MTV had it all wrong: The real celebrity death match happens when two or more luminaries die within a week of each other and the world sits back to watch which one will get the coverage. Apparently, the hot list continues even when the body is cold.
I first noticed this when Princess Diana died in a car crash, and five days later Mother Theresa slipped away quietly from a prolonged illness. Both women were great, both mourned, but it was the 36-year old Princess who got all the press. Didn't seem fair to me. Mother Theresa set the standard for selflessness. She defined it so completely that people used her name as shorthand for kindly people, the same way we use Einstein to describe brainy people. She was a real Mother Theresa, that Mother Theresa was.
But by the time she died, the Princess Diana media mourning machine was running so hard, Mother Theresa barely graced the cover of the NY Post. If she had just held out for another few weeks, she might have got the sendoff she deserved.
When you're famous, timing is everything, in life and in death.
Which brings me to the current batch of deaths: President Ford, James Brown and Joe Barbera. A president, a musical genius and the guy who drew Huckleberry Hound.
With all respect to Barbera, the real media battle was between Ford and Brown. The former prez got nearly a week of painstaking, 24-hour, blow-by-blow coverage on cable news ("The car holding the casket appears to be coming into view now. Once again, the former Michigan football star and president whose controversial pardoning of Nixon may have helped heal a nation, appears to be in the second car from the front..").
The Godfather of Sould got a slew of musical retrospectives on VH1, preempting their usual line-up of smart-ass B-listers making wisecracks about Modern English and the Rubik's Cube, and histrionic ho's bitch-slapping and defecating their way to Flava Flav's oversized heart.
Winner: Ford, but Jamie Foxx may already be negotiating the rights for a bio pic, which could tip the scales back to James.
As for Barbera, he would have done himself a huge service by hanging in there until all this hoo-ha settles down. After all, most of us have had more exposure to his work than that of Ford or James Brown.
3 comments:
Hello there Brian,
I don't know if you remember me, Michelle the Brit, we worked together for Steve Rosenberg,(the crazy Jew with the dandruff problem on what little hair he had left, the Isreali wife that was a B****from hell, a daughter to match, and the Son that ate like a 2 year old!)I was messing about online, and looked you up!!! and found your Blog, your still a very funny and creative writer!!!
I'm glad your doing so well, you called a couple of times after you first went to NYC, but I too left Steves employ, I finally had enough of Braha, Tom and I are no longer together, we seperated, he was having an affair, I am now re-married, and have a wonderful little boy!!!
Still go to Hockey games! my Husband Erich is originally from Long Island and is a HUGE Hockey fan, so we have Carolina Hurricanes season tickets, we were actually at all the playoff and Stanley Cup games last season, what an experience that was!!!
Anyway, thought I'd say hello, we used to have a good laugh at Rosenburg Mail and Marketing, hmmm wonder if that other guy I(can't remember his name) still has the pool boy tied up in his basement???
Take care mate
Michelle
"histrionic ho's bitch-slapping and defecating their way to Flava Flav's oversized heart."
HA HA HA HA HA
That just about sums it all up.
With the explosion of media forms in the second half of the 20th century, the litany of folks awarded celebrity status (A-list, B-list, whatever) has similarly exploded. As a consequence, I've been expecting these "celebrity passing collisions" to become almost commonplace. Sad thing, times three, four or more. March 27th, 2002 set a new standard with the passing of Billy Wilder, Dudley Moore and Milton Berle, but three in a week still impresses. Hmmm. I should get into one of those ghoul pools (see stiffs.com, etc.).
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