My Love-Hate Relationship with Being Famous

500 Words on Thursday | Written by Lee Schneider

Now that I am famous I need to share everything with you. I write this from deep within my soul. (“Hey, really dark in here. Can hardly see.”)

As Yogi Berra once said, navel gazing is not a maritime pastime anymore, it’s happening everywhere. Had we known Greta Garbo like we know today’s celebs, we would have learned she could be pretty crabby. But, in her day, she did mystery really well. Made her more interesting than anybody on Jersey Shore and most anybody whose face appears really big on a multiplex screen today.

“The world, you see, no longer has any tolerance for — let alone fascination with — people who aren’t willing to publicize themselves.”  – Ben Brantley, writing in the New York Times

Garbo had a personal brand – but it was all about not knowing her. How’s that possible? For those who have never heard of a great writer named Thomas Pynchon, here’s a photo that might be of him, but I’m not sure.

I read Pynchon because I heard he was good, not because of his headshot. Same with Joyce Carol Oats, Paul Theroux and Joan Didion. Confessional types; but not on TMZ much. Don’t know if they punched a hotel clerk or shagged a starlet. Didn’t matter.

Garbo wouldn’t exist today. So what? We have Mel Gibson instead. I don’t like, however, to dwell on what was, or on Mel Gibson. There’s a bright future ahead, but you’ll have to keep reading to find out what it is. Just don’t skip to the end because that would hurt my feelings. Famous people like me like to be listened to. I go to a famous persons’ support group for that. Sadly, everybody talks over everyone else.

“I don’t have a lot of patience for people who consider themselves gurus, and if you ever ask me about my personal brand, I will stop what I’m doing specifically to invent the technology that will let me stab you in the face over the internet.” – Alison Gianotto, @Snipeyhead

Hey, rough crowd in this 500 words. Just give me a minute to adjust my athletic cup and keep writing.

Snipeyhead’s words resonate with me, but I realize that Martha Stewart, Donald Trump, Deepak Chopra and Richard Branson are all successful personal brands, filling a public need to identify with a person in order to purchase a product. They have also become gurus. Morgan Spurlock and Michael Moore bring reality-tv-show personal branding to documentaries. Picasso had a personal brand. You can still buy the striped fisherman shirts he wore and they are closely identified with him. Try picturing Donald Trump wearing one and you will become nauseous. I’m still getting used to the power of personal branding and surprisingly (even to me) I respect it.

Doing what Garbo (or Didion) did won’t work now. You make a movie, you market yourself. If the noise of the web/highdef/streaming/facebook/twitter-verse bothers you, then set fire to your laptop in an act of defiance. Maybe you can play Adolph Menjou movies on a white sheet in the jungle.

I have a better idea. Board the train (it’s a metaphor, ok?) with me and use technology to reach the people you need to reach. Look at what Crowdstarter, Kickstarter and Participant are doing. That bright future? I met with director Thomas Napper the other day and he said something profound. “The reality shows have forced documentaries to be about something.” Documentaries have to stand out because they need to be about causes. Huh. That’s not about me. Still, it has merit.