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Notes from the Couch 1
My Dream Celebrity Death Match, Tyson v. Goody
Mediated Lives, (& Deaths) as reflective, 'therapeutic' Spaces
It appears that the popular media is capable of transforming the outlooks of individuals through the act of disclosure and sharing. The sins and sufferings of celebrities and other well known figures are apparently redeemed by the adoption of these aspects of a therapeutic mode. At the very least, they do get sympathy because they share their suffering and this provides different forms of entertainment for different types of viewer.
The lastest examples of this phenomenon are Mike Tyson, once indisputable heavyweight champion and the man everyone loved to hate, and the ubiquitous and soon to be deceased Jade Goody, the first child of Endemol's Big Brother. Both have caused and shared suffering in different ways and popular media editors understand the fascination that we have with love to hate figures. Both Tyson and Goody have lived and will die by the media, having undergone a number of transformations through their exposure. The new documentary on Tyson, adopts a combination of elements of a therapeutic mode and its motifs: by focussing only on him; representing memory, (through the use of archive footage) and conflict or splitting, (through the use of split screens and multiple voices speaking from Tyson's mind). He speaks of dark circumstances, responsibility and self-esteem. Is our fascination a therapeutically informed one or is it more akin to simply wanting to look at the freaks in the show?
Jade Goody has been filmed since 2002 and her last outings recently appeared on Living TV, (Jade: Bride To Be and Jade: The Wedding). Jade is merely doing what she does best, and what is doubtlessly best for her. There is a mutual investment on the part of Jade, certain production companies and her audience, and it would appear that everyone benefits in different ways. Others, are extremely annoyed by her presence, dismayed by the prominence her coverage gets. Two of the most interesting aspects of the recent coverage bring other significant 'hate figures' people into the saga of Jade's life. First, a woman found holding a hammer above Jade as she slept in hospital; and second, the friendly visit made by Shilpa Shetty, a successfull Hollywood actress who became the focus of Goody's envy and resentment in Celebrity Big Brother 2007. These stories hold together a fascination for Jade as well as figures that represent the contempt in which she is held by some people. Lastly the publication by OK! magazine of a tribute to Jade before her death raises questions about how the media can help us to reflect and cope with loss through the pre-mediation of events, a kind of apprehension mitigating against fright or shock which could be traumatic. Of course, very few people are likely to be traumatised by Jade's death but she will be missed, at the very least because she has occupied so much media space in the last seven years. My hope is that she does not actually die and that she is actually only dying in the media. In other words she is doing a Robert Maxwell in front of our very own eyes, saving herself, her family and us from anymore everyday stories of everydayness. But perhaps this everydayness has a comforting, reassuring effect?
It would be patronising and foolish to make any assumptions about Jade and Mike Tyson's actual characteristics; what is significant and more interesting is what they represent as media objects and ideas which we can relate to in one way or another. They are just a couple of fame's anti-heroes, living and dying as ideas in the popular imagination through the media. Both attract contempt, envy, hatred, indifference, fascination, and respect often in accordance with the way they have been represented. But in a bare-hearted fight, I wonder who would win and whom I would be cheering? Goody would probably win as the more media savvy of the two, so I would probably support Tyson because I like to support underdog, and Goody has annoyed me more recently. What you could be sure of I think, is that Tyson would win in the end for being the loser in the 'fight'. Does our popular media culture celebrate these victims and their sufferings 'to help us feel better' (in both senses of the phrase) and is that because our culture is too narcissistic for its own good; too concerned with personal stories rather than social transformations?
Mediated Lives, (& Deaths) as reflective, 'therapeutic' Spaces
It appears that the popular media is capable of transforming the outlooks of individuals through the act of disclosure and sharing. The sins and sufferings of celebrities and other well known figures are apparently redeemed by the adoption of these aspects of a therapeutic mode. At the very least, they do get sympathy because they share their suffering and this provides different forms of entertainment for different types of viewer.
The lastest examples of this phenomenon are Mike Tyson, once indisputable heavyweight champion and the man everyone loved to hate, and the ubiquitous and soon to be deceased Jade Goody, the first child of Endemol's Big Brother. Both have caused and shared suffering in different ways and popular media editors understand the fascination that we have with love to hate figures. Both Tyson and Goody have lived and will die by the media, having undergone a number of transformations through their exposure. The new documentary on Tyson, adopts a combination of elements of a therapeutic mode and its motifs: by focussing only on him; representing memory, (through the use of archive footage) and conflict or splitting, (through the use of split screens and multiple voices speaking from Tyson's mind). He speaks of dark circumstances, responsibility and self-esteem. Is our fascination a therapeutically informed one or is it more akin to simply wanting to look at the freaks in the show?
Jade Goody has been filmed since 2002 and her last outings recently appeared on Living TV, (Jade: Bride To Be and Jade: The Wedding). Jade is merely doing what she does best, and what is doubtlessly best for her. There is a mutual investment on the part of Jade, certain production companies and her audience, and it would appear that everyone benefits in different ways. Others, are extremely annoyed by her presence, dismayed by the prominence her coverage gets. Two of the most interesting aspects of the recent coverage bring other significant 'hate figures' people into the saga of Jade's life. First, a woman found holding a hammer above Jade as she slept in hospital; and second, the friendly visit made by Shilpa Shetty, a successfull Hollywood actress who became the focus of Goody's envy and resentment in Celebrity Big Brother 2007. These stories hold together a fascination for Jade as well as figures that represent the contempt in which she is held by some people. Lastly the publication by OK! magazine of a tribute to Jade before her death raises questions about how the media can help us to reflect and cope with loss through the pre-mediation of events, a kind of apprehension mitigating against fright or shock which could be traumatic. Of course, very few people are likely to be traumatised by Jade's death but she will be missed, at the very least because she has occupied so much media space in the last seven years. My hope is that she does not actually die and that she is actually only dying in the media. In other words she is doing a Robert Maxwell in front of our very own eyes, saving herself, her family and us from anymore everyday stories of everydayness. But perhaps this everydayness has a comforting, reassuring effect?
It would be patronising and foolish to make any assumptions about Jade and Mike Tyson's actual characteristics; what is significant and more interesting is what they represent as media objects and ideas which we can relate to in one way or another. They are just a couple of fame's anti-heroes, living and dying as ideas in the popular imagination through the media. Both attract contempt, envy, hatred, indifference, fascination, and respect often in accordance with the way they have been represented. But in a bare-hearted fight, I wonder who would win and whom I would be cheering? Goody would probably win as the more media savvy of the two, so I would probably support Tyson because I like to support underdog, and Goody has annoyed me more recently. What you could be sure of I think, is that Tyson would win in the end for being the loser in the 'fight'. Does our popular media culture celebrate these victims and their sufferings 'to help us feel better' (in both senses of the phrase) and is that because our culture is too narcissistic for its own good; too concerned with personal stories rather than social transformations?
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| Started By | Thread Subject | Replies | Last Post | ||
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| jamesanslow | Links | 0 | May 3 2009, 4:55 AM EDT by jamesanslow | ||
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Thread started: May 3 2009, 4:55 AM EDT
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| CaroBainbridge | A 'People's Princess'? part 1 | 1 | Mar 25 2009, 4:59 PM EDT by CaroBainbridge | ||
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Thread started: Mar 25 2009, 4:58 PM EDT
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Unsurprisingly, since Goody’s death, intellectual and popular comparisons between Jade Goody and Princess Diana are now being made, not least by Goody’s own mother who simply stated, ‘It’s like Diana, isn’t it?’ on seeing the flowers and tributes outside Jade’s former home, (http://www.metro.co.uk). Talking heads also made this comparison on 23rd March on Today, and Women’s Hour on BBC Radio 4. Goody really is not the people’s princess, of course, no more in death than in life, but one can chart a transformation in our culture from identifying with extraordinary stars to ordinary made popular celebrities, beginning with Diana who traversed both these types. The extraordinary levels of splitting going on around Goody are also significant here. It’s not so very long since she was being roundly demonised in the both the popular imagination and the popular press as a figure who embodied the very worst aspects of a society that has apparently lost all notions of respect – allegations of racism in the Celebrity Big Brother house led to myriad scenes of remorse and regret on Jade’s part, culminating in her decision to appear on India’s Big Boss as a means of doing public penance and demonstrating the emotional journey of the maturational processes that have seemingly marked out Jade’s ‘celebrity’ life. The irony of all of this, of course, is that this was also the very moment when Jade learnt of her illness and emerged into the torrid whirlwind that surrounded her terminal decline in recent months. It strikes me that in this period, the public responses to Goody’s decline have been steeped in references to the maternal. This has enabled not merely her restoration to the status of a ‘good enough’ celebrity but also surely fuels the extent of her sanctification following on from her death a few days ago. So what is at stake here?
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