Pop Culture
I was happily immersed in popular culture as a child. As a young adult, I viewed it with a somewhat arch and ironic eye. Now it just makes me queasy. I feel totally violated at the grocery store by all the magazine covers shrieking at me, every one of them with Jen & Brad & Angelina and now the baby, with Britney, with that horror show Jessica Simpson and her oaf Nick Lachey.
Today it's one Star Jones. Who exactly is this Star Jones? How did she become famous? What can we do at this point to put a stop to it? Seriously. Queasy.
(Later, the Television column in Slate handily recounts, and therein I learn, the history of this show called The View on ABC daytime, whence rose this particular Star.)
posted by 4mastjack @ 11:01 PM
1 comments
1 Comments:
I, too, wondered where Star Jones came from. What exactly made her a "star?"
Since I had about a year off after being let go from my last job, I did occasionally come across "The View" while flipping the channels around. It's not really such a bad show; just a chatfest between some fairly interesting women, including Meredith Viera (who has since replaced Katie Couric) and Baba Wawa, among others. Believe me, there's a lot worse stuff on TV. I never thought of it as "appointment viewing" or anything, but it was OK. Of course, it wasn't nearly as entertaining as watching the kooks on the court shows. Oh, the things people do to each other. Always good for a belly laugh.
But back to that Star Jones. What a turkey. The story goes that she had some big lavish wedding to a banker, and contracted with big name companies to have them supply items for gift bags for those in the wedding party. She proceeded to drop the names of said companies on the air. Did you ever? I mean, what the heck was she thinking? I'd fire her, too.
I, too was wrapped up in pop culture when I was young, but am totally distanced from it now, except for what I read in some news magazines, or the occasional "USA TODAY." Actually, it's hard to avoid it sometimes. I'm barraged with the stuff as soon as I sign on to Comcast: Tom Cruise is jumping on Oprah's couch, Nicole Kidman is dating a country singer, Ashlee Simpson's gotten a nose job, Dixie Chicks ticket sales are plummeting, blah, blah, blah.
Somehow I found popular culture of the 70s and 80s a lot more interesting, when radio wasn't crammed with hip hop and teeny boppers.
All of which reminds me of an interesting conversation I had once upon a time. I was sitting in the apartment of my former friend Tricia, along with my friend Preston and some others. This was years ago, before I was married. Eventually the convo got around to what we would be looking for in our ideal mate. I said that I was looking for someone who had knowledge of popular culture. This absolutely amazed Tricia. She said she never would have considered it. It wasn't even on her radar screen.
For the past five years I've been married to someone who is less than four months younger than I am, and as long as we live, if one of us mentions Paul Lynde or Charles Nelson Reilly, the other will know who that person is. As we get older and the younger kids don't share the history that I always assume that everyone knew, I take great comfort in that. She gets my references, and I get hers, and that's cool.
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