ET exclusively debuts a first look at Tuesday's milestone episode.
Empire is hitting a milestone.
Fox's music drama reaches its 100th episode on Tuesday, but there is little to celebrate for the Lyon family. Following Andre's (Trai Byers) psychotic break at his own wedding, Lucious (Terrence Howard) and Cookie (Taraji P. Henson) stage an intervention in a desperate plea for him to seek help.
"Never seen him like this before," a distraught Cookie tells Andre's psychiatrist in ET's exclusive clip. "He was unrecognizable."
When Lucious and Cookie learn that Andre -- who has bipolar disorder -- needs around-the-clock observation, a thorough psych evaluation and to be locked up for the first 30 days so he doesn't pose a danger to himself and to others, the parental instincts kick in as the reality of their son's deteriorating mental state hits home.
"Danger to others?" Andre bellows as he barges into the room, the Kingsley side of him pushing through. "He's the one who pulled the gun on me. How am I a danger?"
"You need some help, son," Lucious calmly says, prompting Andre to defend his indefensible actions at the wedding to his psychiatrist: "My wife stood me up at the altar. Anybody else would've had the same reaction. You would've had the same reaction! I slept it off. I'm fine. And I'll be even better when I see my wife and my child. Where are they?"
When Cookie tries to tell Andre that he may be in the middle of a psychotic break, he doesn't want to hear it -- and that's when all hell breaks loose as his parents plead for him to get treatment. Watch ET's exclusive clip from Tuesday's episode below.
Last week, ET's Kevin Frazier spoke with Henson about how difficult it has been saying goodbye to Cookie after six seasons. Due to the coronavirus outbreak, the final season of Empire wraps up one episode earlier than originally intended.
“She won't go away. I was about to say goodbye to her, like, 10 days ago and she's still here,” Henson said. “We are finished. I think Cookie did great. I'm leaving her in a great place in the hearts of everyone. What else can you do with a character like that? She's iconic -- she's gonna live long after we're all long gone. People will still talk about Cookie and when I started off on this journey of acting, that's the type of work I wanted to do, because I grew up studying the likes of Lucille Ball, Bette Davis, Diahann Carroll.”
“A lot of them have transitioned and I still look to their work,” she continued. “Bette Davis was long gone before I got into college, so this is a woman that I don't even get to see in present day -- her work is so legendary that I'm drawn to study it. And that's the type of work I've always wanted to do, because those are the type of actors that I studied and looked up to.”
Empire airs Tuesdays at 9 p.m. ET/PT on Fox.
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