Word: hollywood
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Playing around with the contrivances of Hollywood is fun, but Truman wants simply to live a real life without wondering whether or not the people around him are honest. Even if there was a hint of mocking in Americans' pinning on "Free Truman" buttons this summer, they were still--on some level--refusing to let the media dictate the substance of our lives. Just ask the woman in the seat in front of me about this movie that allowed the star to give up his artificial stardom; she couldn't stop gushing, `This is the best movie I've ever...
Apparently it is possible to be too thin in Hollywood. As evidence, we offer the travails of Ally McBeal star CALISTA FLOCKHART, who has lately been the subject of rumors suggesting she is suffering from anorexia. In the show's first season, Ally's notorious upper-thigh-grazing skirts revealed an Audrey Hepburn-like reediness. But a skeleton-hugging sheath at last month's Emmys and this season's still shorter frocks seem to indicate a frame even more devoid of substance. When Flockhart missed a day of work recently, idle minds began speculating that it was because...
Market segmentation, which has revolutionized the way companies market their products, is taking its toll on the media. Once upon a time, before the invention of focus groups, the goal of nearly any product was to be loved by all. In Hollywood, a studio tried to make movies that would appeal to all ages and backgrounds. Today, Hollywood is essentially split in half--the major studios make the blockbusters for boys and men aged 13-25, while "independents" make smaller, sophisticated films for targeted crowds...
...even in Hollywood, would have ventured out with a show based on the preposterous premise that during the Civil War, an English nobleman of Moorish descent somehow winds up in America, where he maneuvers himself into a position on Abraham Lincoln's kitchen staff, unless he or she were intoxicated. Once they sobered up and checked out the pilot episode--a heavy-handed, totally unfunny spoof of the current White House scandal--they would have asked themselves, "What were we thinking?" and pulled the plug on the series out of sheer embarrassment...
Those actions gave UPN president Dean Valentine a pretext for wrapping himself in the banner of artistic freedom, as any savvy television executive would do if one of his shows came under fire. "If I was a creative person in Hollywood, I would be packing up my bags and heading for Nevada," Valentine declared. "In a city that has a host of social problems, including crime and poverty, potholes and a broken-down transit system, one would think the vast power of the city council could be put to better use than analyzing UPN's Monday-night schedule." Still...