What About This Celebrity Thing?
Friday, September 14, 2007 at 04:37PM With the MTV Music awards happening this week, the TV talk was all about the latest Britney Spears meltdown. I saw only moments of it, but it appeared that Ms Spears was supremely out of it., squandering a moment on national TV that most performers will never have a chance to have. The resentment has permeated the community. All the press is down on Ms Spears and it got me to thinking about celebrity, which is definitely the two edged sword in this business that we’re in. What is it and what is it worth?
It is unfortunate, but the truth of the matter is, the more famous you are, the more likely you are to put buns in the seats, which is the only reason that concert promoters and club owners hire us. Not all the truly wonderful singers, songwriters, performers, painters, writers, etc, ever get their public acknowledgement. Many of them slag away in relative obscurity while pursuing their art for their whole lives and we may never hear of them.
While the supremely gifted manage to bring both the people and the chops, most of the time in our business it seems to be about being famous, not about being talented. It also seems to be a question of luck, and if you happen to have the talent when the luck thing shines on you, then you can take it to many other levels, but talent is clearly only part of the equation. Does the celebrity of Paris Hilton mystify anyone besides me? She gets more press in a week than the rest of us get in our lifetimes, but she has nothing to contribute so far as I can tell and I believe the press’s fascination with her will wane as soon as she stops paying a publicist. Consequently, we have to look at that fame thing and ask THE question, “what do we want to have happen here?”
And from the looks of what happens with fame or worse, ill deserved fame, it seems like a worthless pursuit. Let’s go back to Ms Spears for a moment. She is clearly troubled and spinning out of control. Why do you suppose that is?
If we look at her career, so far as I know, she started out being a darling on the Mickey Mouse Club, along with Christina Aguilera and Justin Timberlake. She has essentially been famous her whole life. Ms Spears is bright enough to know that the Disney Corporation could have chosen any of a thousand girls and boys to put in those roles and they would have become momentarily famous. But she had the talent and the luck and they chose her.
Ms Spears, thru the blessings of good teenage looks and drive and discipline managed to emerge from the pack and to become a star; then a mega star. Essentially, she has been famous her whole life, so we truly cannot imagine what that entails. She has to make every single mistake she makes under the brightest of spotlights. I suspect few of us could stand to have our mistakes so brightly lit.
But here’s the thing, I believe. She kept getting more and more famous and more and more money poured in. Unless you are a cretin, at some point in a situation like that, you have to recognize that you haven’t done anything to deserve such an incredible reward. When the reward seems unbalanced to the recipient, no matter how much work they’ve done to get there, they begin to believe that they didn’t do enough work to deserve this. Big time guilt. People starving all over the globe, while Britney Spears makes almost $800,000.00 a week?
That’s what I believe is messing her up; this incredible unbalance in her life. Perhaps grand acts of charity could help her balance it out or actual personal service to others, but I suspect she has no spiritual guidance in this area. And her crippling fame has made it nearly impossible for her to conceive of just doing for others.
That’s why you must be true to yourself and pursue your gift and your art. When and if celebrity comes, it comes in a balanced and guilt free fashion. You work all your life on your craft, your art, and at some point, some where, on some level, you are celebrated for your contribution. And your commitment to your art is your reward and it comes steady and clear. This other stuff is a distraction, a curse, and a necessary evil.
I know when I do a great performance, a truly great one. And in the thousands of nights that I’ve performed, I remember the five or six times that happened. And I keep performing in the hopes of upping the number of times that can happen…and to also get that incredible rush that comes with preparing for and then doing your best. There is no better celebrity than that. Forgive Ms Spears and bless her if you can.
Reader Comments (3)
Whenever a celelbrity has a "breakdown" and goes into "Rehab"...I think of the people who are talented and revered and have earned it who couldnt afford to do so...Judy Garland comes to mind....she worked very hard she was an addict and by the end of her life she had been swindled and become ill to the point that she was working often nonstop with many well publicized onstaged disasters...she was homeless having her wages garnished by the IRS for taxes that went back twenty years...she received a pitance so she could buy her drugs so she could do another performance to pay the IRS so she could buy her drugs so she could do another performance...sleeping at friends homes dying quicker and quicker as time went on...one of the reasons why she avoided help was she was afraid of prison...finally she moved to England where she died in 1969....and the UK always loved her but more than that she was out of the juristiction of the American IRS...
So Britney Spears is getting up on stage drunk or high or both....she's what 25...26?...The biggest difference is that she is famous and other kids her age arent...she is too young has too much money and no one to turn to...she is making major mistakes(What else are your twenties for?)...goofing off partying being self destructive and pardon me but whats the deal with the kids in the front seat on her lap while she drives...more over whats the deal with Britney in the driver's seat?...I'd LOVE to have a driver!...but I digress...she has all this money and fame some talent but she is still a twentisomething kid....in front of the world....and Yeah what is strange facination with Paris Hilton...everyone around her ends up in rehab...and her Daddy's Hotels aren't even that good...BTW My opinions especially on the Hilton Hotles do not reflect those of James Lee Stanley or Beechwood Records...Thank You
I hate to say it but we, the public help to create some of this celebrity hype. As long as we are buying the papers and magazines that these people are featured in this will continue. Britney has two beautiful kids to consider and she needs to grow up. Spend some time enjoying your boys. When you are ready to perform again, then come back. When I was much younger, it was fun to idolize certain people but now I realize it's much better to know someone for real than to just attend a show as a face in the crowd. The artists I enjoy now are more like friends and all the celebrity hype is so unimportant to me now. These out of control girls need to get a real life and do something worthwhile for a change.
Showbiz is such an indifferent mistress. Doesn't care whether you make it or not, doesn't care what happens to you before, during or after. That's why you commit to your art, you are rewarded by and thru that commitment. Too many people in the spotlight either don't think they are artists or don't recognize what gifts put them in the spotlight and think that they don't deserve the spotlight. My old friend, Milt Chapman, who was in the Axidentals, The Gateway Trio and the Jimmy Joyce Singers on the Smothers Brothers Show always says, "anybody who makes it, deserves it." deserves to make it and deserves what happens next, I guess.