Celebrity Obsession A Stage Too Far?
Samantha Gilmartin asked:
Author, director, comedian, physician and all round polymath Jonathan Miller has been all over The Times and the BBC this week running the West End into the proverbial square ditch. Miller insisted that because his version of Hamlet was cast by relative unknowns he couldn’t get a gig in the West End. “Producers might have been swayed” he contends, “if I’d been prepared to put in for more luminous names”.
Attacks may not come any more thinly veiled than that, but Miller continues his tirade by discussing the two versions of Shakespeare’s seminal tragedy that are currently sulking moodily in the West End. The version at the Wyndams Theatre is fronted by a Mr Jude Law whom Miller suspects “can’t act better than the young unknown who played him for me” whilst at the RSC they have “that man from Dr Who”. Of course, Miller is referring here to hip, young actor David Tennant who will be leading the company from 24th July.
Of course, Miller’s remarks have not gone unnoticed by the theatrical powers that be. The artistic director of the RSC, Michael Boyd, hit back by declaring that though he “understood” Sir Jonathan’s frustrations, Tennant was not cast as Hamlet just “because he is Doctor Who”, but “because he is an excellent actor who deserves to play the role” Boyd went on to site the work Tennant has already done with the company before becoming a household name, starring in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Romeo and Juliet and The Comedy of Errors.
David continues: “Of course, the fact that David went on to become hugely popular as Doctor Who and for his other popular TV roles, means that he brings with him audiences who would not necessarily have booked to see Hamlet which can only be a good thing,”…
Hang on a minute, we’ve suddenly veered into fairly familiar waters haven’t we? Theatre producers refuting claims of ‘dumbing down’ by insisting that they are ‘drawing in new audiences’. One envisages Webber and Mackintosh, probably capped in berets, calling out from their golden soapbox at the head of a long line of theatrical liberators. But can theatre really be dressed up in this ‘Masses Vs Classes’ kefuffle? Art, surely, is for art sake?
So then we come to the crunch, how does this affect quality? Does sticking Christian Slater in the Edinburgh run of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest make the production any better or worse? That, of course, is nigh on impossible to answer; would it even have got the gig without his big Hollywood name plastered all over it? One thing is certain though, it does make the play stand out. A familiar face is recognisable whether it is a pleasing sight or not.
With established West End musicals like Chicago casting, well, dubious pop stars like Kelly Osbourne and Duncan James for brief turns in its run, we may question some of the underlying motives working behind the scenes. Are performers like Osbourne and James really the most talented people vying for the role, or are they cast because they have the highest profile?
Similarly, the front page of this week’s Stage Newspaper is adorned with the exclusive story that Gareth Gates is to make his West End debut in a one night Stiles and Drewe tribute gala at Her Majesty’s Theatre. Accompanied by a throng of ‘Any Dream Will Do’ and ‘How do You Solve A Problem Like Maria’ finalists, the more cynical reader may question why this fairly underwhelming spectacle is splashed across the front page? The answer, quite simply, is because Celebrity (Sex’s flatter and more nauseatingly vain half cousin) sells.
Miller’s attack on West End producers might carry more weight if star-studdied performances, good or bad, didn’t attract the biggest crowds. Perhaps if theatre was given a more central role in popular entertainment audiences would be more familiar with the art form and worry less about catching a famous name in the lime light. Until then celebrities will draw the biggest crowds, the highest prices and, unfortunately for Sir Jonathan Miller, the best theatres.
Author, director, comedian, physician and all round polymath Jonathan Miller has been all over The Times and the BBC this week running the West End into the proverbial square ditch. Miller insisted that because his version of Hamlet was cast by relative unknowns he couldn’t get a gig in the West End. “Producers might have been swayed” he contends, “if I’d been prepared to put in for more luminous names”.
Attacks may not come any more thinly veiled than that, but Miller continues his tirade by discussing the two versions of Shakespeare’s seminal tragedy that are currently sulking moodily in the West End. The version at the Wyndams Theatre is fronted by a Mr Jude Law whom Miller suspects “can’t act better than the young unknown who played him for me” whilst at the RSC they have “that man from Dr Who”. Of course, Miller is referring here to hip, young actor David Tennant who will be leading the company from 24th July.
Of course, Miller’s remarks have not gone unnoticed by the theatrical powers that be. The artistic director of the RSC, Michael Boyd, hit back by declaring that though he “understood” Sir Jonathan’s frustrations, Tennant was not cast as Hamlet just “because he is Doctor Who”, but “because he is an excellent actor who deserves to play the role” Boyd went on to site the work Tennant has already done with the company before becoming a household name, starring in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Romeo and Juliet and The Comedy of Errors.
David continues: “Of course, the fact that David went on to become hugely popular as Doctor Who and for his other popular TV roles, means that he brings with him audiences who would not necessarily have booked to see Hamlet which can only be a good thing,”…
Hang on a minute, we’ve suddenly veered into fairly familiar waters haven’t we? Theatre producers refuting claims of ‘dumbing down’ by insisting that they are ‘drawing in new audiences’. One envisages Webber and Mackintosh, probably capped in berets, calling out from their golden soapbox at the head of a long line of theatrical liberators. But can theatre really be dressed up in this ‘Masses Vs Classes’ kefuffle? Art, surely, is for art sake?
So then we come to the crunch, how does this affect quality? Does sticking Christian Slater in the Edinburgh run of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest make the production any better or worse? That, of course, is nigh on impossible to answer; would it even have got the gig without his big Hollywood name plastered all over it? One thing is certain though, it does make the play stand out. A familiar face is recognisable whether it is a pleasing sight or not.
With established West End musicals like Chicago casting, well, dubious pop stars like Kelly Osbourne and Duncan James for brief turns in its run, we may question some of the underlying motives working behind the scenes. Are performers like Osbourne and James really the most talented people vying for the role, or are they cast because they have the highest profile?
Similarly, the front page of this week’s Stage Newspaper is adorned with the exclusive story that Gareth Gates is to make his West End debut in a one night Stiles and Drewe tribute gala at Her Majesty’s Theatre. Accompanied by a throng of ‘Any Dream Will Do’ and ‘How do You Solve A Problem Like Maria’ finalists, the more cynical reader may question why this fairly underwhelming spectacle is splashed across the front page? The answer, quite simply, is because Celebrity (Sex’s flatter and more nauseatingly vain half cousin) sells.
Miller’s attack on West End producers might carry more weight if star-studdied performances, good or bad, didn’t attract the biggest crowds. Perhaps if theatre was given a more central role in popular entertainment audiences would be more familiar with the art form and worry less about catching a famous name in the lime light. Until then celebrities will draw the biggest crowds, the highest prices and, unfortunately for Sir Jonathan Miller, the best theatres.
Filtering Through Celebrity Gossip Lies and Truth
Gen Wright asked:
new celebrity gossip stories hit the front pages of the entertainment sites but how does one separate the truth from fiction? Of the popular news media outlets some of the more established like People Magazine, tend to be more reliable sources, confirming stories as much as possible before publishing. This tends to make these outlets trusted sources but at the same time often slow to come out with controversial news that’s harder to confirm and that might cause backlash. After all if a story reflects poorly on a celebrity, they and their reps are not likely to confirm and may in fact blatantly deny until totally cornered. They may also be reluctant to co-operate with that media outlet in the future.
There are also many media outlets that are more daring and will go forward with publishing a story pretty readily if they believe it’s based on truth, even if the gossip is based on circumstantial evidence. These types of stories require the most detective work to weigh the validity of the story. New couple alerts are a good example. Celebrities are often spotted ‘looking cozy’ together all the time. Sometimes these types of stories have some supporting photo evidence, other times it’s based on hearsay third party witnesses. Many times these stories are just planted by reps. and the celebrities themselves for publicity purposes. Jennifer Aniston is forever being linked to every leading man she works with, especially since her splitting from Brad Pitt. Fans want to see Jen find love again and tabloids are anxious to deliver to sell magazines. Two thirds of those stories or more are false of course. When Jen was initially linked with John Mayer, frankly I was skeptical. The funny/sad thing was, when Jen broke up with Mayer, she was immediately linked with another hot new guy. This rumor which should have made anyone highly skeptical soon proved to be false but that’s the nature of this business. Without going into a whole manifesto here, another type of story example that’s usually hard to get confirmation on is celebrities stricken with health issues. It was ‘The National Enquirer’ that broke the news on the Patrick Swayze cancer story, which was confirmed by his rep. after the actor was ‘outed’. Meanwhile stories like, Paul Newman’s alleged battle with cancer has never been officially confirmed.
Many gossip news outlets fall into a third category. Seemingly under the gun to crank out new articles,they throw in a few ‘trash gossip’ stories in the mix of each publication. Most of these fiction based stories are not malicous, and based on some shred of truth, that I call ‘progression stories’. A celebrity dating the same person for a while, is reported to be, breaking up, cheating or planning their wedding. A celebrity known to drink, is going to rehab. A celebrity is photographed with a new ring, there engaged. A couple weeks before Jennifer Aniston split up with John Mayer she appeared on two magazine covers on the same week. One reporting she was planning her wedding, the second saying she was already making plans to have a baby.
My biggest pet peeves in the truth and lies game is twofold:
Media outlets and websites that deliberately publish malicious ‘false stories’ for the sake of publicity. Many of these stories capitalizing on celebrities misfortunes and are attention grabbing but often based on nothing more then conjecture or just imagination. A recent trash story, that had my blood boiling, claimed that Christina Applegate was going to put off treatment for ****** cancer so she could have a baby! The tabloid picked up on the fact that: ‘Christina told an interviewer that she didn’t want to wait until her mid-forties to have a baby, and that her biological clock was ticking.’We learned 5 days later that Christina Applegate had already had a double mastectomy performed to remove the cancer.
Likewise media outlets that turn their back on certain types of stories because they don’t want to get their hands dirty or offend their audience. Recently the NY Post’s famous Page Six published under their ‘blind items’:
‘Which hunk in a summer movie is a violent, closeted **********? The heartthrob snuck into his ex’s apartment a few months ago and ***** him so violently, the ex ended up in the hospital – and the actor paid him $500,000 to keep his mouth shut.’
Well I guess you can see why they might be a bit reluctant to name, names. It’s not unusual for one of these blind items, which are posted frequently to eventually be reported with names by more daring publishers.
new celebrity gossip stories hit the front pages of the entertainment sites but how does one separate the truth from fiction? Of the popular news media outlets some of the more established like People Magazine, tend to be more reliable sources, confirming stories as much as possible before publishing. This tends to make these outlets trusted sources but at the same time often slow to come out with controversial news that’s harder to confirm and that might cause backlash. After all if a story reflects poorly on a celebrity, they and their reps are not likely to confirm and may in fact blatantly deny until totally cornered. They may also be reluctant to co-operate with that media outlet in the future.
There are also many media outlets that are more daring and will go forward with publishing a story pretty readily if they believe it’s based on truth, even if the gossip is based on circumstantial evidence. These types of stories require the most detective work to weigh the validity of the story. New couple alerts are a good example. Celebrities are often spotted ‘looking cozy’ together all the time. Sometimes these types of stories have some supporting photo evidence, other times it’s based on hearsay third party witnesses. Many times these stories are just planted by reps. and the celebrities themselves for publicity purposes. Jennifer Aniston is forever being linked to every leading man she works with, especially since her splitting from Brad Pitt. Fans want to see Jen find love again and tabloids are anxious to deliver to sell magazines. Two thirds of those stories or more are false of course. When Jen was initially linked with John Mayer, frankly I was skeptical. The funny/sad thing was, when Jen broke up with Mayer, she was immediately linked with another hot new guy. This rumor which should have made anyone highly skeptical soon proved to be false but that’s the nature of this business. Without going into a whole manifesto here, another type of story example that’s usually hard to get confirmation on is celebrities stricken with health issues. It was ‘The National Enquirer’ that broke the news on the Patrick Swayze cancer story, which was confirmed by his rep. after the actor was ‘outed’. Meanwhile stories like, Paul Newman’s alleged battle with cancer has never been officially confirmed.
Many gossip news outlets fall into a third category. Seemingly under the gun to crank out new articles,they throw in a few ‘trash gossip’ stories in the mix of each publication. Most of these fiction based stories are not malicous, and based on some shred of truth, that I call ‘progression stories’. A celebrity dating the same person for a while, is reported to be, breaking up, cheating or planning their wedding. A celebrity known to drink, is going to rehab. A celebrity is photographed with a new ring, there engaged. A couple weeks before Jennifer Aniston split up with John Mayer she appeared on two magazine covers on the same week. One reporting she was planning her wedding, the second saying she was already making plans to have a baby.
My biggest pet peeves in the truth and lies game is twofold:
Media outlets and websites that deliberately publish malicious ‘false stories’ for the sake of publicity. Many of these stories capitalizing on celebrities misfortunes and are attention grabbing but often based on nothing more then conjecture or just imagination. A recent trash story, that had my blood boiling, claimed that Christina Applegate was going to put off treatment for ****** cancer so she could have a baby! The tabloid picked up on the fact that: ‘Christina told an interviewer that she didn’t want to wait until her mid-forties to have a baby, and that her biological clock was ticking.’We learned 5 days later that Christina Applegate had already had a double mastectomy performed to remove the cancer.
Likewise media outlets that turn their back on certain types of stories because they don’t want to get their hands dirty or offend their audience. Recently the NY Post’s famous Page Six published under their ‘blind items’:
‘Which hunk in a summer movie is a violent, closeted **********? The heartthrob snuck into his ex’s apartment a few months ago and ***** him so violently, the ex ended up in the hospital – and the actor paid him $500,000 to keep his mouth shut.’
Well I guess you can see why they might be a bit reluctant to name, names. It’s not unusual for one of these blind items, which are posted frequently to eventually be reported with names by more daring publishers.
