The Chicago police say that Mr. Smollett had been upset over his salary and wanted to stir up publicity when he filed a police report saying that two masked men had beaten him and thrown a noose around his neck as he walked home at 2 a.m. on Jan. 29, in the wealthy Streeterville neighborhood of downtown Chicago.

According to police and court records, Mr. Smollett staged the attack as if he were a director putting on his first play. He paid two brothers who had worked on “Empire” $3,500, asked them to buy ski masks and a noose to use as props and told them which epithets to hurl when they attacked him. The police say Mr. Smollett even scoped out neighborhood security cameras to ensure the assault would be recorded.

Mr. Smollett’s lawyers say he is innocent, but his career now hangs in doubt after “Empire” executive producers wrote him off the season’s final two episodes, and his tale of hatred and racism has instead become a cultural brawl over deception and “fake news.”

The Hollywood friends who rallied behind Mr. Smollett the loudest are now struggling with where to place their allegiance — with their outspoken friend Jussie, or with the Chicago Police Department, an agency long criticized for its treatment of black people. In this case, though, the police laid out an unusually expansive and detailed timeline that appears to undermine Mr. Smollett’s claims.