The Psychology of the Celebrity Doppelgänger

My Two Celebrity Dopplegangers: Melissa George (In Treatment) and Katherine Heigl

If you use Facebook, you’ve certainly noticed the sweep of profile pics changed to famous faces.  I’ve seen pictures of Peter Krause, Paul Rudd, cross-eyed Britney Spears, Ashley Judd, Anne Hathaway, young Sally Field, Julia Stiles, Gillian Anderson, Oprah, Maria Sharapova, and dozens more.  And the most amazing thing — and I think most of you can attest to this — is how uncanny some of the resemblances are.  I don’t look like George or Heigl exactly; I do look like both of them inexactly.  Enough to give pause and wonder.

Because this celebrity doppleganger business isn’t just the latest iteration of Facebook’s gradual transformation into a massive digital chain letter (see also: post a picture of you and your brother and sister! post this really sappy paragraph about how much you appreciate your significant other/mother/father/best friend!)  The impulse is also dissimilar to that which fueled the wildfire spread of the “25 Things About Me” meme almost exactly a year ago, which played upon the simultaneous need to disclose and protect that characterizes “friendship” on Facebook.  This is just a manifestation of a greater social/psychological phenomenon — the same phenomenon that leads random people on the street to say things like “Oh man, you really look like that one guy from that one movie!” or “Are you related to Hilary Clinton?”

So here’s what I think is going on.

1.) Celebrities fix standards of beauty.

Celebrities — and movie stars in particular — have been theorized to ‘fix’ standards of beauty.  The more popular the star, the more we come to take that person’s beauty as a standard for the time.  Angelina Jolie is a good example of this for our current era, ‘fixing’ a standard of sexiness built on a foundation of danger, sexual experimentation, and sultry features.  Megan Fox fits within this paradigm — when people call her “the poor man’s Angelina Jolie,” they’re not (exactly) saying that she’s ‘trashy’ (although that is one of her valences) but that she almost, but not quite, fulfills the superlative type established by Jolie.  This is also what’s likely behind The Octo-Mom’s various surgeries to resemble Jolie.  It’s not that she wants to look pretty, or better, but rather resemble an established type of beauty.

2.) But none of you look like Jolie.

Think about it — did you see any Jolie doppelgängers?  What about, oh, Cary Grant? Or young Elizabeth Taylor?  Brad Pitt?   Paul Newman?  No.  Because those types of beauty are so fixed, and so superlative, that to say that you resembled him/her — even though you don’t, because if you actually looked like Paul Newman, you’d be mine  – because you’d  either be seen as a.) bragging or b.) full of crap.

Also, if many people actually looked like Jolie, then she’d cease to be original.  Part of what elevates her — makes her not only a superlative, but a superstar — is the uniqueness of her looks.  Think about it: she has large, incredibly distinctive lips, almond-shaped, almost feline eyes, a chiseled jaw.  She is different looking.

People don’t resemble Angelina Jolie, just like people don’t resemble Greta Garbo.  If they did, they wouldn’t be the stars that they are.  Barthes famously asserted that Garbo’s face resembled that of the archetype — “not drawn but sculpted in something smooth and fragile…at once perfect and ephemeral” — most similar to the masks of antiquity.  See below and try to disagree.

As Barthes continues, “The name given to her, the Divine, probably aimed to convey less a superlative state of beauty than the essence of her corporeal person, descended form a heaven where all things are formed and perfected in the clearest light.”  Garbo’s face is perfect — archetypal — and thus a point of admiration, but rarely aspiration (your facial features just won’t do it, no matter how much make-up you use — and not attainment.  Thus…

3.) It’s not that you look like the celebrity, per se.  It’s the celebrity looks like you — and many others.

In other words, most celebrities — the non-Jolies, non-Garbos, normal looking, often times B-celebrities, television personalities, sports players, cartoon characters, reality stars, newscasters, and other people that serve as our dopplegangers — are celebrities in part because they encapsulate not an ideal, but a reality.

It’s not like I’m the only person who resembles Melissa George and Katherine Heigl.  Anyone with strong Nordic heritage/features and blonde hair looks a lot like these stars.  My friend Colin just posted his doppleganger as Will Arnet — and it works, but not because their facial features are the same, but because they have the same hair.  Which is whispy and slightly receding.  Which is by no means unique.

Another friend of Indian heritage posted a picture of Jasmine as her doppelganger — not because she actually looks anything like the ridiculously proportioned Disney fetish object, but because Jasmine’s facial features are made to resemble as Indian/’Persian’/Arabic/Iranian/Iraqi/Palestinian features more broadly.  That and it’s a joke, playing on the idea that all white people think brown people look the same, or, in this case, like Jasmine.

In this way, the non-illustrious performers — the Jerry Seinfelds, the Jon Cryers, the Neil Patrick Harrises and Jeff Probsts and Emilie de Ravens and Kings of Leon brothers and Rachel Rays — have talent, of course, but they also have faces that touch on something familiar about the human condition.  They look like us.  Even someone like Jennifer Aniston looks like that one really good looking girl in your high school, given the benefit of a daily hair blow-out and professional make-up and daily meal service.  They become famous because they’re doing something unique, but they also manage to be non-threatening and normal.  They reinforce the essental notion that any of us, at any moment, could transition into fame — a belief that has long undergirded celebrity culture (just think of early star-making contests in the fan magazines of the 1920s) but has become ever more salient with the rise of reality television and culture.

When you put a celebrity doppelgänger up as your profile picture, or tell the guy next to you on the plane that he looks like a young Michael J. Fox, you’re participating in the perpetuation of our particularly American understanding of fame.  Just like anyone, no matter their economic, national, or racial background, is able, under the precepts of the American Dream, to succeed with hard work, so too is fame, in at least one of its myriad valences, available to us all.  It’s cultural democracy in action.  And our belief in it provides essential support for the otherwise fraught ideologies of the American Dream and democratic process.

Recall, however, that the word ‘doppelgänger,’ while commonly used to mean ‘double’ or ‘twin,’ actually has a much darker, more sinister connotation — a “sinister form of bilocation,” a “ghostly double” and “harbinger of bad luck.”  Perhaps more to the point, an omen of one’s death.  But perhaps that gets to the heart of the issue — if we all have the potential to be famous, what’s to keep me, with the help of some good eyeliner and a publicist and acting lessons, from usurping Katherine Heigl?  Or you from taking the place of Ryan Seacrest?  Or Elizabeth Hasslebeck?  Indeed, all celebrities have doppelgangers, which only serves to underlines the fickleness of fame.  They may pass from favor at any moment, exchanged for a new Nordic-looking blonde with oversized cheeks.

The Abjection of Jessica Simpson

Last week, gossip spread concerning “Jessica’s Big Oops.”  That oops, it seems, was that Jessica Simpson had – wait for it – farted, loudly, in a meeting.  According to US Weekly:

“A source tells Hot Stuff Jessica Simpson had a windy moment during a business meeting in January.  ’While one of the executives was speaking in a room full of five people, Jessica let out a very loud fart,’ says the insider.  ’Her mother was there, and it prompted her to turn around and yell ‘Jessica!’….It wasn’t Jessica’s first brush with public flatulence: she famously cut loose on an episode of Newlyweds, telling then-husband Nick Lachey, ‘You love my stinky ass.’”

Now why am I focusing on a silly bit of gossip like this?  Because it got me thinking more about Simpson — and why we’re continually fascinated by her, even when her love life and career appear to be one embarrassment after another.  She’s different from Britney Spears, and she’s no Lindsay Lohan.  She hasn’t descended into drug abuse, and there are no sex tapes.  But Simpson has a particular proclivity towards unfortunate fashion choices, accentuated by her oscillating weight.  Perhaps most famously, she rocked a pair of “mom jeans” while singing at a state fair last year, depicted both above and below.

These pictures spread through the internet and gossip mags, ostensibly because they highlighted Simpson’s weight gain.  (Really, though, she’s not even overweight — she may have gained a few pounds from before, but she only looks, er, ‘wide’ because of the cut of the jeans coupled with the belt and tank top).

Simpson’s appearance is also repeatedly criticized as “hermy.”  This is a rather mean term used to convey the fact that she oftentimes resembles a cross-dressing male.  The term has likewise been applied to Gaga and Cameron Diaz — it’s most often prompted by the presence of strong, angular facial features over-accentuated by make-up, as well as square, broad shoulders.

Note that part of what makes Simpson appear somewhat like a man is the presence of large, seemingly fake breasts and wig-like hair — both things that a man dressing as a woman might employ.  In other words, it’s not just her face — it’s her entire body, her wardrobe, her hairstyles, her make-up, even her poses and facial expressions.

My contention, then, is what makes Simpson so fascinating — what keeps her in the tabs and on our radar, what was at the core of her relationship with “serious musician” John Mayer — is a distinct quality of abjection.

The theory of abjection was first and most famously pronounced in the work of Julia Kristeva.  In Powers of Horror, Kristeva theorized the role of the abject in society-building, from Judaic Law to the present.  The common connotation of the abject is of that which is cast away – something  wretched – abject poverty, for example, or a rotting corpse.

Now, obviously I am by no means saying that Jessica Simpson is a corpse.  But aspects of her image absolutely manifest other aspects of abjection.  As I explain above, abjection includes that which is dirty — feces, decay, etc. — but also that which crosses borders and confuses.  The Jewish Tribes created laws concerning what was and wasn’t abject so that they wouldn’t die out: people naturally wanted to do things like have sex with their wives when the wives were on their periods, but when you’re living in the desert, as these Judaic Tribes were, you just can’t get yourself clean enough.  To do so would be to risk disease and, ultimately, death.

So what do you do?  You make a woman’s menstrual cycle into something dirty and shameful — and write laws (still on the books in the bible) that make the woman go hang out in a hut for a week while menstruating.  Eating pork was made abject because pigs were dirty animals and likely to pass along diseases — and kill off the tribe.  Incest was made abject because sleeping with your family members would result in genetically deformed children — and eventually kill off the tribe.  Homosexuality or not acting like your sex was made abject, because if you didn’t have sex that could make babies, you’d kill off the tribe.  All sorts of rules were set up around the way that a corpse would be handled — because handling the corpse would pass along bacteria and infection, and, of couse, kill off the tribe.  By labeling certain things as gross, the tribe — and society — was able to survive.

Thus, for Kristeva, the abject applies to that which makes her wretch – but it is also, on a deeper level, “what disturbs identity, system, order.  What does not respect borders, positions, rules.  The in-between, the ambiguous, the composite.”  Ultimately, the abject – refuse, corpses, blood – is what must be pushed aside, rejected, and labeled as other in order to live.  Put differently, by clearly labeling what I am not, I receive a clear understanding of what I am.

Importantly, the abject is at once an object of fascination and of repugnance.  It draws in as it repels, seduces as it disgusts.  It “fascinates desire,” seduces, calls out, but must, ultimately, be ejected, rejected.  Say you’re part of one of these ancient Jewish tribes.  You *want* to eat the pig — bacon tastes good!  But it’s also dangerous.  So in order to make it so that no one will succumb to the temptation of bacon, you’ve got label the pig as disgusting.

Thus the abject is thoroughly shadowed with shame.    Trespass into the abject must not only be a societal violation, but a moral one as well.  Desire for the chaotic, the border-breaking, the other, is constructed, at least in Judaic society, as an offense to God: to covet is to corrupt one’s inner purity.

Okay, okay, so what does this have to do with Jessica Simpson?

Everything.  There’s the association with farts and feces, which are quite straightforwardly abject.  There’s the “herminess,” highlighting the ways in which her appearance confuses gender and sex boundaries.  There’s her unruly body, overflowing her jeans, her dresses, trespassing the limits of her clothing.  She famously confused chicken and fish (“Chicken of the Sea”), emphasizing her own troubles with classification and order.  There’s the creepy micro-management of her career by her overbearing father, which hints of incest.  (Again, I’m not saying that she and her father have an incestuous relationship — but the suggestion is there, and that’s enough to infuse an image with abjection).

But perhaps most importantly, it seems that all those associated with her — whether Nick Lachey or John Mayer — have demonstrated their shame at being associated with Simpson.  They desire her strongly (enough to be in long-term relationships) but they are embarrassed by her.  Mayer in particular appeared sheepish when appearing with Simpson, and communicated as much in several interviews.  And even if he wasn’t ashamed “in real life,” he was represented as being ashamed — and that’s what makes Simpson appear so thoroughly abject.

She’s fascinating but repulsive, desirable but shameful.  And while this blog post may have seemed like a highly theoretical and hypothetical exercise, it’s not.  The abject is real — it’s not just a theory.  It’s an incredibly compelling way of explaining why we think of some things as disgusting but keep them around nonetheless; why desire and shame are two sides of the same coin.  And, at least in recent years, it forms the very foundation of Jessica Simpson’s image.  Ultimately, Jessica Simpson, the living, breathing person, with a heart and a mind, is not in and of herself abject.  But her image — the way that we consume and experience her — absolutely is.

How to Make a Valentine’s Day Movie in 10 Steps or Less

1.) Say you’re Warner Bros.  You’re trying to revamp your New Line ‘brand.’  You witness international success of your Valentine’s Day movie from last year, He’s Just Not That Into You, which grossed  $93.9 million domestic and $84 million international.  You realize that the film simply involved a vaguely pre-sold premise (a popular advice book) coupled with a large handful of male and female stars, all in supporting roles and thus (relatively) cheap.  Also realize that the quasi-British quasi-prequel to He’s Just Not That Into You from Universal, entitled Love Actually, grossed $246 million internationally on a $40 million budget.

2.)  Ah! So maybe New Line should have He’s Just Not That Into You and Love Actually mate! Only this time around, let’s ADD EVEN MORE STARS!  Like an exponential amount of stars!

3.)  How many stars?  Would ten be too many?  No?  Okay, let’s try NINETEEN BIG NAME STARS.

4.)  Get the woman who wrote The Prince and Me (and The Prince and Me 2: The Royal Wedding) and many episodes of Lifetime’s Army Wives to write the script, because that is exactly the filmic tradition that this movie should continue. Also get Pretty Woman director Garry Marshall, who, after a string of big flops (Georgia Rule, Raising Helen) is available for cheap.  But you can still put “Director of Pretty Woman” next to his name on all of the promotional materials.  SCORE.

5.) Make sure that that script involves each and every one of the nineteen stars (plus some otherwise cute little kids or hot also-rans) either falling in love with each other, proposing to one another, or falling in love with themselves for who they are (they might also start “dancing like no one is watching.”)  Each plot line should be heteronormative and affirm our generalized understanding of love as the universal language.

6.) Ensure that each of your 19 stars hits a crucial demo.  Get the teen audience with Taylor Swift, Taylor Lautner, and Emma Roberts (featured very, very prominently in the preview); get the 20/30 somethings with Jessica Biel, Jessica Alba, Ashton Kutcher, Topher Grace, Anne Hathaway, Jennifer Garner, and Bradley Cooper.  Get the amorphous middle-aged set with Julia Roberts and McSteamy AND McDreamy.  Make sure you spread your appeal beyond the just-white audience (a point on which He’s Just Not Into You failed) through the inclusion of Jamie Foxx, Hector Elizondo, and Queen Latifah.  Oh, and put Shirley MacLaine in there too!  You need to make this movie simultaneously seem like a girls-sympathy movie (e.g. the type of movie that girls go see when they’re without a “valentine”) AND a date movie (for teens as much as for married couples).  In other words, make sure it’s not too female-centric — or something that a guy would feel embarrassed walking out of.

7.) Create aesthetically pleasing interactive functions on the website that invite you to share your experience with love, as evidenced below.  Co-mingle user-generated ‘love’ content with star-generated ‘love’ content, available via each star’s authenticated Twitter account.

(Oh look, mypersonalized make-out spot in Walla Walla! Just enter your zip code!)

Note the incorporation of the film’s stars’ Tweet “concerning love”

8.) Solicit incredible tie-up/product placement/endorsement deals with so many companies so as to thoroughly subsidize our own budget — not to mention ingratiate yourself with fans through association with the likes of “Warriors in Pink,” which manages to promote the film, Ford, the stars involved with the promotion, and, well, breast cancer awareness.  (Ads for this are also all over the gossip weeklies).

Also make sure that all endorsement and tie-up deals are with companies that specifically target an audience of white middle-class women ages 20-50.

9.) CROSS-PLUG.  Make sure one of your stars just happens to be the hottest universally-palatable music artist of the moment, Taylor Swift.  Then make sure she records a song — to do with love — and pre-sell it on iTunes to build hype for the film and soundtrack.  Then have that star sing that song on the Grammy’s (two weeks before the film’s release) and celebrate the fact that the single was the fastest-selling female single iTunes history.

10.)  And if you haven’t made a perfect Valentine’s Day movie  yet, why don’t you NAME YOUR MOVIE VALENTINE’S DAY.

(And you can watch the trailer here).

Now that you, too, can create your own Valentine’s Day Movie, I will addthat as transparent and potentially brilliant as this strategy might seem, it’s certainly been done before, most notably by Universal in the early 1970s with ’star-fests’ The Towering Inferno, Earthquake, Airport, and Airport 1975, all of which were overflowing with old and new stars.  However, those movies required the actors to interact with each other — making it necessary for them to be on set simultaneously.  Genre revision and what Charles Ramirez-Berg has termed “the Tarantino effect” have made the splintered galaxy-style narrative format at home in both Love Actually and Valentine’s Day (not to mention Babel and Crash) not just popular, but conventional.  And it’s cost effective: each star can come in for two or three days and shoot what will end up to be three or four vignettes for total screen time between 10-15 minutes.

Crucially, star value was under threat during the 1970s, just as it is today.  As I’ve argued elsewhere on the blog (and has been reported by several other outlets) the studios are not only tightening their belts in general, but especially in the realm of star salaries, especially following the very public failures of star-studded film from last Spring and Summer.  (Duplicity, State of Play, Year One, The Taking of Pelham 123)  Even someone like Denzel is taking a pay cut in exchange for points off the film’s net, a common practice that can give a star a huge paycheck….but only if the movie is a hit.  Which isn’t to say that stars aren’t still important — obviously, celebrity gossip is as successful as ever, and star faces ensure much larger international grosses — but that the studios have figured out, once again, that they don’t assure a hit movie.  So they’re cutting salaries — and arranging things like Valentine’s Day, which uses stars, but only in very small doses.

I’ve been unable to find any budget info on the film (if you have it, let me know) but my guess would be that the top level stars were each paid anywhere from $200,000 – $500,000, and the second tier stars a little less.  Remember: 15 minutes of screen time, people.  19 stars x approx. 250,000 = 4.75 million.  That’s less than one big star.  While it remains to be seen how the film will compete with Nicholas Sparks weepie Dear John (released the week before), my guess is that no matter how fractured or cliched the story, it will succeed.  But what’s next year’s Valentine’s Day movie going to do, now that the only good name is taken?

The Hills Are Alive – with Tragedy

(Today’s Guest Post comes from Liz Ellcessor, a Ph.D. student in media and cultural studies at the University of Wisconson-Madison.  Find her fantastic blog at Dis/Embody.)

The latest stage in the neverending, intertextual, multimedia, and much-maligned rise of the stars of MTV’s “reality” series The Hills has centered on Heidi Montag Pratt’s extensive plastic surgery. “10 Procedures at Once!” People, trumpeted, complete with a quotation from Heidi that she is “addicted” to plastic surgery – a believable claim, as this is at least the third set of procedures the 23 year old has had done since emerging on the celebrity scene (a nose job and bigger breasts preceded the most recent improvements).

There has been quite a bit coverage of the stars of The Hills during its 5 seasons. Castmembers including Heidi, her husband Spencer Pratt, Audrina Patridge, Stephanie Pratt, Whitney Port and Brody Jenner have been the subjects – and financial beneficiaries – of celebrity tabloids, particularly US Weekly. Hills star Lauren Conrad, has appeared on more “respectable” covers, as well, including Seventeen, Entertainment Weekly and Cosmopolitan. Heidi and her husband, Spencer Pratt, are largely excluded from these venues, where other co-stars sometimes appear, as well as from cast events that Conrad attends. Due to feud after the second season – involving Lauren, a sex tape, Perez Hilton, and some tasteless interviews by Spencer – subsequent seasons of The Hills largely kept the couple apart from the putative star of the series, cordoning them off in their own plots and excluding them from promotional activities that involved Conrad. Since Conrad’s departure from the show, the Pratts have had a more significant presence, but Heidi was still denied the “starring” role as narrator, a part given to Conrad’s Laguna Beach nemesis Kristin Cavalleri.

Yet, Heidi and Spencer are perhaps the most visible Hills cast members in contemporary celebrity culture. Through their Twitter accounts, Heidi’s music career and Miss Universe performance, appearances on I’m a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here!, a boisterous public religiosity, interviews with David Letterman and a close relationship with Perez Hilton (plus their own hired paparazzi), Speidi are available for consumption at every click of the mouse, push of a button, and trip to the grocery store. Spencer attributes their pop cultural success to their willingness (particularly his) to play the part of the villain, engendering a love-to-hate-them response that carries an audience from outrageous fake Mexican wedding to outrageous fake LA wedding to multiple plastic surgeries.

While this villainous narrative is certainly a part of the plot of The Hills, particularly seasons 3-5, it is most certainly more directly applicable to Spencer than to Heidi – while his vitriol towards Conrad spewed forth, Heidi seemed to retain a desire to regain her friendship with Conrad, and seemed uncomfortable with some of Spencer’s more outré anti-social behavior. Having rewatched early seasons of The Hills recently, I want to suggest an alternative reading of the program and its extensions into gossip blogs and tabloid publications. Removing our focus from the aspirational elements and relatable themes of young women trying to make it in the big city, Heidi’s “character” – a version of herself and her star text – emerges as a potential tragic figure, undercutting the spectacle of the program and her own celebrity with a sense of impending doom.

During the first season of The Hills, Heidi was the second lead. Living with new best friend Lauren Conrad, attending school before beginning a new job, meeting a new boyfriend, and acting as a supportive friend to Lauren’s pathos, Heidi was charming. She was funny, she liked dogs, and while she may have seemed a little professionally unfocused, she carried a youthful optimism and was an important part of the show’s emerging dynamic. Yet, even in these early shows – and her brief appearance in Laguna Beach a retrospective view clearly illuminates what will become Heidi’s tragic flaw – like Macbeth’s, it seems to be ambition. In Heidi’s case, the ambition is not necessarily for a kingdom, but for attention and fame. Her runway kiss with Cavalleri, her desire for a music career, dropping out of college for a PR job, changing her appearance – all seem to point to a young woman eager to be popular, visible, adored.

As Shakespeare’s Macbeth killed the king, Duncan, with the encouragement of Lady Macbeth, giving his ambition full flower and leading to his downfall, Heidi’s ambition bloomed with her relationship with Spencer. In the context of The Hills, Heidi could never become the star – it remained Conrad’s show, and when Heidi moved out at the end of season two (to live with Spencer, whom Conrad disliked), it dramatically shifted her out of the central plots. Short of killing Conrad, what were an ambitious reality starlet and her celebrity hanger-on of a boyfriend to do?

By all appearances, Spencer used the time between seasons to take the text of The Hills well outside the borders of the MTV storyworld and tell the world a different story. Using Perez Hilton to get his message out to the public, Spencer asserted that rich-girl-next-door Conrad had made a sex tape with her drug-addicted ex-boyfriend. This attempt to tarnish Conrad’s image – complete with some extremely personal insults – could have utterly changed the direction of The Hills and Heidi and Spencer’s future success. Had it worked, had audiences turned on Conrad and MTV have released her to cut their losses, Heidi was still in a strong position as the second female lead – the show could easily have reoriented around her story. Though Spencer’s role in the sex tape rumor has been largely acknowledged, Heidi’s possible participation in or support is unclear – in an infamous scene, Conrad screams at Heidi, “you know what you did!”, but, in fact, we don’t know what Heidi did. Did she calculate that professional success, acclaim and attention were worth whatever falling out might ensue with her television friend? Did she turn herself over to a pernicious influence in the form of Spencer, her very own Lady Macbeth?

In the end, this ploy failed – Conrad and the boyfriend denied the rumors, MTV stood behind its proven star, and Heidi and Spencer were increasingly pushed to the periphery of the show. From this position, their newly chosen role as “villains” emerged, as Spencer continued to lambast “LC” and encourage Heidi to revel in the ended friendship. Within the show, Heidi’s discomfort with this was visible in her stated desire to reconnect with Conrad, in her desire for female friendships generally, in her dissatisfaction with her relationship with Spencer – even as they moved toward marriage, the couple fought openly and constantly. Additionally, though, Heidi’s on-screen presence lost its verve and charm. She seemed an increasingly wooden actress going through the motions, as she probably was, given the largely scripted or directed nature of the program. Was Heidi uncomfortable in this story, in this representation of self and image that would follow her outside the television screen?

The sex tape scandal is illustrative of the rise of Speidi outside The Hills as well, as it marked the moment when the extratextual, multiplatform, gossipy discussion surrounding the series became more interesting than what the dream-like reality soap opera could deliver. Suddenly, the “real” story of The Hills was always already happening – events transpired in the tabloids months before they aired, in edited form, on television. Here, then, Heidi and Spencer could shine – generating tabloid stories, staged photo opportunities, new music videos, and more, the couple found an alternative path to achieving a degree of celebrity notoriety. Ambition, then, was realized.

But, as Speidi’s antics evolve, this retrospective reading of Heidi as a tragic character primes us to wonder about her (inevitable?) fall. At what point will the ambition that drove her so far – ending relationships, losing status, staging PR stunts, releasing embarrassing music, getting extensive plastic surgery – begin to harm her? And at that point, what is the responsibility of those of us who watched her transformation from afar? Given the bodily extremity of Heidi’s latest news cycle, the tragic sense of doom seems all the more palpable, and the fall all the more imminent.

Brangelina: Only Over When They Say So.

See this PR machine? It'll only break when it's good and ready.

Maybe you didn’t hear the news on Saturday night.  Maybe you weren’t like me, at home, preparing a journal article at 7 pm, and were thus out of reach of all internet gossip.  But if you were online or in any way attached to social media, chances are you heard or saw the tsunami-like progress of the Brangelina Break-Up through the internet.  Of course, it was false.  But for a few hours, for many, it felt very true.

Lainey Gossip does a superb job of laying out the very specific reasons why this rumor could not have been true.  As she underlines,

These two are manipulative and obsessively controlling. Especially HIM. And they’re not lazy. They’re not Tiger Woods. They are experienced. They lock their sh-t down tight. And for something like this, if they really are prepared to call it off, it would have been engineered and masterminded months ago. They would have had a game plan in mind to run the message the way they want to run the message. Just like Pitt made the announcement of his split from Jennifer Aniston strategically on a Friday afternoon, after everyone had gone home, while he was away on holiday, as the least opportune time for the media.

In other words, they’re the best.  I’m not saying this because I like them or I’m fascinated by them; I’m saying this because they have a tested and true record of brilliant and immaculate publicity manipulation.  Please recall: Angelina Jolie, whose image had theretofore been characterized by brother-kissing, amulet-wearing, and associations with the likes of Billy Bob Thorton, “steals” Brad Pitt from all-American Jennifer Aniston.  They don’t get married.  They adopt many, many non-white children; they have three children out of wedlock.  And they got away with it!  Not only that, they are beloved.  Indeed, they are, without a doubt, the biggest stars in America.  Their auras are the largest; they may not be able to open a film like, say, oh, John Travolta in Wild Hogs, but trust me, their brands are much, much more valuable.

This wasn’t some magic trick or intrinsic quality; it was the product of impeccable and incredibly savvy P.R.  Just see Nikki Finke on Jolie’s manager, Guyer Kosinski, who was recently hired by Nicole Kidman to revamp her struggling career.  He may be referred to as “Guyer the Liar” and have a general reputation in Hollywood for sleaziness, but the guy is so effective that Jolie does not even have an agent.  Many of you already know this about Pitt and Jolie.  But for those of you who don’t, the lesson is: when, and if, they ever separate, it will be a masterpiece of P.R. manipulation.

And it will most certainly not come from the likes of The News of the World, whose story, published on Saturday afternoon, was the source of the rumor.  Now, as Lainey again points out, U.S. tabloids have been trumpeting the demise of Brange for the last four years.  Life and Style is especially keen on declaring the various reasons for their tragic break-up: Angelina cheats on Brad with tutor, Brad’s secret rendezvous with Jen, etc. etc.  But when you read it in Life and Style in the supermarket aisle, the vast majority of us, even those who love gossip, put absolutely zero stock in such a claim.  Why?  We’ve been trained.  We’ve seen so many false claims on the tabs — and I’m not necessarily talking about The National Enquirer, which, as the John Edwards and  Tiger Woods cases prove, are actually oftentimes ahead of the curve — but the truly unresearched, sensational, and derivative tabs like L&S, The Sun, and The Star.

Why, then, did so many believe it?  Let’s be a bit more specific.  Why did so many Americans believe it?  The answer is pretty simple: lack of international media literacy.  In other words, they didn’t realize that News of the World was a British tabloid.  Doesn’t it kind of sound like, oh, I dunno, The Globe and Mail?  Or something else super official?  It’s promising to offer the News of the World!  Not Life and Style!

And many people believed this story — including reputable people — which only facilitated the spread of the rumor.  Even Roger Ebert, who’s developed quite the devoted Twitter following, retweeted the news.  When it first broke, I was in Twitter “conversation” (oh god, supernerdtastic) with fellow media scholars Christine Becker and Alisa Perren, and all of us were looking for TMZ to break the news.  And if you ever hear news of such a split again — or of any major celebrity news — that’s where I’d absolutely advise going to confirm.  As I argue in my recent article on TMZ, which just came out in print in Television & New Media, TMZ has a rock-solid network of informants, inside-men/women in the legal system, and immaculate fact checking.  They’re basically lawsuit proof, in part because they don’t publish rumor.  They publish confirmed facts.  When they broke news of Michael Jackson’s death hours before anyone else, it wasn’t because they were jumping the gun.  He was dead on arrival, and they had the sources within the ambulance/EMT network to confirm it.   But they’re more than just libel-proof — they’re also right.  No matter your feelings about their garish and intrusive style, they get the dirt, and they publish it first, and if it’s not there, it’s not true.

Of course, when Pitt and Jolie (and their publicists) realized they needed to counter this unexpected rumor, they didn’t call TMZ.  TMZ rarely trucks in publicists.  Instead, they called People, which relayed an official statement as to the continuing integrity of their relationship.  And while official statements are often bunk, this one rings true.  Again, if they were going to break up, it most certainly would not be leaked, scooped, or scandalous.  It would be handled with kid-gloves, it would sustain the auras of both Pitt and Jolie, and it would make all involved parties look saintly.

So let this be our lesson: don’t trust British tabloids, don’t trust sources just because they have “news” in the title, and don’t believe a Brangelina break-up tale until it involves an official statement, TMZ confirmation, and a dramatic surge of damage control pictures featuring beautiful children.

Why George Clooney Makes Me Donate: Haiti, Celebrities, and Philanthropy

I was recently asked to review Andrew F. Cooper’s Celebrity Diplomacy for the online journal e3w Literature, published out of the English Department at UT-Austin.  (Kinda like Flow — but replete with book reviews).   I received the book just this week, and, considering the horrific disaster that befell Haiti last week,  it couldn’t have happened at more ‘appropriate’ time. As I work my way through the book, I’m struck by the ways in which ‘official’ diplomacy — the work of UNICEF Goodwill Ambassadors, etc. — bleeds into the work of more unofficial action, which would include general philanthropy and fundraising.

Iconic Image of Audrey Hepburn's UNICEF Work

According to Cooper, diplomacy is action, on the part of celebrities, that actually works within established political frameworks to advocate, agitate, or assist in change.  In other words, people who are “official.”  The most obvious example would be Audrey Hepburn (especially her work in hunger in Ethiopia in the 1980s) but many, many others have taken on official roles within the United Nations, from Angelina Jolie to Richard Gere. (The use of high profile celebrities has increased exponentially under Kofi Annan, who believes strongly in the P.R. potential of their association with various causes).  You also have those not officially tied to the United Nations, but still working within the system a quasi-diplomats.  Bono is the exemplar here, but Bob Geldof, the outspoken and oftentimes gauche British musician behind Live Aid and Live 8, also fits the bill.  (So, in a weird way, does someone like Bill Gates, who becomes a celebrity first through his innovations and capitalist skill, and second (and now, primarily) through his work with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation)

BFFs

And then you have celebrities who are not engaging in diplomacy, per se.  Instead, they have philanthropies, and they encourage you to give to them, e.g. Not On Our Watch, dedicated to preventing mass atrocities, founded by George Clooney, Don Cheadle, Matt Damon, Brad Pitt, and producer Jerry Weintraub.

Matt Damon visiting Zimbabwe as part of "Not On Our Watch"

Alternately, celebrities encourage you to give to OTHER philanthropies.  In other words, they attempt to use their clout and aura as a famous person to induce you to give to a specific cause, whether that be Operation Smile (Jessica Simpson) or PETA (Pam Anderson).

In the aftermath of the earthquake in Haiti, we’ve seen both of these approaches mobilized.  Perhaps most prominently, Haiti-native Wyclef Jean called immediate attention to the cause (most prominently on Twitter) and encouraged his fans and followers to donate (using text message) to his foundation, Yéle Haiti.  (Interestingly, according to the all-knowing Wikipedia, the foundation itself has been under investigation for non-reportage of funds, and has paid a rather low percentage of its funds towards actual projects.  Just a caution.)

Joel Madden, UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador. WHO KNEW?

In the days since, UNICEF Goodwill ambassadors, including Alyssa Milano and Joel Madden, have helped to raise money for aid to victims of the quake, appearing on Larry King, hosting benefit concerts, and asking for ‘matching donations‘ from corporations and encouraging donations through Twitter feeds and fan websites. Ben Stiller, John Mayer, Big Boi (from Outkast), Ryan Seacrest, Jennifer Lopez, Oprah, Rihanna, Nicole Richie, and dozens of others have participated in fundraising efforts; Rihanna, for example, just recorded a version of “Redemption Song” to benefit the effort, and John Travolta had one of his fleet of planes fly to Haiti stocked full of aid.   Madonna gave 250,000 dollars, Sandra Bullock donated a million, The Jolie-Pitt Foundation put up another million, and Gisele donated 1.5.  And those are just the biggest, most reported donations.

And I haven’t even mentioned George Clooney’s telethon, slated for January 22nd, which will air on all of the MTV networks (MTV, VH1, CMT, Comedy Central) plus NBC, ABC, CBS, The CW, CNN, and HBO.  The guestlist includes String, Alicia Keys, Justin Timberlake, Bono….and promises many, many more.

So celebrities encourage us to donate money — and many of us do it.  But what does this tell us about ourselves — and about the celebrities behind this diplomacy and philanthropy?

There are two major currents at work here.

1.) Celebrity Aura

Celebrities are used to sell all sorts of things — Kim Kardashian sells salads, Tiger Woods (used to) sell everything from watches to consulting services.  The idea is that your stored up appreciation, admiration, or affection for that celebrity will (subconsciously or consciously) lead you to purchase the product they endorse.   In most cases, you don’t go buy a salad at Carl’s Jr. because Kim Kardashian tells you to — but if you’re in the market for a salad, or for Carl’s Jr., then her endorsement might stick in your head.   The same goes for philanthropy.  You don’t hear Ryan Seacrest tell you to donate and suddenly realize “oh, yes, I SHOULD TOTALLY DO THAT!”  Rather, you’re already disposed towards donation — you’ve heard the stories on the news, you’ve seen images of the destruction — and their plea, and your trust in their specific celebrity, puts you over the edge.   Bear in mind, though, that different celebrities cater to different populations.  I don’t donate when Jennifer Lopez tells me to — but George Clooney, boy, I’m listening.  Why?  It’s a matter of respect and adulation.  George Clooney is a celebrity who I forget is trying to pitch me something.  His image resonates with me. Nicole Richie might resonate with you, or John Mayer or Bill Clinton or Bono might.  Clooney, as much as Bono, resonates with a broad and diverse swath of people — the exact reason he’s perfect to spearhead the telethon.  (Also like Bono, he’s popular within his particular community — in other words, people, and not just fans, will do what he asks.  Which means that he can compel other actors and celebrities to appear and promote a cause.  Indeed, part of his stated reason for attending the Golden Globes, despite being deep in planning for the telethon, was to buttonhole his Hollywood friends and compel them to participate).

An image that speaks

2.)  Celebrity Construction.

To put it bluntly, celebrities participate in philanthropy and charity causes because it helps their images.  Now, by no means am I proposing that celebrities hate those in need or don’t, in fact, care for the causes they champion.  I am, however, suggesting that visible work in the philanthropic or diplomatic sphere can be used as very handy and very effective tool in shaping a celebrity’s image.  Whether to neutralize rumor or scandal or to generally foster good will, there’s little you can argue with about helping others.  The case of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie is perhaps most instructive here, but there have been dozens of sports figures whose images have been tarnished by various foibles — drug use, dog fighting, whatever — and have cultivating relationships with philanthropies or created philanthropies to counter criticism.

It can also flesh out a pre-exisiting star image: Clooney, for example, wasn’t exactly lacking in public affection, but once he develops a philanthropy and explicit cause, and then backs up that dedication not only financially, but with his time, voice, and connections, he further ingratiates himself to his fans and, perhaps, develops new ones.  Since the end of 2008, Clooney has been an “ambassador of peace” for the UN.  What does that mean, exactly?  Your guess is as good as mine.  It means he travels places and has pictures taken, draws attention to otherwise neglected causes, and puts his name alongside good causes.  Again, I’m not saying that Clooney doesn’t care about these people or these causes — but you cannot deny the fact that his participation in these causes helps him, and his image, accrue no small amount of good will.

When it comes down to it, celebrities don’t make us give when we don’t want to.  But they do help motivate us to give when we’re too lazy to.  Which is part of the magic of the text message gift, right?  It’s painless giving.  Which, in and of itself, is a phenomenon of which we should be very, very wary.  Faced with what happened in Haiti — or, for that matter, with what has been happening in Haiti for over 200 years — we should feel a constant need to do something.  It shouldn’t take a celebrity to activate that desire, and it shouldn’t be limited to pocket change.  As is, however, a celebrity plea is often what it takes.  And if that’s how things are, then I’m thankful celebrities are willing to lend their names to causes in order to spur us into donation, even if that donation is never enough.

Our Golden Globes Hangover

Today’s post features a roundtable of various scholars from the Twitter media studies universe, all of whom (myself included) are invested in the Globes for rather different reasons.  Read on — and make sure to weigh on the question posed at post’s end.

Hollywood’s only shining moment of the night

Annie:

I’m going to go ahead and say it: this year’s Globes was a game changer.  And while it isn’t in any way predictive of who will actually win the Oscar (or the Emmy), this year’s show was markedly different than those of past years.  Different, and, in my humble celebrity opinion, worse.  It was more transparently commercial — and the artists involved registered their cognizance of that commerciality (and the general practice of studio bribing) accordingly.  (See Nikki Finke’s incisive take down here).  To my mind, even though it aired from 5-8 on the West Coast, it had all the trappings of NBC primetime: unfunny, trite, and throwaway.  The electricity and spontaneity the Globes historically connote: gone.  Here’s a brief break-down of what went wrong.

1.) Gervais stunk. I’m sure we’ll elaborate on this further, but let’s just agree that his particular brand of humor did not lend itself well to the Globes format.

2.) At the risk of sounding elitist — and again, this is a point that we’ll have to discuss at length — several wrong things won for all the wrong reasons. The wins for Glee, Robert Downey Jr., Sandra Bullock, Up in the Air, or Avatar made this much abundantly clear.  Now, I’m not saying that I don’t like Glee or RDJ, or that I didn’t appreciate most of Up in the Air,  or that I don’t value the achievement and innovation of Avatar.  Heck, I even kinda sorta like Sandra Bullock.  But they weren’t the best in their categories — that much is near universally agreed upon.  They’re popular and likable, but not the best.  Which is why I repeatedly Tweeted that this year’s Globes were resembling The People’s Choice awards — not lauds from a group of critics.  I’m particularly incensed by Bigelow and Mulligan’s losses.

3.) 90% of the celebrities were wooden.  There was obviously not enough champagne drinking going on.  Maybe it was the rain?  The general spark and spontaneity generally associated with the Globes was gone, and I blame James Cameron’s massive ego for sucking all the oxygen out of the air.  When Robert De Niro has the best and juiciest speech (okay, okay, rivaled by that of RDJ) you know something’s off.  There was no Pitt Porn, there were few bitch faces (save that of Jessica Lange, who gave two excellent ones — one for Drew (who didn’t even thank her) and another for Cameron’s trite call to “pat ourselves on the back.”)  There was one moment when it looked like George Clooney’s Italian Queen was perhaps giving him a happy ending under the table, but they cut away too quickly.

4.) No really.  Nothing exciting happened. I thought we were headed for greatness when the now-skeletal Felicity Huffman went off the rails in the early moments of the ceremony, but hers was the last gaff of the evening.  I also loved Julia Roberts vintage asshole behavior during the red carpet — with Tom Hanks by her side, she made fun of NBC and yelled “who’s Natalie?!?” when Billy Bush decided to cut his losses and leave them be.  But shots of her flirting with Paul McCartney simply couldn’t salvage a dry night.

5.) And I blame the director. Of the broadcast, that is.  There was a paucity of choice reaction shots.  There were all sorts of opportunities to catch the stars reacting poorly — when Gervais was digging on writers, say — but there was a lot of rushed panning and random celebrities.  Why couldn’t we have more shots of William Hurt’s beard?  Like all the time?  Enough of Julia’s smile and Meryl looking quietly bemused.  Let’s get some extended Clooney nookie action, or at least Cameron passive aggressively looking out the corner of his eye at how hot his exwife still is.

It’s like a party where you drank a lot and know you’ll be hungover the next day, but didn’t actually get the feel the joyful and giddy pleasures of being intoxicated.  And that’s just the worst.  Almost as bad, that is, as Sandra Bullock winning Best Actress for a movie about white people saving black people.

Myles McNutt (Graduate Student, TV Critic/Blogger)

I don’t want to sound as if I’m speaking out in support of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, but I think it’s important to clarify that this is not, in fact, a group of critics. They are (primarily) members of the press and little more, closer to tabloid reporters than to a Roger Ebert (not to suggest that Ebert himself is perfect, but he is unquestionably a critic and not a reporter). Perhaps it’s because I’ve spent so much time in the past ranting about how the HFPA fetishizes the new, continues to elevate HBO over the rest of television, and somehow has never realized how inane their supporting acting categories are, but I’ve come to the point where I’m almost rooting for the Globes to go off in bizarre directions.

The problem is that, while most of us have written off the show, the industry has not: the Globes have an influence on the Oscar race (Bullock, for example, is now guaranteed an Oscar nomination), and every star (except for Robert Downey Jr., who revealed the “HFPA are nuts” line of argumentation in his speech) thanks the Hollywood Foreign Press Association as if they are a voting body that deserves to be recognized as a legitimate sign of a film/show/star’s quality. I don’t blame them for this, but I do always worry about providing the show any sense of legitimacy. I might, in a bubble, be fine with Sandra Bullock’s win in terms of the Globes being the only non-fan-voted awards show crazy enough to give her an award for making history as the only woman to topline a film earning more than $200 Million, but I’m not so fine with the idea that her performance could knock out a more deserving competitor (Mulligan is safe, I think) come the Oscars.

What’s convenient about viewing the show from a primarily television perspective, however, is that they have extremely little impact: their love for things which are popular or airing on cable means that few shows are going to be “rescued” by a Golden Globe win, and because there’s such a long gap before the Emmys (and because the Supporting categories are organized so differently) there’s really no correlation. So on that front, I’m sort of glad Glee won a Golden Globe, since its chances of coming close to winning an Emmy are slim; the Globes sit in that liminal space between popular and legitimate, and I think that defines Glee almost perfectly, so it feels “right” (in so much as it feels kind of wrong, but in a way that I’ve come to accept).

I agree with Annie that Gervais was a failure, and would argue it was a combination of both the format not being built for a host (too many categories, too little time to develop rhythms) and Gervais not bothering to try very hard (which I expand upon here). And while there may not have been much exciting happening in the ballroom itself, I thought there was some great banter on Twitter: without the online engagement, I probably would have found the show excruciating. In the end, though, I guess my expectations were such that what we saw felt almost comfortably precisely, and I guess my Golden Globes-related cynicism might finally be close to depletion.

Hopefully next year will provide a refill – I don’t like being the closest thing we might have to an HFPA advocate.

Noel Kirkpatrick (Graduate Student, Blogger)

This had to be the dullest, least surprising Golden Globes in…well…forever (was no one drinking?!). Which is odd, since the thought of Ricky Gervais hosting had all of us very excited. In fact, that Gervais wasn’t very entertaining was probably the biggest surprise of the evening.  The Globes don’t have the leisurely pace of the Oscars, and Gervais has always taken over an awards presentation in a leisurely way. There’s no room for him to do his awkward comedy bits (with Steve Carell) when you have to move so briskly. It’s that scruffy, pig-nosed guy coming in from nowhere and tweaking the institution that makes us laugh, not him getting swallowed into it.

I’ve never been a fan of how the Globe organizes its dining tables, and it’s telling. The television folks feel scattered, sometimes way in the back, while the cinema folks are all very up front, easily shot for the cameras (though, the camera work in this telecast was ABYSMAL). It perpetuates this sense of stratification between cinema and television. Indeed, the telecast not only does it with its seating chart, but how it presents awards. The television awards are mostly up first, instead of scattered throughout. Why? To keep the audience, that they assume cares more about movies, watching to see who will win. (Even more telling is the presence of an award for lifetime work in film but not one for television.) This is a well stood upon soapbox, so I won’t belabor the point any longer save to say that people watch these award shows on TV, not on a silver screen and that matters. (Or it should matter more.)

Interestingly, however, I think this ties back into the elitism that Annie mentions. I can’t comment on most of the film winners simply because I haven’t seen most of the nominees, and neither did/could most of the people watching from home (How many people in the home audience saw An Education? My mother hadn’t even heard of The Hurt Locker). Yes, it’s not the People’s Choice Awards, but Bullock, Downey, Jr., and Cameron essentially, as Myles noted in the Twitter conversation, bought their Globes with box office dollars, not with merit. Perhaps in the face of sagging award show ratings, the HFPA decided to do the arty television (notice that we’re not really chiding them for their television votes (except for ignoring Neil Patrick Harris, c’mon people!)) and the mainstream movies to keep people viewing.

I personally always tune in for drunk celebrities.

Lindsay H. Garrison (Ph.D. student, blogger):

So the celebrities weren’t drunk, but the broadcast’s director could have been. So many shaky floor shots and awkward zooms – all for boring reactions and rushed walks to the podium. I’m with Annie: more of William Hurt’s beard, please.

The People’s Choice Awards Golden Globes were less than spectacular last night, with surprising wins that seemed more like picking the quarterback and the head cheerleader for homecoming court than the best acting talent or films. But I’m not sure I’d go as far as calling this a game-changer. While it’s easy to dismiss the HFPA for voting Avatar best picture along with Sandy B. and Meryl as best actresses (in a drama and comedy/musical, respectively), there were at least a few other head nods that didn’t seem like total celebrity suck-up: Best Original Song could have gone to U2 or Paul McCartney, but Ryan Bingham and T Bone Burnett took home the trophy for Crazy Heart. Jeff Bridges won over George Clooney for Best Actor. (Okay, that’s a stretch; Jeff Bridges isn’t a total ingenue, but his speech was great – who else thanks their stand-in?) Seriously, though. Yes, the Globes felt flat and too mainstream this year, but I’m not sure the Globes were ever really a truly magical event that their mediocrity is something I’m going to mourn for too long. I think their role as an Oscar barometer and box office nudger are still intact.

I mean, Avatar was already a clear front-runner for Best Picture; The Hurt Locker, Inglorious Basterds, and Precious have already made their Oscar mark with dominating wins at the Critic’s Choice Awards. I’m not sure this totally means Oscar failure for them or necessarily guarantees a win for Cameron and Avatar. Streep was already a front runner in the actress category, and yes, Bullock’s win does perhaps make her more of a stronger contender to Streep. So, we’ll see. But in the meantime, here are my thoughts on other parts of last night’s broadcast.

Notable TV win: Julianna Margulies for The Good Wife (in its first season on CBS). Margulies finally wins after being nominated six times for her work on E.R. (did you see her get a congratulatory kiss from George Clooney? Oh, Dr. Ross and Nurse Hathaway.) But The Good Wife is a show that intrigues me; there’s something about it that I really like, but something that keeps me from all-out loving it. Just renewed for its second season, its win here will hopefully allow Margulies and team to develop the show further and let it find its stride.

Most Wheels-Off Presentations: Harrison Ford looked like he hated being there and just wanted to go to bed (hopefully video will find its way online soon). Felicity Huffman could hardly get the words out of her mouth, and Taylor Lautner could hardly be heard over everyone still talking in the ballroom. Presenting the award for Best Comedy suited him well, but even on TV, it was obvious no one was paying him any attention.

Best Moments in Acceptance Speeches: My personal favorite goes to Julianna Margulies, who snuck a jab in at NBC (who was airing the awards show) when she thanked Les Moonves “for believing in the 10:00 drama.” Mo’Nique brought a tear to my eye in her heartfelt speech; too bad it was the first one of the night and seemed to be quickly forgotten. Scorcese gave a great speech in his win for the Cecille B. DeMille Award, captivating the room with his love for the art and desire to see it preserved. And James Cameron, G-d bless him, spoke a sentence or two of Na’vi while accepting the award for Avatar. (I know. Seriously).

Kristen (Phd, Late to the game blogger)

I can only blame CP time for why I’m late to this roundtable. But uh..I’m here. So here it goes.

First, I want to say that this whole section is in great part a conversation I had with some of my most trusted and respected bedfellows. So thanks IC.

Second, I disagree about Gervais. I thought he was a great host. Funny, smart, timely, and not afraid to state things the way they are and not the way publicists would like it to be. I’m not quite sure I want to return to the Hugh Jackman-esque/Billy Crystalitis that has been award show performers. I want someone who can make the celebs a little uncomfortable. They don’t just exist in that ballroom. They exist on the Pacific Coast Highway inebriated to the utmost and bedhobbing from star to star. Let’s not pretend like all is wel just cause you’re in some loaned pretty garments. And that is what I loved about Gervais.

I disagree with Annie on the being irate at the Golden Globes thing. In my opinion, to look to the Golden Globes as an indicator of “quality”  like looking to the Nickeoloden summer awards to know who’ll be the next “it” person. A futil enterprise, indeed. I’ve said elsewhwere that I believe the Golden Globes are the Walmart of award ceremonies. Complete with Rollback prices. To expect anything LESS than populist award winners is problematic. As had been said about the “HFPA” (in scare quotes because if they’re journalists, then I’m Lady Gaga..and I ain’t), they are more concerned about partying with celebrities than about actually being concerned about awarding good films their due. Also, as I was reminded in an earlier conversation this move to the popular has slowly been emerging. Recall, the changes made to the Oscars to accommodate more populist movies by expanding the nominees from 5 to 10 selections in various POPULAR categories. Perhaps the  Globes are following suit(especially since they can construct the  winners as they see fit).

Which leads me to this point: I may sound a bit ornery but really, what is the point of televised award shows? Is it really to elect the “best” film? Is it really to appreciate and give praise to the films we won’t forget about by the time Memorial Day rolls around? No, as Laineygossip says, “it’s about style.” And, you know what, we need to be honest about that and admit that that is what it is. I will remember that Reese Witherspoon wore a fantastic gown and had fantastic hair and makeup. I will remember that Clooney and his Italian new young thang were there and she may have been entertaining him in ways untold underneath that tablecloth. I will remember that Julia Roberts needs to go ahead and retire because it’s over. I will not, however, remember The Hangover. I will not, however, remember The Blind Side (well, I might if it makes into my dissertation). Why? Because they will fade with time. And the things I remember are more about extratextual things rather than the films themselves. Think about it: Aren’t the less televised, lesser known critic circles really  where we should be looking to determine what the worthy (that is, respectable, important, relevant, quality) cinema is? Televised award shows are placed in a set of boundaries that pertain to ratings and advertising revenue and popular acceptability. Forget Julia Roberts, “Who’s Natalie?!” deal. Insert into the masses’ mouth: “Who’s Kathryn Bigelow?!” I rest my case.

Finally, I really do think there’s something to minority actors and international actors acceptance speeches that functions to set the tone and generate some sort of appropriation device by which all other winners restate what the formers acceptance speech was. I’m thinking particularly about Mo’nique’s winning speech and Drew Barrymore’s “redo” of that. Drew don’t know Mo’nique. Probably won’t know Mo’nique. So for her to “shout out to her” in that way (despite Barrymore already being a nutter) is interesting.

Enough for now.

Kelli Marshall (UToledo, Unmuzzled Thoughts)

I think everything that can be said about this year’s Golden Globes ceremony has been said:

• Ricky Gervais was less than thrilling. However, as some have pointed out, it’s not necessarily all his fault.
• NBC (aptly?) was reamed throughout the ceremonies, e.g., “Let’s get going, before they replace me with Jay Leno” (Gervais); “Just want to say thanks to Les Moonves for believing in the 10 o’clock drama” (Julianna Margulies).
• The speeches of Mo’Nique (earnest), Robert Downey, Jr. (sarcastically amusing), and Meryl Streep (reflective) stood out.
• William Hurt’s beard was a highlight of the night. Just ask Noel Kirkpatrick.
• Witnessing The Hangover, The Blind Side, and Sherlock Holmes receive accolades prompted many to rename this year’s broadcast The People’s Choice Awards.
• Slow-talking Harrison Ford and eye-rolling Jennifer Aniston evidently did not want to be presenting.
• Kathryn Bigelow and The Hurt Locker were inexplicably shut out.
• De Niro and Di Caprio’s tribute to their mentor and friend, “Marty” Scorsese, was touching, funny, and well deserved.
• Upon accepting his award for Avatar, James Cameron spoke Na’vi. WTF?

My colleagues have already skillfully (and humorously) analyzed many of these events, discrepancies, and surprises. To this end, I will keep my analysis to a minimum, politely redirecting you to the above bullet points. I would like to mention, however, a bit about Twitter and its role in my Golden Globe experience this year.

Generally, I don’t watch award shows in their entirety. With TiVo remote in hand, I often fast-forward only to the categories that interest me (e.g., comedy/musical, drama, best film). This year, however, I decided to view the Golden Globes as they aired, tweeting while I watched.

Last night, my Twitterverse consisted of about 5 of 6 “film and media people,” grad students and professors, firing off tweets at each other about every 30 seconds. (Yeah, it’s hard to keep up!) Short statements about fashion (or lack thereof), awards speeches, winners, and losers flooded our Twitter accounts (apologies to my followers who had no real interest in The Globes). In 140 characters or fewer, we dissected the evening in real-time, cheering virtually for Dexter, Mo’Nique, and Glee, and booing virtually for Sandra Bullock, Sherlock Holmes, and Avatar. It’s a strange little community, Twitter. But it sure does make a three-hour event much more entertaining than it’s ever been before. Perhaps you’ll join us at the Oscars?

Annie Again:

Having slept on my earlier comments, I do agree that this year’s Globes was not as much as a ‘game changer’ as I’d like it to be.  I want people to be weirded out by this Globes, but listening to the chatter online, in the blogs, and on the air, no one seems to think this was all that special.  WHICH KINDA FLOORS ME.  Am I experiencing selective amnesia?  Between the  show itself (boring) and the chose of awardees (populist), it still seems much different — a return to Weinstein/art-house backlash that brought us a win for Gladiator and The Lord of the Rings over at the Oscars.  Thus, in conclusion, I’d love to hear others’ thoughts on whether this particular Globes signified as different or as par for the course….and, of course, your own favorite and least favorite moments.  Let the roundtable continue.

Team Conan: Nice Guys Finish First. Okay, well, kinda.

So you’ve got a weird looking male comedian.  He has flaming red hair, his humor is relentlessly self-deprecating, and he has real talent.  He also has a certain demeanor — different from Leno, different from Letterman, different from Carson — that makes you want to buy him a drink, give him relationship advice, and ask him to your sister’s wedding as a platonic date.  He’s not a star (clearly, he’s a television personality — like reality stars and daytime television hosts, he’s not an actor).  He’s a comedian.  Who ‘plays’ himself, whether in skits, appearing on other shows (Liz Lemon’s ex-boyfriend!) or interviewing guests.  Conan O’Brien doesn’t play other people, he doesn’t take roles.  Rather, he cultivates the image of Conan.

And ever since he took over as the host of The Late Show following the Leno-Letterman war for The Tonight Show, his particular persona has been built on a foundation of likability.  I’m not saying the guy is the Ellen Degeneres of Late Night — forgive me, but he’s far funnier, and treads the fine line of respectability and poor taste in a way that pleasures me to no end.  And just look at that face!

Like Tom Hanks and Jimmy Stewart and, yes, even Ellen, that face demands to be liked.  I look at Leno’s face, and I want to punch him.  I look at Letterman’s face, and I kinda suspect he’s up to no good.  But I look at Conan’s face — and, crucially, he’s almost always referred to by his first name — and I want to ask him to by my screwball adopted uncle.

Jay's Enormous Chin: Askin' for it.

My point exactly.

So when NBC made the decision earlier this week to move The Jay Leno Show back to 11:35, thus displacing Conan and his hard-earned Tonight Show back to The Late Show’s slot at 12:30, the air was thick with electric potential.  How would my screwball adopted uncle react?

Earlier today, Conan issued a statement that not only reified his established persona, but has quickly and effectively unified his fan base behind him.  Take a look at the statement, which I’m copying in full:

People of Earth:

In the last few days, I’ve been getting a lot of sympathy calls, and I
want to start by making it clear that no one should waste a second
feeling sorry for me. For 17 years, I’ve been getting paid to do what I
love most and, in a world with real problems, I’ve been absurdly lucky.
That said, I’ve been suddenly put in a very public predicament and my
bosses are demanding an immediate decision.

Six years ago, I signed a contract with NBC to take over The Tonight
Show in June of 2009. Like a lot of us, I grew up watching Johnny Carson
every night and the chance to one day sit in that chair has meant
everything to me. I worked long and hard to get that opportunity, passed
up far more lucrative offers, and since 2004 I have spent literally
hundreds of hours thinking of ways to extend the franchise long into the
future. It was my mistaken belief that, like my predecessor, I would
have the benefit of some time and, just as important, some degree of
ratings support from the prime-time schedule. Building a lasting
audience at 11:30 is impossible without both.

But sadly, we were never given that chance. After only seven months,
with my Tonight Show in its infancy, NBC has decided to react to their
terrible difficulties in prime-time by making a change in their
long-established late night schedule.

Last Thursday, NBC executives told me they intended to move the Tonight
Show to 12:05 to accommodate the Jay Leno Show at 11:35. For 60 years
the Tonight Show has aired immediately following the late local news. I
sincerely believe that delaying the Tonight Show into the next day to
accommodate another comedy program will seriously damage what I consider
to be the greatest franchise in the history of broadcasting. The Tonight
Show at 12:05 simply isn’t the Tonight Show. Also, if I accept this move
I will be knocking the Late Night show, which I inherited from David
Letterman and passed on to Jimmy Fallon, out of its long-held time slot.
That would hurt the other NBC franchise that I love, and it would be
unfair to Jimmy.

So it has come to this: I cannot express in words how much I enjoy
hosting this program and what an enormous personal disappointment it is
for me to consider losing it. My staff and I have worked unbelievably
hard and we are very proud of our contribution to the legacy of The
Tonight Show. But I cannot participate in what I honestly believe is its
destruction. Some people will make the argument that with DVRs and the
Internet a time slot doesn’t matter. But with the Tonight Show, I
believe nothing could matter more.

There has been speculation about my going to another network but, to set
the record straight, I currently have no other offer and honestly have
no idea what happens next. My hope is that NBC and I can resolve this
quickly so that my staff, crew, and I can do a show we can be proud of,
for a company that values our work.

Have a great day and, for the record, I am truly sorry about my hair;
it’s always been that way.

Yours,
Conan

Note the themes, tone, opening, closing: there’s no name calling, there’s no mention of Zucker, there’s not even an explicit jab at Leno.  Instead, there’s a sense of respect, not only for his fans, but the long history of the show that he has long held sacred.  When he writes ““My staff and I have worked unbelievably hard and we are very proud of our contribution to the legacy of The Tonight Show. But I cannot participate in what I honestly believe is its destruction,” he implicates NBC, but he does it in a way that emphasizes the fact that he’s simply attempting to protect his show, its history, and the millions who have watched it over the last six decades.  He’s not protecting himself — he’s protecting his show!  Its legacy!  HOW CAN YOU ARGUE WITH THAT, AMERICA?!?

Such respect is juxtaposed with his own signature humor, both in his address and salutation.  The statement mixes an extremely serious call to action, a well-earned defense of his previous work, and clear markers of his personality to a tremendous effect: it’s the work of an excellent writer and extremely savvy member of Hollywood, and, even better, it is by all accounts the work of Conan alone.  (As always, it doesn’t matter if it actually is or not — what matter is that enough people are reporting that his agents didn’t want him to issue the statement, but he purportedly stayed up into the wee hours of the night crafting what he “knew he had to do.”)  The statement is thus constructed as the outpouring of his own passionate, dedicated, and innately quirky self.

This much is authenticated by the statement’s reception, which has been without exception positive.  I don’t think I’ve ever seen such uniform support for a star or personality.  In articles, comments, and Tweets, he’s called a “class act,” “honest,” “full of integrity,” etc. et. al.  Even curmudgeon Nikki Finke really, really admires the move:

I’m proud of O’Brien for standing his ground and protecting his own and The Tonight Show’s future from NBC’s nitwits. There’s a rich legacy of that among his predecessors, from Steve Allen through Jack Paar and during Johnny Carson: they all refused to knuckle under to the network. Only Jay Leno didn’t. Instead, he begged like a dog for The Tonight Show, and then rolled over and played dead even after Zucker canned him. Then Leno stayed with the network and agreed to a 10 PM show doomed fromn the outset. What a doormat. Obviously, NBCU thought Conan would be just as compliant. I’m thrilled that he’s not. Hollywood should be, too, and publicly support him.

Because it’s the kind of principled position you don’t see anymore from showbiz talent who these days are afraid for their future livelihoods in this downsizing entertainment community and just grateful for a job, any job. As much as Big Media’s networks and studios think they call all the shots, and in almost every case they do because they’re so rich and powerful, here’s one of those rare times when they can’t push people around at will.

And in the hours since the release of Conan’s statement, the internet has facilitated the coalescence of fan sentiment.  The Twitter hashtag #TeamConan hovers between the fourth and fifth trending topic, and a Facebook Team Conan page has already attracted 10,000 fans.  IN UNDER SIX HOURS.

A quck sampling of #TeamConan tweets to exemplify the current sentiment:

Oh Conan. Lead. I will follow your pale, pale torch.

Conan, I have heard what they are planning to do to your show and it isn’t fair! Congrats on declining the offer! Fight man, fight!

Conan O’Brien has more class in his little finger than all of those guys at NBC put together!

I am for #team conan. Even the Pentagon is! I have never watched a full episode but might just tonight to spite NBC’s ongoing stupidity.

So we like Conan.  But I want to emphasize a few crucial points — especially since they’re mostly getting glossed over in the media coverage.  First, sure, we like Conan.  But we like the IDEA of Conan.  As the last Tweet makes clear, most of us don’t watch the show.  In fact, I have NEVER seen one of the new episodes of The Tonight Show with Conan was host.  The fandom and #TeamConan movement is around what Conan represents — not his actual product. As as Dyer and other star scholars have long emphasized, a star or personality can be tremendously popular….and even still, no one goes to see his movies, buy his products, or watch his show.  Conan’s problem isn’t NBC, per se; it’s the fact that only older audiences still watch late night television (because only older audiences still watch late night news) and the younger, commercially viable audiences either get their comedy/current events via The Daily Show, which plays at all hours and is always available via Comedycentral.com or through other online comedy sites.  I’m particularly fascinated by the fact that much of the Conan Twitter support has been stirred by a tweet by comedian Jim Gaffigan, a hilarious stand-up comedian with a Twitter following of 150,000.  Gaffigan isn’t popular because 150,000 people have seen him live; he’s popular because of his YouTube videos, radio clips (I personally was first introduced to him via Seattle’s 103.7 5:20 Funny).  In fact, my own affection for Conan, at least in recent years, centers around his tangental role in 30 Rock. The lesson, it seems, is that people aren’t rooting for Conan’s show, per se, as much as they’re rooting for a style of comedy and a persona — and a youthfulness.  And even though Conan evoked the storied past of The Tonight Show in his statement, most of the people Tweeting their support wouldn’t even find Johnny Carson, or his particular brand of humor, funny.

Second, Team Conan has no embodied opposition.  It’s not like Twilight, when Team Jacob is clearly up against Team Edward.  There is no Team Jay.  NBC isn’t deciding between Jay and Conan; it’s already announced that Leno will be back at 11:35.  Finke and others think that the statement could be used for leverage, but I think Conan’s gone.  His agent are fielding dozens of calls.  It’s not that he’s not a formidable competitor for Leno — he certainly is — it’s that there’s just not a contest.  They’re catering to very different demographics, with very different styles.  As more than one commentator has pointed out, this isn’t 1992, when Leno and Letterman were constructed as rivals.  Conan’s opposition is NBC, which has already demonstrated that it no longer even understands the rules by which these games, let alone fights, are played.

And third, we need to step back and consider why people would find it important enough to digitially voice their support for a persona.  To reinvoke the Twilight analogy, when you announce yourself as Team Jacob, you’re announcing something specific about what you find attractive in a male and in a relationship.  You’re also rejecting the hegemony of Team Edward.  To be Team Edward is to be different.  Does the same hold for Team Conan?  Just because he has red hair and a quirky sense of humor, does that mean that my support for him actually says a single thing about me?  If anything, supporting Conan, especially considering the outpouring of support, simply reinforces how easy, and ultimately non-controversial, it is to like the guy.  He issued a statement that signified as gutsy, brave, and dignified — all traits that, like his plaintiff Irish face, are easy to get behind.  Now, if he would’ve said something rude, or made fun of Leno, or said that Leno’s audience would be dead in twenty years, or that NBC was completely screwed, or dared to blasphemy the past, present, or future of late night comedy — that would be risky.  And if fans were voicing their support for that — well, that would be something (even more significant) to write about.  As is, I like him.  I could motivate my fingers to type in the #TeamConan hashtag.  But I’ll still fall asleep before he comes on tonight, as I generally do, and there’s very little to be done about that particular situation.

James Cameron: Star Maker?

Cameron and His Raw Clay

James Cameron makes huge, monstrous movies.  I’m not going to delve (too deeply) into the critical melee concerning his most recent film  – I saw it; it’s tremendously striking and aesthetically pleasurable, it’s also ridiculously, embarrassingly ideologically f-ed.  (You wonder why this film is doing so well internationally?  Because it makes Americans look destructive, one-minded, intolerant, profit-minded, and controlled by roided-up guys with bad scalp scars.  I’m just sayin’.)  Jonathan Gray at The Extratextuals has a compelling take on Avatar’s ‘anti-fans’; Maria Bustillos at the always dourly and smarmily entertaining The Awl shreds the film’s progressive claims; I appreciate the balance of appreciation and critique at work in David Denby’s review.

But what few people are talking about — in part because they’re too busy arguing how Avatar will or won’t change the way that films are made forevermore — is the fact that James Cameron has further established himself not as a director, or an innovator, or a somewhat derivative writer, but as a tremendously skilled star maker.

Before we get to Sam Worthington, let’s take a trip in the wayback machine.  Remember these kids?

Leonardo DiCaprio was sorta kinda a rising star when Cameron cast him in Titanic. That is, if you can call a head-turning performance in This Boy’s Life, an Oscar nom for What’s Eating Gilbert Grape and a recurring role in Growing Pains credentials for the mantle of ’rising star.’  Remember: Cameron cast him before he appeared in Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo + Juliet.  Cameron knew what could happen with this kid.  As for Kate Winslet, she was, at that point, pure arthouse.  She had attracted attention for her roles in Heavenly Creatures and Sense and Sensibility (including an Oscar nom) and starred in Jude and Kenneth Branuagh’s Hamlet, but she was certainly no household name.  She didn’t have a Cameron Diaz body; she didn’t star in action films; she wasn’t funny.  And while Winslet has mostly kept with arthouse fare  (Hideous Kinky, Smoke, Quills, Iris, Finding Neverland, Eternal Sunshine, Little Children, The Reader, Revolutionary Road, to name only half) and wouldn’t be trusted to open a film, she’s a hot prestige commodity.  As for DiCaprio, following a few manic years of “Leo-mania” post-Titanic, he has managed to tread the line between action star and prestige commodity (not to mention Scorsese’s new muse).

Most importantly, Titanic — and Cameron’s selection of them to star in it — effectively made their careers what they are today.

Go back a little further and you’ll find Cameron’s most brilliant find: Arnold Schwarzenegger.  See The New Yorker’s profile of Cameron from a few months back for details, but suffice to say that Cameron not only convinced Schwarzenegger, then known only for Conan the Barbarian, to take the role, but also wrote the lines that would allow his particular enunciative qualities to endure in American culture for decades.

And then there’s Avatar.  How can you make stars out of ‘Real-D’ digitally rendered characters?  THAT ARE BLUE AND LOOK LIKE CATS?  You don’t.  But with a human component, you don’t have to make the cat smurfs themselves stars.  The Na’vi and their likenesses can be synergistic moneymakers — can you imagine how many kids are going to dress as Na’vi next Halloween? — but Cameron also knew that he needed human bodies to make this film profitable.  As was the case in Titanic, most of the roles in Avatar are purely utilitarian, put in place simply to advance the narrative: what do we know about the Colonel (Stephen Lang), the asshole corporate guy (Giovanni Ribisi), the pilot (Michelle Rodriguez), the nerdy scientist (Joel Moore) or the other nerdy scientist (Dileep Rao) other than clipped statements or actions that establish them clearly as good or bad guys?

Do you see Zoe Saldana here?

The character of Neytiri, voiced by Zoe Saldana and modeled on her facial features and body movements, is a unique case.  Zoe Saldana herself has been a long struggling Hollywood actress — please recall both Center Stage and Crossroads — and is coming off a key franchise role in Star Trek. She has a handful of biggish movies in post-production; she’ll be in Neil LaBute’s Death at a Funeral and several action-esque movies that make ample use of her midriff.  My guess is she’ll end up a star, if not a huge one — but not necessary because of Avatar.  Her face is too absent from the film.

Sam Worthington, however, is another story entirely.  Here’s a guy who, as has been well-rehearsed in publicity for this film and Terminator, was LIVING IN HIS CAR before he was cast in Avatar.  He apparently went to an audition to an acting school with his then-girlfriend; he got in, she didn’t, they broke up.  When he was 30, he wanted to “reboot” his life, so he sold all of his belongings, netted $2000, bought a car, and ended up living in said car.  He tried out for an unnamed project with no director’s name attached; a few days later he received a call from Cameron, who wanted him to come in for six months of auditions.  He eventually got the part.  While Cameron was endlessly tinkering in post, he “sent” Worthington to McG, who was directing the fourth installment of Cameron’s former baby, Terminator. Granted, Terminator: Salvation was no tremendous success, but it put Worthington’s name (and face) on the map.  In essence, Cameron was prepping the market for his new star.

Worthington, Terminator-style

With both Terminator and Avatar on his resume, Worthington was cast in three big films, each of which are now in post and scheduled for release within the year: espionage thriller The Debt (with Helen Mirren and Tom Wilkinson); quasi-rom-com Last Night (with Keira Knightly) and, most significantly, CGI-orgasm Clash of the Titans, in which 300 meets Avatar meets Grand Theft Auto.  He’s basically establishing himself as a Matt Damon/Russell Crowe hybrid — equally adept at action, thrillers, drama, fantasy, and historical epics.

Worthington, historical-CGI-epic style.

I mean, the guy’s a babe.  He has that sweet hint of Australian accent sneaking out in his speech (you can hear it distinctly in the voiceover for Avatar); he has big arms; he’s got that look of the innocent and the slightly busted and the huge-hearted, all of which are crucial to pulling off the action/heartthrob role.  (See Daniel Craig and Crowe for exemplars in this vein).  He kinda looks like Tom Brady, which is to say he kinda looks like he wants to be America’s hero; he’s genial in interviews; he has a fantastic ‘origin story’ (I mean seriously, living in your car?  Only Hilary Swank can compete!); and he’s hungry.  He appeals to men and women, which is, of course, crucial.  Even older women like him, as emphasized by this fawning EW blogger.

Tom Brady's dimple-less doppleganger

He’s not as pretty as Leonardo DiCaprio, but he’s pretty enough.  His muscles aren’t as big as The Terminator’s, but they’re big enough.  He’s just unique enough to be interesting, but not crazy or volatile and thus uncastable like Colin Farrell or old school Johnny Depp and Robert Downey Jr..  His image was completely malleable going into the publicity for Avatar, which was exactly what Cameron wanted.  Just as in the case of the technology he uses in his films, Cameron molds his tools — and that includes his stars — to fit his purpose.  Worthington will most likely go on to huge success following this film.  But he did it on Cameron’s terms, and Avatar will always be the ground note of his stardom.  Cameron isn’t doing anything novel — star makers such as Selznick, Mayer, Henry Willson, and others have long practiced this sort of career manipulation.

Ultimately, it’s fascinating to me that we, as media studies academics, film critics, and informal industry observers, make such noise about everything to do with Cameron — his bombastic filmmaking style, his visionary use of technology, his insistence on playing by his own set of rules, his rejection of the maxims of contemporary conglomerate Hollywood — yet fail to see the very clear ways in which he operates very much like an independent producer, and star maker, of classic Hollywood style.

Fun! New! Syllabi!

The only good picture of my new home in Hunter Conservatory. Only no police man waiting outside.

Just a brief post to guide you to my two new syllabi and course blogs for two of the three classes I’m teaching here at Whitman:  Hollywood Stars and Television & American Culture.

A few caveats:

**The students I’ll be teaching are either a.) upperclassmen or b.) film majors.  Note the term use, though — they’ve taken film classes, but they haven’t taken any television or cultural studies courses (at least not media-based cultural studies).  (That’s part of the problem with small liberal arts colleges with nascent media studies programs — in the case of Whitman, there’s one full time professor teaching film, a smattering of film courses offered outside of the department, and a Rhetorician in the department teaching film criticism.)

**Television & American Culture isn’t History of Broadcasting.  Indeed, if I could revise the title of the course now, it’d be Contemporary Television & American Culture.  At first, I was planning to incorporate much more historical television (and broadcasting history more generally) in the syllabus, but there simply was not enough space or time.  If I get “optioned” to continue in the Fall, I’d most likely teach a History of Broadcasting class to supplement this one.  I’ll be working hard to make sure the class doesn’t end up ahistorical, but in some ways, the fact that these students have never taken a television course allows me to play with all the fun stuff.

**I’m so excited for the Stars class that I can’t even conjure a proper metaphor to indicate how excited I am.  I suppose this is what all teachers feel like when they finally get to teach a class wholly based on things that they love and that matter to them.  This obviously also made settling on topics, stars, screenings, and readings super difficult, and the syllabus has gone through a number of holistic changes.  I “borrowed” a few ideas/readings from Christine Becker’s excellent syllabus for Movie Stardom and Celebrity Culture at Notre Dame.

**Twitter just flat out didn’t work last semester; I honestly don’t know how many kids bring computers to class at Whitman (I never did, but that was seven years ago), but I still think kids are figuring out how Twitter works, and most don’t even have accounts, let alone use it on a daily basis.  (I do think Twitter works effectively in classes on New Media — but it’s harder when the medium itself isn’t the focus of study).  I’ll be truly interested to see how Ben Aslinger’s strategy for using Twitter works.

**I am, however, switching  quizzing for to forced compelled blog discussion once a week, facilitated by an opening question or two.  My class size is small (20 in each), which will hopefully encourage more engagement between students (instead of each response simply speaking to me, or to my question).  Again, we’ll see.  I’m also continuing with “Supplemental Screenings,” for which students view an additional film and think through the ways in which it complements/complicates the screening, reading, and lectures from the week and then post on them.

The goal of these screenings is simple:  GET STUDENTS TO WATCH MORE THINGS.  I’m always dismayed by how little time students find to watch old/new media (because they’re focusing on doing the reading for my class and others), and this is a way of making the “work” into actual screening of media.  Students in my History of the Moving Image class did an incredible job with it last semester, posting screen shots, close analysis, YouTube videos, etc. to, er, supplement their supplemental screenings.

I still have two weeks before I start teaching, so any suggestions — for additional supplemental screenings, readings, additional topics, etc. — would be wholly welcomed and appreciated.