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| Why Have We Let Actors Become Our Moral Guides? |
| 2018-01-16 |
| h/t Instapundit [NationalReview] There’s a great scene in the wonderful 1982 movie My Favorite Year, which is set in 1954. Peter O’Toole plays a semi-washed-up actor named Alan Swann, famous for swashbuckling roles. For reasons too complicated to explain here, Swann tries to shimmy down the side of a building using a fire hose. He ends up dangling just below a cocktail party on a balcony. Two stockbrokers are chatting when one of them notices Swann swinging below them. "I think Alan Swann is beneath us!" he exclaims. The second stockbroker replies: "Of course he’s beneath us. He’s an actor." It may be hard for some people to get the joke these days, but for most of human history, actors were considered low-class. They were akin to carnies, grifters, hookers, and other riffraff. ...Needless to say, times have changed. And I suppose I have to say they’ve changed for the better. But that’s a pretty low bar. I don’t think acting is a dishonorable profession, and I’m steadfastly opposed to banning plays, musicals, movies, and TV shows. But in our collective effort to correct the social stigmas of the past, can anyone deny that we’ve overshot the mark? I think part of the answer has to do with the receding of religion from public life. As a culture, we’ve elevated "authenticity" to a new form of moral authority. We look to our feelings for guidance. Actors, as a class, are feelings merchants. While they may indeed be "out of touch" with the rest of America from time to time, actors are adept at being in touch with their feelings. And for some unfathomably stupid reason, we now think that puts us beneath them. |
| Posted by:g(r)omgoru |
| #14 ^ Or vice versa? A presser: "The crew made a habit," Sniffed plaintiff Ms. Jessica Rabbit, "Of watching the spot Where my body was not, So I knew that they wanted to grab it!" |
| Posted by: Zenobia Floger6220 2018-01-16 22:50 |
| #13 I can't wait til a CGI character gets accused of sexual assault |
| Posted by: Frank G 2018-01-16 21:08 |
| #12 Its the left - they push appearance over substance, feelings over facts. Uneducated morons, which most actors are, are convenient vehicles for this, and the media aids it by promoting and publicizing them uncritically. For example Jenny McCarthy and Jim Carrey on Vaccines, or Gwenneth |
| Posted by: Injun Bucket8891 2018-01-16 20:03 |
| #11 |
| Posted by: swksvolFF 2018-01-16 19:09 |
| #10 "This is not a pipe" |
| Posted by: Skidmark 2018-01-16 16:49 |
| #9 Well at one time actors modeled good citizenship and high morals and ethics as well as "strong manly" behavior and a respect for women, the elderly, children and dogs. All of this new wave cinema thing in which they idolize the "antihero" is the problem. Our movie industry wants to portray the nuclear family in the most dysfunctional terms, men as louts and evil, capitalism as bad, the military as evil, and law enforcement as corrupt. So when Bogie, the Duke, Randolph Scott, and Clark Gable left the scene we were left with these wannabes who would get a sniff in the golden age of film. |
| Posted by: Sock Puppet of Doom 2018-01-16 14:28 |
| #8 Venn Diagram overlap? |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2018-01-16 14:23 |
| #7 Actors are just high priced prostitutes No entirely certain of that, but the reverse is certainly true. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2018-01-16 13:18 |
| #6 Actors are just high priced prostitutes |
| Posted by: Silentbrick 2018-01-16 12:32 |
| #5 Remember the vapors so many had when the world-renowned scientist Meryl Streep testified before Congress about Alar? I remember... going out and buying Red Delicious apples. I knew even before then that the number one job of the media is to scare the shit out of its readership. |
| Posted by: Raj 2018-01-16 09:34 |
| #4 Waddya mean 'we', kemosabe? |
| Posted by: Raj 2018-01-16 09:32 |
| #3 I have never considered actors to be a moral guide. Richer, yes. Better looking, yes. But more moral? Ha! Look at the marital history of almost everyone in Hollywood. You almost never see someone who is married to one person for Life. And that doesn't count all the affairs, shack-ups etc. Face it, actors are only famous because they are good at reading words somebody else wrote, and pretending to be someone else. |
| Posted by: Rambler in Virginia 2018-01-16 09:29 |
| #2 A lot of this would disappear if we went back to the original copyright periods not to exceed 28 years. Suddenly a lot of money in entertainment would disappear as well. |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2018-01-16 09:15 |
| #1 Remember the vapors so many had when the world-renowned scientist Meryl Streep testified before Congress about Alar? That started the dog and pony show, imo. |
| Posted by: Vast Right Wing Conspiracy 2018-01-16 08:06 |