Topic 129: Penalties of Success

Carol:

Go to the Penalty Box           

One of our friends from college  was always looking for the best deals.  One summer Russ came back from Mexico bragging about all the stuff he had bought. He pulled up his sleeve to show his proudest purchase. “Guys, can you believe I only paid $30 for this Omega watch? Take a look.”  As Russ  pulled the watch off his wrist, the little gold horseshoe on the clock face came loose and dislodged in the hands of the watch.  Imitation may be flattering, but it is also costly. Consumer Reports estimates that legitimate businesses lose nearly 250 billion dollars a year in sales to counterfeit merchandisers.
 

If one penalty of success is unwanted imitation, another is notoriety. Successful people have little privacy. The missteps of famous celebrities like Charlie Sheen and Mel Gibson make money for “entertainment” magazines and talk-show hosts, but successful people are rarely portrayed with compassion or insight. Nor are their family members, who then become “collateral damage” through the media attention.  Take, for example, the son of Bernie Madoff—the most successful of Ponzi schemers, at least until he got caught.  Forty-six-year old Mark Madoff committed suicide on the 2nd anniversary of his father’s arrest. According to Madoff’s lawyer, “Mark was an innocent victim of his father’s monstrous crime” (source: Reuters).
 

Successful people may seek fame regardless of the loss of privacy. But, they may not anticipate all the consequences of courting the public eye. The penalty for James Frey put him in a league of his own. Frey is the author of A Million Little Pieces, whose critical reviews  sent him on the Oprah Show, was “outed” for fabricating parts of his so-called memoirs. Random House settled a law-suit by disgruntled book buyers at a cost of 2.35 million dollars. The damage to his reputation wasn’t permanent;  he may make a million little dollars on the success of his book turned teen-age science-fiction film I am Number Four. Don’t look for his name on the book, however. He and collaborator Jobie Hughes publish under a pen name, Pittacus Lore (source: Wikipedia).
 

Of course, plenty of people are successful without being famous. Do the successful folk in our own families pay the price for being good at what they do?   My son  son taught me a lesson about success when he was in high school. Because he had shown a strong aptitude for mathematics, we pushed him into accelerating his math studies to include a college calculus class at the same time he was working part-time, playing guitar in a band, and taking a full course-load at the high school.  When I applied a little pressure to work harder in the college class, he remarked “Just because I’m good at something doesn’t mean I like it.” Duh—I have thought about that comment often.
 

Closer at hand, my writing co-conspirator  pays the penalty for being the most proficient “techie” in our household.  Yesterday, I decided to reconfigure my workspace and started moving everything around without unplugging the computer, the modem, the printer, or the screen.  The penalty of that hasty, lazy whim was that I pulled some wires loose.  Megan was not pleased to be rooting underneath my desk reconfiguring a tangled mess of wires by flashlight.
 

Everybody knows how Megan’s cartoons really add just the note of humor to The Daily Theme essays. I can only imagine what she would have come up with today. I asked her if she had the time, but she said no. I guess I’m in the penalty box now.

Sources:
James Frey. Wikipedia.
 Mark Madoff death.
“Real or Fake? Counterfeit Merchandise can Threaten Your Safety and Fund Crime.” Consumer Report  Jan 2008. 

Megan:

Penalties of Celebrity

I bet celebrities are counting on there being a special place in hell for the paparazzi . But those photographers wouldn’t be taking the pictures if there wasn’t a market for them. Tabloid magazines and websites wouldn’t buy them if there wasn’t an audience eagerly waiting for the next picture of Suri Cruise, Brangelina, or the Twilight kids. I have always been a part of this audience, but recently I’ve started to feel uncomfortable about the role I play in supporting this part of the industry.

As I’ve mentioned before, I see almost every mainstream movie that comes out (I like Independent films too, but they hardly ever make it to my local cinema). Naturally, I have a curiosity about the actors who star in these movies. One of my favorite TV shows is Inside the Actor’s Studio, and although I was not previously a fan of his work, the interview the Dave Chappelle changed how I thought of Hollywood. In the interview, he was speaking of Martin Lawrence, Mariah Carey and his own public “breakdown” when he left his show at the height of its popularity and went to Africa:
 

What is happening in Hollywood? Nobody knows. The worst thing to call someone is crazy. It’s dismissive. I don’t understand this person. So they’re crazy. That’s bullshit. These people are not crazy. They are strong people. Maybe the environment is a little sick.

Since he gave this interview in 2006, we have watched Britney Spears shave her head, Joaquin Phoenix freak out in a very elaborate hoax, and now we are watching Charlie Sheen implode. If there was ever a reason for not doing drugs – aside from their illegality – look at what they do to the people who otherwise have everything going for them. 

For every Charlie Sheen, you have dozens of actors who aren’t wasted on live television, who aren’t modeling for the paparazzi every night in front of nightclubs, who remember to put on their underwear. Because there are so many examples of celebrities who are able to cope with their fame, it is easier to put the blame on the ones who can’t, the ones on drugs.

But I think it’s more than drugs.  I think the condition of celebrity will eventually be studied in college psychology classes. I don’t think a person can withstand that much scrutiny, such a loss of privacy without it having some sort of negative affect on their mental landscape. Sometime last year, Kristen Stewart compared the effect of the paparazzi with rape – an analogy that drew derision from the public and the Internet. But maybe she was just using the only other word for such persistent violation that she knew. 

Sure, there are financial compensations… these people live in mansions, can travel the world, and have trainers and personal chefs and nannies for their kids.  But they aren’t famous because they are rich – there are CEO’s who make more money, who can walk down the street without getting mobbed by fans and photographers. Celebrities are famous because we recognize them; we can pick them out of a crowd, like we could a family member or a friend. But we treat our family and friends with more respect.


Inside the Actors Studio: Dave Chappelle 2006.