Word: jonases
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...More than 40 years after Walt's death, his successors at the Disney Channel haven't forgotten how to fashion/manipulate/stoke/corrupt/enhance the young imagination. They've made culture-spanning franchises of High School Musical, Hannah Montana and the Jonases: on TV and CDs, in concert and on the movie screen. Early box office returns for the Jonas boys' movie indicate they're not yet in the Miley Cyrus empyrean. JB 3D, which analysts had said would gross $30-40 million, took in just $4.8 million on Friday, for a projected $15-18 million weekend total. Compare that with the Hannah Montana/Miley...
In a story commemorating the 40th anniversary of the Fab Four's conquest of America, I detailed the initial mainstream U.S. response: that they were a passing fancy, that their music was derivative, and that the funniest thing about them were their haircuts. It was the last gasp of an...
...exuberant; if the crowd included desperate stalker girls, you can bet they were edited out. In a way, the fans are as knowledgeable about their role as the Brothers are about theirs. One shows up with Jonas-style sideburns charcoaled on her face. Three guys presenting themselves as faux-Jonases get a modicum of attention from the girls. That too is a hallowed tradition: dressing like a famous person in order to get attention and maybe some action...
...also exalted the theatrical element over the musical. It happens that the Jonases write most of their own songs, which on first listen did not make me eager for a second. But the basic impact is visual: they're meant to be simultaneously cheerful and lubricious, to fulfill their fans' childlike idolatry and blooming sexual awareness. That's how the brothers' antiseptic image, and the movie's G rating, can coexist with the Jaggeresque poses and wind sprints of the one in the center, Joe Jonas...
This has got to be part of a Disney expansion strategy. Where once the company aimed to keep its target market in perpetual childhood, now it is priming kids for the more overtly erotic signals of puberty. The Jonas Brothers concert is like a very gentle sex-education lecture given...