 

As though to effectively shut down all the commentary/surrender to the pressure and impossible beauty standards of fame, Del Rey shed a noticeable amount of weight in time for her April 2024 headlining performances at Coachella. Of course, that only caused a flare-up of even more internet commentary about her “glow up.” But ultimately, the “whispers” died down far more effortlessly than when Del Rey was “fat.” Because, the truth was, “fans” and casual listeners/spectators alike couldn’t deny a preference for this physical return to “2012 Lana.” As though all of her former glory had been “magically” restored. Almost as if she took…the substance. (Or what most in H’wood are now calling Ozempic.)