Michael Moore.
Cervaise, without covering the remainder of your post, to what do you attribute the lack of participation by “high profile” celebrities in the “Get Me Outta Here” network show? I’m sure budget had some small degree of influence, yet nonetheless, ratings are of such advertising contract worth (let’s not fool ourselves, it’s all about selling the viewer to the ad men and not ads to the viewer) where I find it hard to believe that this show couldn’t garner the needed star power. Your analysis please. Too tacky or too lame, or both?
I think the thing that worries me, is not the interest in famous peoples’ lives, it’s the underlying assumption that because they are famous, they are more intelligent or better at relationships than the wider population. I would hazzard a guess (judged on the actors I have worked with in my time) that the thing that makes the vast majority of them rich and famous is a clever and very intelligent manager.
Adulation? You must be watching different programs than I do.
If you let a genie out of a bottle and told it you wanted to be rich and famous, anf the genie made you into one of these guys, man, that would be twillight zone horror twist. These guys are despised by 99.9% of the population. And the other .01% are faking it.
Of course more folks are interested in Paltrow’s love life. Because more of us would like to shag Paltrow. Besides, what are the gonna say about Powell’s?
“Yep, still married and faithful.”
Nice. But not very interesting.
:dubious:
::: Clap ::: Clap :::
That’s one hell of a post Cervaise.
Well, this is more speculation than analysis, but here goes: It’s not about the money, really; it’s about what the celebrity actually gets out of the deal. Celebrities are willing to do a lot of things for money, as long as there’s no downside; look at all the high-profile stars who would never appear in a TV ad here in the U.S. but are willing to do the same in Japan. If they did it here, they might dilute their star power or their mystique, while overseas they get the paycheck and no reputation as a shill at home. This is changing, though; see Catherine Zeta-Jones as the spokesperson in those cellular ads, and I saw Dennis Hopper in one the other day also.
And in addition, people who are famous tend to get that way either through luck, or because they have a good instinct about what the public wants to see. They get to the top, and they stay there, because they’re media-savvy. Madonna’s the best example of this; the fact that she’s appearing in Gap ads is groundbreaking, and clears the way for others of her stature to follow. On the other hand, Cuba Gooding Jr. demonstrates with virtually every movie that Jerry Maguire was a fluke, and he’ll be on a celebrity reality show within five years, I think. Most really successful celebrities, however, are smarter than that.
And what they’re smarter about, in this case, is an attempt by the network to push a little too hard on the celebrity button. The public, more often than not, can smell this kind of manipulation, and stay away from it. See, f’rinstance, the manufacturing of Colin Farrell as a superstar. Seems like one minute, nobody knew who he was, and the next, he was the Next Big Thing. I know I wasn’t the only one who was skeptical of his staying power, even though he’d showed himself to be a pretty good actor. The public definitely felt that the establishment was pushing him, and it’s taken a while for us to agree to swallow. He can’t open a movie on the basis of his star power right now, not like Samuel L. Jackson or Julia Roberts or Bruce Willis can. It’s possible he’ll stick, and stay, but the jury’s still out.
The public much prefers to discover their celebrities on their own, or at least feel like they are. Look at Russell Crowe. He’d been kicking around the system for a few years, getting work without getting noticed by the mainstream (go back and look at an Australian movie called Proof, also starring Hugo Weaving). Then he’s part of the L.A. Confidential ensemble, and suddenly everybody says, “Wow, who’s that guy?” And by pure happenstance, he’s got a high-profile role in The Insider, for which he gets nominated, and then a movie-star-style lead in the shortly-to-follow Gladiator, which cements his fame. It’s important to remember that Gladiator wasn’t expected to be a smash hit; it was in a moribund genre, director Ridley Scott had been floundering the previous few years, it was released in late spring so it didn’t have to go head-to-head with the “bigger” summer titles, and so on. As a consequence, the public got to feel like it’s participating in the discovery of a personality, rather than having him simply foisted off on them.
For a similar phenomenon, look at American Idol. We may watch that show in droves (the collective we; I’ve never seen it), but we don’t actually buy the albums that the winners put out, and we certainly didn’t bother going to see that From Justin to Kelly movie. To me, this suggests that we’re fascinated by the process of how a celebrity is manufactured, but we have no interest in the celebrity that actually results from said process.
In short, then, in my opinion, I’m a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here failed because of a confluence of factors: There wasn’t enough money in the world to get A-list celebrities over their aversion to the concept, so they had to go down the ladder a ways, which gave the impression to the public that the show didn’t feature people they really wanted to see, it featured people who were desperate to keep themselves in the public eye. Sort of a feedback effect, I think.
This is the primate effect I was describing in my long post above. For whatever reason, we’re hardwired to believe that prominent people are important, and that important people are better than us. Obviously, we can decide not to believe this, and in fact most of us do on a case-by-case basis (i.e., “Why should I care what Sting thinks about rain forests? He’s just a bass player in a pop band”). However, I’d wager to say that if I found a celebrity you really did respect — on the basis of work or character, you might say, or some other “legitimate” criterion, but a celebrity you respect nonetheless — you would not be able to help yourself in giving undue weight to their beliefs on a range of subjects. As I said above, it’s just part of who we are.
No, my point is, why should we be interested in either person’s love life? Why should we be interested in the love life, or indeed the personal history in general, of any public figure, whether in entertainment or sports or politics or whatever?
No, and I didn’t mean to give that impression. Politics was just one example. The nature of celebrity suffuses every endeavor and interest. You mention sports as one alternate example; okay, so take a look at the fan-voted starters for the All-Star Baseball Game. Every year, there’s moaning and bitching from the sports journalists that the best guy wasn’t voted in at one position or another. Athletic accomplishments for the season take a back seat to — you guessed it — celebrityhood.
This is true about almost everything. Doesn’t matter if it’s politics, baseball, classical music, journalism, medicine, glass blowing, or anything else. Certain people rise to the top, and pass a certain threshhold of fame. Or already-famous outsiders step in and bring their penumbra with them. Remember when Geena Davis came thiiiiiis close to qualifying for the Olympic archery team? How many other people can you name who weren’t already celebrities who got coverage for not making it? Hell, Tom Cruise is on the cover of the current issue of freakin’ Architectural Digest this month, and it ain’t because he designed hisself a spiffy house.
For the life of me, I can’t figure out what your point here is. In fact, you’re supporting mine:
I still can’t understand how you think this means the media is forcing anybody to watch Barbara Walters interviewing Gwyneth Paltrow. The entertainment marketplace, by your own admission, revolves around giving people what they want to see. And what they want to see, as is easily demonstrated empirically, is stuff about celebrities. Is it an accident that the Andy Dick episode of Trading Places is one of their highest-rated shows?
Yes, I do know people who wouldn’t shut up about it. But more than that, we won’t admit our obsession. I guaran-goddamn-tee that if you ask ten people on the street if they were sick of the coverage, they’d say yes, but if you then went on to ask whether Condit was a scumbag, they’d all have an opinion about the question, forcefully held and expressed in painful detail that shows they were paying attention despite their disgust. It manifests itself like this: Go to Yahoo News. See another Condit/Levy story. Roll your eyes; “not this again.” And click on it anyway because you’re curious. In the preceding paragraph, you say that stuff nobody wants to watch doesn’t last, and in this paragraph you say the airwaves were filled with stuff nobody wanted to watch. Er, hello? You can bemoan the phenomenon all you want, but the big media companies are very, very good at measuring what gets consumed, and offering more of it. If it isn’t working, it goes away. The original example I offered, international politics, is near the bottom of the public’s prioritized-interest pile, just above hemorrhoids and dental surgery, and thus it’s impossible to find on television. QED.
This isn’t a new phenomenon, either. Back in the 1930s and 1940s, there was a nationally syndicated newspaper column called “What Babe Ruth Did Today,” or some such. (It’s mentioned in Ken Burns’s Baseball book, I believe.) It wasn’t a scandal piece, about his drinking and whoring; it was a cleaned-up, and sometimes wholly fictional, version of his life, solely to feed the interest of his fans. Why should anybody care what an athlete does outside the field of play? Does it matter, really, what the Babe had for breakfast, or whose horse track he patronized? Not at all… unless he’s a celebrity. And then we can’t get enough.
I’m sorry Cervaise, but I do think you’re quite wrong to so closely identify ‘the cult of celebrity’ with social hierarchy. I’d agree there is social aspect to it, but in seeking context you’ve raised a leg at entirely the wrong lamppost.
The reality lies elsewhere; as increasing numbers live behind gated communities, in isolation behind bolted doors in high-crime cities, outside estranged families and in non-existent communities, the doings of J-Lo replaces Mrs Jones daughter down the street who didn’t come home last night and Mrs Smith (two doors down) who invited the milkman in for a ‘cup of tea’.
Celebrity is the back fence tittle-tattle of yesteryear; our neighbours are now our ‘Friends’ (“I’ll be there for you . . . “). Little more to it than that.
However, it does – indirectly - inform what constitutes ‘acceptable behaviour’ so, in that sense, can be construed as having a hierarchical dimension. For example, the old conventions/hierarchy of, say, nice girl > fallen girl > tart > whore – except nowadays, those are just labels with little or no moral implications.
That’s why it exists, and why it grows exponentially as society becomes increasingly estranged and dysfunctional. As to how, he individuals (celebrities) sustain themselves as commercial vehicles
Cervaise, I thought about quoting your entire first post and responding, “Uma and Ethan broke up!?!?”, but I couldn’t bear to disturb the hamsters for such a lame joke.
Seriously, brilliant post.
As an observant limo driver to celebrities and the rich I have developed much disdain for them. When you live a life of excess it clouds your judgment and unless you are grounded in humility you will be chasing the wind forever. They believe they are privileged, entitled and deserving of non stop pampering and being catered to. Most are morally bankrupt and on some kind of drug and I couldn’t imagine having to live with any of them. They are incessant whiners and self obsessed pigs. They think too much of themselves and think we should think too much of them also. The truth is that even though they become giddy when they’re around them, deep inside people actually have little to no respect for these attention whores. It’s easy to get near one for an autograph, but try and live with one for long and you might be running for cover
Welcome to the SDMB. The post you responded to is thirteen years old. Thanks for the input. If you’d like to start a thread - “Ask the celebrity limo driver”, as a suggestion. Please do it in Mundane Pointless Stuff I Must Share (MPSIMS) section. I’d be interested.
The adulation of celebrities is good for democracy; it deflects the focus of the masses away from the adulation of politicians. Which is extremely bad for democracy. Most celebrities are just airheads with shit for brains, the more recent trend of adulation of successful (and powerful) businessmen is really more troubling.
Some celebrities also have big asses and bouncy tits that are nice to look at so that’s like prostrating yourself in front of the Paleolithic Venus. Although I’ve recently been informed in the most serious of way that objectification of women is very very wrong, so stick with the democracy thingy.
I’m a cultural limo driver, but not observant.
Unless one of the celebrities decides to run for office.
I can’t stand them either. And when Donald Trump gets elected he’s going to put and end to this nonsense.
You’re fired!!
Stiffed you on the tip, eh?
Regards,
Shodan
Chances are he’s a drive-by poster. 
Maybe so but I like to encourage new members. He was still showing on-line when I posted.
Bruno Kirby is alive and well!