Written by Luke Barnes
In this cinema issues article we are talking about the idea of the movie star in the classic sense, and asking have they become extinct.
So when you think of movie stars of the past George Clooney, Julia Roberts, Brad Pitt, Densel Washington and many others you think of worldwide recognition, you think of everyone knowing who they are, you think of them as almost transcending cinema and genre: this is the bar to movie star as we are setting it out here.
These days you have people like the Rock, Henry Cavill, Charlize Theron and Zendaya, but are any of them movie stars, that is the question. In my opinion, no they aren’t and there are 3 key reasons for that.
The first key point to address here is that the idea of celebrity itself has changed over time, the idea of being famous has been watered down somewhat, so in a bygone time if you were famous you were famous for something, being a musician, a sports person, an artist and actor or a presenter amongst other thing. Whereas now you have streamers and influencers you have reality tv stars, there are more famous people now then at any point in history, but are they really famous, and isn’t the fact that people can now become famous for doing nothing reducing the overall quality of what it means to be famous. As such the idea of celebrity becomes devalued and because there are so many it is hard to standout and reach that point of superstardom that some used to be able to achieve.
Secondly, and directly tied to, you have the idea of fragmentation. So as fandoms have become more and more of a thing society has become divided into niche interest groups, things are less mainstream and widely accessible. For example, for those who are super into wrestling, they may know every wrestlers name and backstory, they are in that fandom, as such these wrestlers are celebrities to them, whereas to the wider world these people are unknowns, you may have a passing interest or know the big high profile wrestlers but other than you don’t know any. As such celebrities can just belong to one sub-group or community, they may be huge and all consuming to them but not outside of it, this again raises questions of what a celebrity is and how we define it. In addition, and this is a tale as old as time, if someone doesn’t leave the pigeonhole they are in and take chances it will affect their celebrity, look at someone like a George Clooney he didn’t stick to one genre he moved around and got different audiences to notice him, therefore he improves his celebrity and more people take notice. Compare that to a Zendaya or the Rock, both have really stayed within their niches and fandom spheres, the Rock has tried to dabble with different genres but has mainly stayed within ones that boost his persona as an action hero, which is fine but it doesn’t get him in front of new audiences. Whereas Zendaya has moved from angsty dramas to try and do superheroes and science fiction, to limited success, and in a sense you could argue that she is being more adventurous then the rock, but there are still genres she hasn’t gone to yet which could boost her celebrity. Look at Will Smith, before the slap, he had done drama and prestige, rom-coms, comedies, science fiction, horror, action, superheroes, sports movies, thrillers, animated films, musicals and westerns, the man had range. Whereas today’s stars are too scared to try and branch out.
Then thirdly you have the politicisation of what it means to be a celebrity now. The famous actors of the past would just talk about their movies, they didn’t think they were activists, they didn’t pander to them they just wanted to make good movies. In doing this they had a wide appeal, people on both the left and the right liked Will Smith and the reason for that was that he didn’t divide people with politics, he didn’t comment on hot button issues and go if you disagree with me don’t watch my movies I hate you. Stars today didn’t get that memo and such know every red carpet is a lineup of millionaire narcissistic babies who a lot of the time don’t even understand what they are endorsing or condoning reading out pre-paired statements that they have memorised or reciting buzz words in an effort to seem like an activist and get some social media points. You cannot fully blame them for this as again they have a team of people and publicists and what not that could vet what they are going to say before they say it, but they either don’t or don’t see the career damage of being an activist. Let’s look at two high profile examples of what I am talking about where actors got political and it cost them. The examples in question being that of Rachel Zegler who said how problematic by modern standards Snow White, a remake of which she is starring in, and then Brie Larson who did her famous I don’t care what a white dude thinks about a Wrinkle In Time rant. Both of these examples made sections of the viewing public turn against them, by talking about politics or by criticising a beloved classic to many people they both suffered a huge backlash and became hate figures. Captain Marvel starring Larson would be big, because it was between two Avengers films, but look at her career post that, she has had two cameos, a documentary film, a short film, the biggest flop in the MCU with her Captain Marvel sequel and has been a small role in the new Fast film, her post Endgame career highlight, and has mainly pivoted to Youtube and TV on the flip look at Zegler who post her Snow White comments is facing down a boycott of the film, and again isn’t exactly swamped with new offers, she has a pre-comments animated film on the horizon and the aforementioned Snow White film. Why aren’t they getting bigger roles, well because Hollywood knows they can’t unify the audience only divide it.
Finally, a bonus reason for you why movie stars are dying off is because of stan culture, some actors have stan communities that are incredibly toxic and vicious, these communities are not only not welcoming but in a sense gatekeep the wider public from that actor and therefore stop the social media reach they could have in becoming more internationally famous.
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