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Ladataan... Celebrity: How Entertainers Took Over the World and Why We Need an Exit StrategyTekijä: Marina Hyde
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Kirjaudu LibraryThingiin nähdäksesi, pidätkö tästä kirjasta vai et. Ei tämänhetkisiä Keskustelu-viestiketjuja tästä kirjasta. I’ve been gleefully devouring Hello magazine since the early 1990s, while simultaneously despising every celebrity sell-my-story sad-sack in there. This dual love/loathing for celebrity culture creates contradictory forces which miraculously, in my case, seem to live in happy co-existence. Yes, I read, actually inhale, New Weekly but I also have “read it, enjoy it but never, ever believe it” etched onto my cortex. But one thing I cannot stomach is celebrity do-gooders, and Celebrity: How entertainers took over the world and why we need an exit strategy explains in a much more coherent and entertaining way than I ever could just exactly why people like that Bono need to shut their yappers and give world peace a wide berth. Marina Hyde, the author of this rollicking good read, writes a celebrity column for The Guardian called Lost in Showbiz; she also mercilessly parodies celebs in a mock diary column A peek at the diary of… Like the Dr Doolittle of Celebsville, she attempts to decipher celebrity grunts and gobbledygook to find out if their forays into the world outside the movie studio or catwalk have any real meaning or long term benefit. The resounding answer is no. Hyde then hilariously proceeds to bash celebrity in all its self-serving attempts to “give something back” or use their fame to highlight or bring focus to issues, issues they regularly fail to understand. Hyde is a little light on answers to the celebrity conundrum: how do we get them back in their box, back to what the famous have always done well- wear sparkly frocks, go to orgies and generally brighten up our drab little lives? Nonetheless this book will make you snicker out loud and roll your eyes at the fatuous arrogance of the celluloid chosen ones. Angelina, Sharon Stone, Richard Gere etc you have been rumbled. näyttää 2/2
It's all sad and all true, and while Hyde doesn't provide an exit strategy, she does make this tour through the lives of the rich and stupid devastatingly funny.
A brilliant, hilarious thinking person's guide to a world obsessed to the point of lunacy by celebrity- a guide to our times and a classic piece of comic writing. These days, entertainers no longer just entertain- they advocate dubious 'religions', work for the United Nations, get face-time with heads of state and monopolise problems they are infinitely qualified to solve - problems like Africa, the Middle East, and AIDS.We stand at the beginning of a bright new chapter in human history. Feast your eyes, then, on Sharon Stone's peace mission to Israel, on a world where Angelina Jolie advises on the Iraqi reconstruction effort or Charlie Sheen analyses 9/11, and in which Jude Law's attempts to establish contact with the Taliban are reported without irony.Celebrity is a roadmap, a survivalist's guide, a Rosetta Stone for our times- without a copy you are not equipped to engage with the world... Kirjastojen kuvailuja ei löytynyt. |
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Marina Hyde manages to be extremely funny, while making some very serious points. Certain celebrities come in for more exposure than others – such as Tom Cruise, Sharon Stone, Angelina Jolie and Britney Spears (in Britney’s case, Hyde discusses the relentless and disgraceful hounding of the star when she was in the midst of a breakdown – and recalls instances such as when a paparazzi photographer put a camera up Britney’s skirt and photographed the menstrual blood on her knickers, subsequently printing same as evidence that she wasn’t pregnant). She is withering towards Jolie, citing the time when Angelina and Brad decided to have their first biological child in Namibia. What wasn’t widely reported at the time was how journalists wishing to enter the country during the couple’s stay were told that they would need to seek written permission from Angelina and Brad before entering. How on earth did we get to the stage where two film stars are allowed to dictate who enters a country? And how was it ever allowed for civilians in that country to have their homes searched for evidence of photographs of the couple?
Why does Elmo from Sesame Street get invited to speak at the UN Congress? Yes, Elmo is a puppet. Who got invited to speak at UN Congress! If this happened in a satirical novel, the reader would probably dismiss it as a stupid storyline, but it actually happened.
Hyde also discusses the dangers of celebrities wading into areas of which they have little knowledge (witness Sharon Stone talking about how she beat cancer through lifestyle alone – a dangerous message to send to other cancer sufferers), and how the rise in celebrity adoptions from developing countries (as in the cases of Angelina Jolie and Madonna) have actually led to more children being left in orphanages in such countries.
My favourite chapter was the one about ‘celebrity’ magazines – I have a personal dislike of such publications as Closer, Reveal, New, etc. as they seem fixated on celebrities’ weight, and love to speculate wildly and without any basis in fact about the lives of people in the public eye.
Despite all this, the book remains full of humour and made me laugh out loud on a number of occasions, and I would absolutely recommend it. ( )