Theory of Stardom

This blogpost is done by Haresha, It includes a summary on what we have learnt in class about the theory of stardom and includes our group's research on the theory stardom's real life examples.

STARDOM THEORY

Richard Dyer’s Stardom Theory suggested that celebrities are developed and presented by the media industry to the public eye or the audience as an idol (their "ideal" type of person they dreamed of), which often represent a specific persona that are engaging and appealing to the targeted demographic. The purpose of doing this is to sell media company's products and/or just generating popularity in general.

Persona can be divided into two types:

1. REAL persona
   A curated version of themselves, designed to fit the expectations of an audience; to REEL or to attract the audience.
   Eg. Performances, Music videos, social media
2. REAL persona
   The authentic personality of the star— it means how they really behave (they're real personality as an individual) in their personal life, behind the stages, and away from camera
   Eg. Interviews, documentaries, behind-the-scenes footage
   
   

Why are celebrities appealing? 

1. Love: We are fascinated with the love lives of the stars, can also feel a romantic affiliation with them
   
2. Ordinariness: We like to see them doing routine things, living normal lives just like our own
   
3. Success: We like the idea of overnight success, and failure before success. This appeals to our
   sense of fair play. (Why we like reality TV so much)
4. Consumption: We are fascinated by the huge material wealth brought by media success. Not just
   luxury homes and cars, but also strict dietary regimes set by expensive nutritionists, holidays etc.
5. Dream turned sour (downfall): fascination with the exploitation of their misery

Names:	Neta’an & reszha’a
Celebrity:	d4vd (David Anthony Burke)
REEL persona:	Instagram: He portrays himself as a down to earth average American teenager who occasionally has celebrity type posts (professional photographer’s works of him and self promotion) Music: Often in his music, it is about a struggle in romance and almost always losing in his music videos.
REAL persona:	From what is publicly available, d4vd is a humble and private person, keeping his online personality separate from his private one, he often plays video games, expressing interest in Fortnite. He also enjoys watching movies.
Love:	Currently, he doesn't publicly have his partner shown, rather keeping it more private in the short run.
Ordinariness:	In his instagram, he openly shares and updates his day-to-day activities. Such as when he is in the middle of the concert performing his songs, a photo of behind the scene for his upcoming music video, and his frequent selfies.
Success:	He was an almost overnight sensation success, the vocal track for his chart topping “Romantic Homicide” song was recorded on an iphone as he didn't have anything else to record it on, he has commented that he could’ve done the recording on his computer but his terrible wireless headset quality was just not a usable choice.
Consumption:	He spends his money on video games and on his computer. There are also lots of posts of him going out, not necessarily to high class or expensive places. Lastly, from what I can tell, he drives a Tesla as the Tesla-ish car interior was shown on one of his photos on his instagram.
Dream turned sour:	No reports or news has spoken out or have rumored d4vd’s involvement in any kind of scandal

Names:	Ata & Louis
Celebrity:	Andrew Tate
REEL persona:	What image to they project through their work (films, music, social media) Social media platforms portray Andrew Tate as someone who has a unique sense of masculinity and is said to be an extremely hard worker that eventually achieves success from it through his suffering. Andrew tate typically shows off his success and masculinity through his stories and by displaying expensive products he owns
REAL persona:	Have there been any cracks in this image (examples) Yes, such as Andrew being wholesome to one of its students / fans after that person made money from his course. Congratulated him in front of all Andrew Tate’s audience on screen. Also
Love:	How is their love life reported on? Andrew Tate had links with many different famous and young celebrities such as Sofia Guliyeva, Naghel Georgiana Manuela, and Lori Harvey.
Ordinariness:	Do the media try to show them as everyday individuals like you? No, sometimes even showed his past which he also had an interest in riding motorcycles like I do now.
Success:	What is their success story? How is it told? Andrew Tate’s success story leans more to the overnight success stereotype. He states that he gained his wealth through his ventures in Hustler’s University, social media, and casino businesses. From there he gained a massive audience, and had his name talked about in conversations, gaining popularity.
Consumption:	Can you find any articles that celebrate their luxurious lifestyles? Or their extreme diets? Tate tends to show off how much he’s spent on a product (which is mostly extremely expensive) and brags about the excessive amounts of money he has. Tate only spends money on typical rich people products that can be easily flexed such as expensive watches, sports cars
Dream turned sour:	Has this celebrity had a downfall? How is it reported? Did they recover? Yes, at some point he was reportedly abusing two women he met on the internet which then the police department took all of his luxury vehicles and barged into his and his brother’s (Tristan Tate) home. However, it was found that both of those women actually falsely accused Andrew Tate for human trafficking but Andrew Tate couldn’t bring back his luxury cars home. Few months later he recovered his popularity after the allegation was over and went famous

Reflection: Doing the research on these artists has given us a better idea on branding and what kind of content we need to make for our digipack and social media, the research has greatly helped Haresha who is in charge of the social media aspect in our group as it includes how artists portray themselves, their private lives and also what dominant reading they try to push out through the media texts that they output.