Photo by Anthony Fomin on Unsplash
I almost titled this blog post, “The Death of Celebrity,” but that wasn’t quite right. There are plenty of social media celebrities (or influencers) being formed before our very eyes day after day. Just look at the meteoric rise of Jools Lebron who has ridden TikTok fame on her “very demure, very mindful” trend all the way to the set of Jimmy Kimmel.
Celebrities are certainly not dead.
No, I’m talking more about the studio-created celebrities. Those shining movie stars of the past who did all their own stunts and had perfect teeth. Think Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt or Julia Roberts and Nicole Kidman as they stunned audiences with their million-dollar red carpet looks. Or think about those music superstars who have sold millions of albums. Madonna wowed audiences with her risqué music videos and energetic music tours.
Over time, those celebrities morphed into not just stars but brands. We didn’t just watch their movies or listen to their music. We wanted to be them. And so, they started to put their names on everything. Rihanna is not just a music artist, she’s a makeup mogul. In fact, the majority of her billion-dollar wealth comes from her Fenty beauty brand. Everyone and their mothers are releasing a haircare line, including J Lo, Beyoncé, and the ill-fated Blake Lively.
I say ill-fated because of all of the drama surrounding her botched marketing launch of her new beauty product while promoting her new film about domestic violence. I mean, I could see the dilemma. A romcom seems like the perfect vehicle for promoting a bouncy, shiny new haircare line—a movie about generational trauma centering on domestic violence, not so much.
The Internet denizens were scathing in their takedown of Lively’s celebrity. Some will point to rampant online misogyny in all of that vitriol, and, yes, there is definitely a lot of that swirling around recent social media celebrity takedowns, a la J Lo.
But there is also celebrity and rich person fatigue. The rise of TikTok has shown us that anyone can become a celebrity. And these celebrities that come from our own masses are relatable, because they are us. These aren’t mega-rich celebs singing “Imagine” from their mansions during the height of the pandemic to show us how relatable they are.
So, yeah, I did watch “It Ends with Us” fully prepared for a downer of a movie given all of the viral videos that were created along with the movie’s terrible promo.
And it was just okay. I had never read the book, but I was somewhat engaged by the storyline. SPOILER ALERT: I did not understand why the movie was titled “It Ends with Us,” even though the main character implies that she is going to end up with a man who is just as emotionally broken as her and is pretty violent himself (and I certainly didn’t understand how she could afford to open up a store in one of the most expensive neighborhoods in Boston, Back Bay).
I suppose the news story swirling around Lively’s PR meltdown was enough to make me curious so that I did go see the movie, along with a lot of other people. It appears to be Lively’s highest grossing film thus far. So maybe, in the end, studio celebrities still do have a place in the entertainment marketing ecosystem, even if it isn’t as pleasant a place as it used to be.
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