Core Response #5: A Culture of Authenticity

In both of his readings for today, Richard Dyer argues for Judy Garland's appeal (particularly for gay men) as being a combination of reality and fiction within her own star image. Thus audiences can read films like A Star is Born and I Could Go On Singing as reflections of Garland’s own personal life and stardom. These films would be read entirely differently had the star been someone without Garland’s public problems in fact, part of their power comes from the combination of reality and fiction that Garland infuses them with.

The rise of the internet and the pervasiveness of celebrity/tabloid culture has extended this notion to a whole series of stars, mostly those of a younger generation whose stardom rests on a mixture of talent or work and tabloids. Yet whereas before, it was possible to read Judy Garland’s films as blending her life and art, now the life of a star like Lindsay Lohan trumps her art. It is difficult to watch a film like Georgia Rule and see her as anything but Lindsay Lohan. There is an inability to lose oneself in the film, not only because the character itself is so closely aligned with her own image as a wild LA girl, but also because of the influence of the widely-publicized personal drama surrounding the film such as her being publicly chastised by the head of the film’s production studio, her disruptions on set with late-night partying, etc. The result is that while one could read a Judy Garland film as being accentuated by her personal life, in this case, Lindsay Lohan’s personal life overtakes the film completely.

Dyer argues for the desire and need for authenticity in stardom, even as audiences and producers alike recognize its inherent manipulation. This kind of authenticity has become especially significant now with the availability and access to stars that exists on a level unseen in celebrity culture. This becomes most apparent with the recent phenomenon of hacking into stars’ lives. Within the past two years, Paris Hilton’s blackberry has been stolen and its contents posted online, Lindsay Lohan’s private messages on Myspace have gone public, and several other stars have found their private information offered to the public.

This phenomenon taps into the idea of authenticity because I think that the fact that these stars are putting themselves on public forums on the internet raises the question of authenticity as well as creates a new kind of fan-star relationship (am I really looking at Lindsay’s Myspace? Could I talk to Paris if I wanted to?) Yet this also marks an extreme form of this desire for authenticity as it is no longer just the paparazzi who capture stars at candid moments but rather it is fans themselves who can hack a person’s email or Myspace and post what they find for the world to see.

That’s why I’m surprised that any celebrity actually uses the internet for communication other than email because of this pattern of making photos and information public. But I think that on a certain level, it also makes sense in our current culture because a) the people who are using it like Lindsay Lohan or Miley Cyrus are stars whose fame depends in large part on relevancy and what better way to stay relevant than to have your private information leaked to the public and b) because the use of the internet also keeps them authentic by allowing people a glimpse, however brief that may be, into their private lives.

This notion of authenticity is pervasive, as seen by the fact that just this morning, I read on Page Six that Lindsay Lohan recently created a Facebook page. I looked it up and sure enough, there it was in the New York network. Granted, it was taken down within the hour (as it was on both ONTD and Page Six, I’m sure a ton of people tried to friend her) but even for those few minutes that I saw the page, I found myself looking for signs that it was real or authentic. In doing so, I started processing the information on the profile as details that would inform my own general reading of her as a star (i.e. the fact that her Facebook account was under Lindsay Ronson, a reference to her supposed girlfriend Samantha Ronson; her status defending her sobriety which refutes recent photos of her passed out in a car; Hilary Duff being one of her Facebook friends, etc.)

It sounds crazy, I know, but while reading Dyer's essay in Stardom: Industry of Desire, it was also the first thing that came to my head and I think this question of authenticity is one that has come to the forefront not just in our reading of stars, but of ordinary people as well. In this culture of Facebook and Myspace, we create profiles of ourselves that we display for all the world to see. I’m always fascinated by how people choose to present or edit themselves because much like reality television (another branch of this quest for authenticity), there are constant decisions being made about what to show and what not to show so that in the end, a new kind of reading of people has emerged from this culture, one which coexists with the reading and search for stars’ authenticity.