General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20265 min read

Royalties (2020 TV series)

Royalties is an American musical comedy television series created by Darren Criss for the short-form streaming service Quibi, satirizing the songwriters behind the world's biggest hits. It stars Criss and Kether Donohue as Pierce and Sara, a songwriting duo navigating the challenges of writing a great song week after week for demanding pop stars.¹ The series ran for one season of ten episodes, each about eight minutes long, from June 1 to June 29, 2020, and was canceled after one season.¹^•²

Key fact	Detail
Format	Musical comedy, 10 episodes of about 8 minutes each, rated TV-MA¹^•³
Created by	Darren Criss, who also wrote the series and its songs with Nick and Matt Lang of Team StarKid¹^•⁴
Director	Amy Heckerling, director of Clueless and Fast Times at Ridgemont High⁵
Original run	Premiered June 1, 2020 on Quibi; finale "Perfect Song" aired June 29, 2020¹^•⁶
Lead cast	Darren Criss as Pierce, Kether Donohue as Sara, with Tony Revolori, Georgia King, Sabrina Carpenter, Jennifer Coolidge, John Stamos, and Mark Hamill in guest roles¹^•²
Music	Each episode features at least one original song written by Criss⁷
Afterlife	Acquired with the Quibi library by Roku in January 2021 and relaunched as a Roku Original; last available on The Roku Channel until September 2023⁸^•³

Spoilers

Premise and format

The series follows Sara (Kether Donohue) and Pierce (Darren Criss), aspiring songwriters who work catering jobs to support themselves while writing songs for fictitious pop stars.⁹ Fortunately for the duo, their friend Theo (Tony Revolori) allows them free access to his recording studio, and upon landing their first major opportunity they draw the attention of the manager Kendra (Georgia King).⁹

Each self-contained episode follows a different musician who needs Sara and Pierce's services, building to a music video in the final moments.¹⁰ Every episode contains at least one original song written by Criss, such as the mattress-themed innuendo number "Break It In" and the country song "Mighty As Kong".⁷^•⁶ The episode titles themselves are drawn from the songs featured in them.⁶

Development and production

Quibi, a mobile-focused short-form streaming service founded by Jeffrey Katzenberg and Meg Whitman, announced the project in July 2019. Criss signed on to write, produce, and star, and the series was described as the first musical in development at the platform.⁴ He wrote it with Nick and Matt Lang, his co-founders of the musical theater company Team StarKid, whom he had worked with since college on productions such as A Very Potter Musical.⁴^•⁷

The series came from SideCar, the content development unit Fox Entertainment launched in February 2019 under Gail Berman, and it was that unit's first sale since its formation.⁴ Executive producers included Criss, Gail Berman, Hend Baghdady, Joe Earley, Matt Lang, Nick Lang, and Ricky Rollins.⁴ Amy Heckerling directed all ten episodes.¹¹

Criss described the show as a long-gestating passion project drawing on his own songwriting career, and said the tone shifted from an early drama concept toward a scrappy, campy comedy as a counterpoint to melodramatic music-industry shows like Empire, Smash, and Nashville.⁷ He called it "a zany little love note to the plight of songwriters" when announcing the premiere.⁵

Cast

Criss and Kether Donohue lead the series as the songwriting duo Pierce and Sara.¹ Tony Revolori plays Theo and Georgia King plays Kendra.¹ Guest stars play fictitious music stars, with each episode featuring celebrity guests; the cast includes Sabrina Carpenter as Bailey Rouge, Jennifer Coolidge as Miriam Hale, John Stamos as Elia Peck, Jackie Tohn as McKenzie, and Mark Hamill as Philip Combs.¹^•² Ed Asner also appears.⁹ Several of Criss's Glee colleagues appear among the guests.¹²

Release and cancellation

Royalties premiered on June 1, 2020, on Quibi, which charged $4.99 per month with ads or $7.99 without ads.⁴ Episodes were released in batches through June 2020, with the first three on June 1 and the final two, "I Hate That I Need You" and "Perfect Song", on June 29.⁶ The series was canceled after one season.²

Quibi shut down after roughly six months of operation, having raised $1.75 billion from investors including Disney, NBCUniversal, and Viacom.¹³^•¹⁴ In January 2021, Roku acquired the rights to Quibi's library of 75 original shows, and in May 2021 it relaunched the content as Roku Originals, free and ad-supported on The Roku Channel, with Royalties among the 30 titles available at launch.⁸^•¹⁵ The series remained on The Roku Channel until September 2023; as of 2024 it was unavailable to stream in the United States.³

Reception

On Rotten Tomatoes, the season holds an 83% Tomatometer score based on three critic reviews.¹⁶ Critics described it as a funny, affectionate parody of the music industry; Amanda Mazzillo of Film Inquiry wrote that it "affectionately brings forward the lives and difficulties of songwriters with stellar performances", and Kiko Vega of Espinof gave it 4 out of 5, calling it a series that "doesn't pretend to be anything more than a good time".¹⁶ Common Sense Media rated it 4 out of 5, noting heavy cursing and strong sexual innuendo consistent with its TV-MA rating.⁹^•³

On IMDb the series holds a weighted rating of 6.5 out of 10 from about 385 user ratings, with individual episode ratings rising from 7.0 for the premiere to 9.2 for the finale.¹⁷ Reviewers noted that the short runtime suited the material: Film Inquiry found that the eight-minute episodes kept jokes from overstaying their welcome and let each story revolve around a single song and musician.¹⁰

References

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026