CELEBRITAUNTING: YOU’RE NO ONE IF YOU’RE NOT DISRESPECTED

Now that the award season is officially over, what are we to do? No more fashion faux pas. No speeches to ridicule. We no sooner do we roll up the red carpet then we fall into the funk of there being no more celebritaunting.

We used to create stars and called them Hollywood royalty. But unlike the noble lineage of European birthright, ours were simply be the product of the American dream—discovered at a soda fountain and turned into an honest to goodness screen icon. Today those stars have all but gone and in their place we are creating nothing but celebrities—from trailer trash to Beverly Hills divas, anyone can be famous. How else can an Armenian family, short on talent and long on P.R., become a bona fide celebrity cash cow? We made them so? For this is the age in which we are not creating screen legends we love but rather car wreck notables we love to hate.

All of which leads to why?

Think of ‘celebrity’ like Starbucks. Starbucks isn’t about coffee; it’s about a lifestyle—the notion that you can feel better about yourself by overpaying for a cup of coffee unlike the poor slob who gets his coffee at the local McDonalds. You are a simply a better person than that other guy. To ensure the experience, they’ve created world wide parlors from which your can experience the experience—wombs with a view—for road weary travelers who needed to feel superior to the natives in the land to which they’ve traveled. Celebrity, today, is Starbucks. We feel better about ourselves by passing judgment on those we have elevated.

To that end we have created a new sport I call celebritaunting. Build them up just to rip them down. In days of old you would have never seen Joan Crawford, Lana Turner or Elizabeth Taylor coming out of a yoga class or even, god forbid, a Starbucks in sweat pants, no make up and their hair in a loose bun. They were stars. But today we want to see that mess in a dress, not to prove our celebrities human but rather to guarantee a less-than-perfect status. We can feel better about ourselves if celebrities are fallible and frumpy.

Celebrity used to be aspirational and now it is an embarrassment waiting to happen and we celebritaunt to make sure it is so. Take E!—the venerable kiss-ass network which has made a one letter name for itself kneeling at the alter of celebrity. On Oscar Sunday, they take to the red carpet, oohing and aahing, praising every bejeweled and bouffanted haute couture heroine to grace their presence only to rip them to shreds the next day on the “Fashion Police”—celebritaunting at its finest.

So how did we go from creating Hollywood royalty to elevating classless commodities to celebrity status? We have created something called reality entertainment, which is closer to the Roman Coliseum than it is to actual reality. As long as there is a Kardashian ass or a Honey Boo Boo or a Surreal Housewife to poke a stick at, we will feel better about ourselves by assuring ourselves that no matter how hard life is, we are, at least, not those wretched people.

We have competition shows from Survivor, to Big Brother, to The Bachelor in which you have to kill off the competition. Sound familiar you ancient Romans?

How long before “Celebritaunting” is not a concept but a hit show? Be careful what you ask for you celebrities of tomorrow. We’re coming after you an we will be a pain in your ass-piration.