In the midst of the award show mania that has been happening lately and is continuing tonight with the Grammy's, I started to pay close attention to the red carpet pre-show in which celebrities are interviewed on their way into the show. Typically if I watch the pre-show, I just leave the TV on in the background to look at what people are wearing without really paying attention to what is being said in interviews. The past two shows (namely the Golden Globes and the SAGS) I have listened to the interviews and am surprised at how horrible they are.
In many ways, these reporters have created the obsession with seeing celebrities as 'normal people' which is why we care more about who they're wearing and who they arrive with rather than their work. This got me thinking that if reporters focused more on asking the celebrity about their work, we might take some people more seriously as an actor. Granted, the reporters are responsible for interviewing many many people and do not have much time to prepare, but there have to be more in depth questions to ask other than 'are you excited to be here?'. Quite frankly, no one really cares if they are excited to be there and the fact is, even if they did not want to be there, the answer to that question will always be yes.
I have had some experience interviewing celebrities on the red carpet through working at Trojan Vision and found that while the interviews do move quickly, the celebrities tend to be better interview-ees when you ask them about things they care about. Celebrity culture is so shaped by the personal lives of the actors, that we often forget that the reason they are actors in the first place is because (for the most part) they genuinely love to act. If the reporters responsible for interviewing them at these major events took more of an interest in the business aspect, asking them about their next projects and what they are looking forward to do in the future, chances are, celebrity culture could begin to be more legitimate as we would care about stars more for what they do professionally rather than which designer they choose to wear on a given evening (which many people do still care about!). When reporters treat celebrities like children by asking silly question, the star is given no choice but to go along with it and it is quite obvious that they do not like being asked the same thing over and over again. If the reporters start asking more pressing questions and treat the stars in a more serious manner, we can start taking the acting profession more seriously and judge the star based on their work credentials, rather than their latest hook-up at a Hollywood club.
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The red carpet interviews can be tortuous. Your red carpet questions sound much smarter and more interesting.
Excellent observation that acting is presented more as a lifestyle than a job. The actors are used as promotional vehicles for dresses, shoes (or knockoffs of those things) that audiences can buy - rather than laborers. Dyer has much to say about how the star text often conceals laboring - all the people who work on the film and all the labor that goes into creating the star: dressing, making them up, sending out press releases, arranging interviews etc.
I also wonder if this occurs because during awards time we are supposed to think the academies are giving prizes to "truth" and "beauty" rather than rewarding actors (and films) that make a lot of money for others - I heard a critic surmise that Robin Williams largely won for Good Will Hunting because he had made a lot of voters (producers, directors) money on his other films and they rewarded him for that. Best to take our minds off the cold hard business of film.
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