Ryan ChartrandWhen actress Lindsay Lohan was in town a few months ago shooting her new movie, the San Luis Obispo Tribune sported a huge headline: “Look Out for Lindsay.” The very next day it read, “Welcome to Lohan-ville.” These front page stories eclipsed other news of a fatal car accident, a story about tainted tap water, and war news from Iraq.
San Luis Obispo’s recent brush with fame served as a reminder of the increasing level of importance society places on celebrities. Today, fame appears more attainable because it is no longer, as Socrates calls it, “the perfume of heroic deeds,” but (with the advent of the Internet and reality television), a virtual free-for-all.
“Fame Junkies,” by Jake Halpern, explores the discrepancy between “real life” and the illusion of grandeur in an extensive study of three areas of fame obsession: the celebrity entourage, rabid fans and aspiring child actors.
Rather than conduct his research from a desk, Halpern infiltrates the inner circles of his topics, simultaneously engaging in countless interviews. He has a knack for dredging up complete honesty from his subjects while remaining unbiased in order to let his readers form their own opinions. No matter how bizarre, he approaches every case with humanity and curiosity.
In an increasingly celebrity-obsessed society, “Fame Junkies” is eye-opening. It covers a topic that affects nearly everyone, but rarely gives us pause to consider why fame is such an attractive concept. Our interest in celebrities may be more deep-rooted than we think.
According to Halpern, this inclination could be the remains of an ancient survival technique. Those who latched on to the best hunter in a tribe were sure to reap the benefits of greater protection, more food and better shelter. These early syncophants might have been the ancestors of that girl with the Britney Spears binder who sat next to you in homeroom.
The fact that celebrities’ lives are spewed across tabloid covers and TV shows like “Entertainment Tonight” may give the public a false sense of familiarity, or what Halpern calls a para-social relationship. For instance, a character from your favorite sitcom may seem as real, or even more so, than those you encounter in your daily life. Others entertain delusions (whether or not they admit them) that they could really someday become friends with the celebrities they worship.
Halpern provides interesting data showing that people are significantly more lonely today than they were 50 years ago. Less extended families are living together (we ship grandma and grandpa off to the nursing home), and couples are getting married much later, resulting in more single-person homes. Halpern hypothesizes that this lonely void is increasingly being filled with pop culture.
Halpern, a journalist who has written for publications as diverse as The New York Times, Entertainment Weekly and Psychology Today, writes in clear, descriptive language.
Although the book gets off to a slow start, it soon proves itself to be a gem. Halpern offers the rare insider look at not one, but several different worlds the reader would never have the opportunity to explore.
In one of the book’s more intense interviews, Michael Levine, Michael Jackson’s publicist, summarizes Fame Junkies’ conflict when he says, “Fame is a validator. The conflict is that I want it. You want it. We all want it – or want to be close to it. But what is the price? It’s the Faustian bargain … Celebrities offer you the drug of validation, but you can’t talk straight to the pusher, or you won’t get your drug. That’s the deal.”