04/18/09 - PASTBLAST - Media Analysis 2
Media Analysis 2 – Celebrity Archetypes
(Another past favorite… Enjoy!)
The concept of celebrity has been with us a long time. An instantly recognizable face or name has always been a basic organizing factor in civilization. I think that gets overlooked a lot, because of today’s connotation of celebrity as an athlete/artist/entertainer of some kind. But go ask the ancient Greeks who’s better known or more important to them—Helen of Troy, or the bitch playing Antigone down at the amphitheater. And don’t even get me started on Genghis Khan…y’know, not one good album got put out under Genghis Khan, but I’m not getting into it…
Point is, over the vast bowels of time, there’ve been many types of celebrities. And today, as media consumers, there are literally hundreds of celebrity archetypes for us to choose from. Yet the competition to personify those archetypes is as fierce as ever. Let’s turn to the world of entertainment, for its neverending plethora of examples.
EXAMPLE 1: BURT REYNOLDS. It’s sometimes hard for me to wrap my head around, but thirty years ago, Burt Reynolds was the sexiest thing going. It’s not that he doesn’t have his good points—I mean, he saved Jon Voight from hillbilly sodomy that one time with a bow and arrow; that was cool—I just can’t get past the moustache. But apparently I don’t know shit, because he posed naked in Cosmo and got panties wet from coast to coast. You think I’m shitting; go ask your mom about it. Oh yeah…
But Burt Reynolds was more than just a sex symbol. He was a Man’s Man, that special strain of double-manliness that fainting couches were invented for. He was the All-American Ideal…what more could you ask for? Well, if you’re a capitalist, the answer is another one. So the entertainment gods created Tom Selleck, for there are many times and places that moustaches are handy. But the hierarchy was clear: Burt Reynolds is a movie star, while Tom Selleck is the second string Burt Reynolds, a.k.a. “Burt Reynolds on TV”. And this situation functioned well for several years, so well in fact that a parasitic third string Burt Reynolds briefly appeared in the early 80s—Lee Horsley, who played the detective Matt Houston on the TV drama Matt Houston. (It’s okay; nobody remembers Lee Horsley except for me, but I love saying both of his names.)
It’s interesting how certain archetypes lend themselves to exaggeration with repetition. Consider EXAMPLE 2: MICK JAGGER. Deployed during some of the heaviest bombing of the first British Invasion, Mick Jagger took the “Big-Mouthed Singer” to a whole new level. It would take America years to develop a comparable model. But soon, from Boston, a town well known for not taking shit off the British, came our very own flappy-faced frontman: Steven Tyler of Aerosmith. He’s like a weird, hot-rod version of Mick Jagger—he’s skinnier, actually has a bigger mouth, and always with those tassel-things dangling off his arms and mic stand, like flame decals.
And the next step after Steven Tyler? …Audrey II, the giant talking plant from Little Shop of Horrors. Yes, named for a woman but voiced by a man, veiny and throbbing like a cock, yet more obviously vaginal than a Georgia O’Keefe painting in a titty bar, Audrey II is the biggest-mouthed singer in show business. There’s no question, really… I mean, do you think Steven Tyler can fit all of Steve Martin in his mouth? And to all of you that just went there in your heads, there’s nothing pretty about that, so just stop.
Then, there are some archetypes that are so powerful, so magnetic, that they inspire entire strains of doppelgangers. Nowhere is this clearer than with EXAMPLE 3: DAVID BOWIE. Good lord… any man who says he’s never secretly wanted to be David Bowie is either a fucking liar or hasn’t thought it through. Suave, sexy, sophisticated, mysterious, international, urbane, willowy, yet still frightening in a primal sense… and he can do anything. David Bowie can do anything he wants, and no one will say shit. He could cut a polka album with Yo-Yo Ma and Castro, and all anyone would do is say, “Really?” He’s the closest thing we have living to Oscar Wilde; he’s that cool. And because he’s that cool, he’s inspired a whole legion… the Legion of Sub-Bowies. Let’s take a moment to examine…
Who’s the first Sub-Bowie? Well, it was Sting, and look what happened… Goddamn it, Sting. You were doing just fine. Then something happened. Maybe it was in the rainforest, maybe it was after that Frankenstein movie… I don’t know. But you fucked it up. And I tried to ignore it, for years I tried to ignore it, Sting. But then I saw you on MTV that one time, singing a duet with the goddamn Backstreet Boys. And I still want to punch your face for that. You BROKE MY HEART, Sting… And there’re a lot of things I could say right now, but I’m going to keep a civil tongue, ‘cause you wrote “De Do Do Do, De Da Da Da”, and I love that shit.
But in reference to the current topic, time has made it painfully clear that David Bowie is superior to Sting in all ways, and Sting is definitely Sub-Bowie. This begs the question of just who is inferior enough to David Bowie and Sting to be Sub-Bowie 2. The obvious choice: Jude Law. And like a copy of a copy, there are now signs of distortion—the singing’s gone, and the scariness has been reduced to just creepy. Also, he’s actually gone beyond willowy into funhouse-mirror thin. Seriously, if Jude Law hasn’t played an AIDS patient in a movie yet, he should play one in every movie. That, and a concentration camp inmate… really, is there any question in people’s minds that both David Bowie and Sting could kick Jude Law’s ass? So there we go—Sub-Bowie 2.
You would think it ends there, but no. Because, faced with all this, if you ask yourself, “Who’s a big enough bitch that he could get beat up by David Bowie, Sting, or Jude Law, any day of the week?”… it’d have to be a pretty big bitch, wouldn’t it? The answer’s clear—Justin Timberlake. He’s the Bowie archetype gone all wrong; the singing’s back, but the accent’s gone, and so is the mystery, the sophistication, and the scariness. Which leaves a skinny white boy impersonating Michael Jackson and Prince. Somehow they sold that to us as the sexiest thing walking. And while I should perhaps in a weird way take that as a positive sign for myself, it’s still bizarre to think about…women desire a white Michael Jackson, but the Michael Jackson we already have… It’s like some Zen Buddhist koan; you could ponder it for years…
Getting off-point. The point is, Justin Timberlake’s a bitch, and in a fight between him and Jude Law, I’m going with the Judester. I know, it’s a tough call—neither of them looks like they could beat eggs, let alone someone’s ass. So you gotta go with your gut, and my gut tells me that all British people are a little bit crazy, and Mouseketeers are not known for scrapping.
The examples go on, but I won’t. It’s just interesting to see how celebrities end up piling atop each other, due in part to many of them being variations of older, familiar archetypes… that, and what was Sting doing singing a duet with the fucking Backstreet Boys? I mean, when I saw it, the world went still, and I thought I heard a trumpet…
Long, but worth it (And yes, that is what she said…),
JG
