Lately it seems like we’ve been inundated with news stories about racial prejudice from celebrities. I’m not going to talk about Michael Richards or Mel Gibson; those stories have been covered to death. I’m more interested in the tales of Michael Irvin and Rosie O’Donnell, which have received considerably less press.
Michael Irvin, if anyone has not heard, attributed Tony Romo’s recent quarterbacking success to having a little “brother in him.” Irvin claims that the comment was made in jest, and it certainly was not delivered with the level of hate shown in Richards’ diatribe. Regardless, it was a racist comment, and some people were (fairly) offended. A comment that celebrates one race’s superiority is just as racist as one that berates another’s inferiority. And the funny thing about humor is that it often it reveals one’s underlying feelings. Even though Irvin may not hate white people, his joke does reveal his personal prejudice—he thinks African-Americans are better athletes.
Does Irvin’s comment offend me? Not really, if only because I don’t take anything Michael Irvin says seriously. He’s had far too many legal run-ins for me to dignify his comments with respect. From someone else, such a statement might bother me a lot more. What is alarming is how Irvin seems to be receiving a “get-out-of-jail-free-card” compared to what happened to Steve Lyons after his joke about Lou Pinella (quite possibly a less-offensive joke to boot). Lyons was fired; Irvin is keeping his job. Does either of them deserve to be fired? Probably not. But I believe in equal application of the law, and while there is no formal legal statute, what’s fair is fair. So why is what Irvin said more acceptable, or at least less punishable?
Now let’s consider Rosie O’Donnell and Kelly Ripa. Again, for anyone not familiar with the story, at one point during Clay Aiken’s guest host stint on “Live With Regis and Kelly”, the singer put his hand over Ripa’s mouth. Ripa pushed the hand away, saying, “I don’t know where that hand’s been, honey,” a statement for which O’Donnell ripped Ripa, calling her a homophobe.
On what grounds does O’Donnell get away with this? Despite what many may think, Aiken is not out of the closet. If you accept him at his word (hence, as straight), then what Ripa said could not in any way be construed as homophobic. Even if Clay is gay, there are a trillion reasons why Ripa might not someone else’s hand over her mouth—according to Kelly, Clay was shaking hands with everyone in the audience, potentially gathering germs during cold and flu season.
It is O’Donnell who is prejudging here. She first assumes, rightly or wrongly, that Aiken is gay and secondly assumes that Ripa’s response could only result from homophobia. Assumptions built on top of other assumptions! Tell me, who is the truly biased one in this story? People see what they want to see, they find what they want to find. Why would anyone want to find bigotry other than for a reason to justify being offended?
Share This
Yesterday, while watching Fox’s late football game, I heard one of the announcers touting the premiere of The Simpsons movie trailer later that night. I missed The Simpsons trailer, but I did catch the big Spider-Man 3 trailer premiere on CBS between episodes of CSI and Shark three days before.
Trailer premieres are becoming almost as big as the film launches themselves.
While trailers are almost as old as movies themselves, the unbridled anticipation of them is a relatively recent phenomenon. What once was edited from alternate takes and cut scenes, throw-away footage often lost to posterity immediately after the film begin marketed was released, has become an art-form of its own. Apple has a huge collection of them on the Quicktime portion of its website, trailers are the most likely ads actually to be watched by someone ad-skipping with TiVo, and if anything is likely to be a special feature on a DVD, it is the film’s trailer.
Why this fascination with something little more than a glorified commercial?
Although the quality of trailers had been increasing for quite some time, the first film I recall this phenomenon existing for was Star Wars Episode I, where anticipation of the film was so high that any inkling of what might be to come was valued like gold. Even though few films ever have that level of expectancy, it must have been proof-positive to the studios that, if done right, marketing itself can become a commodity of sorts. You may not be able to sell it, but how much more will the consumers want the final product if they want the promotion itself first? And trailers are a perfect bite-size for our sound-bite MTV generation to seek their teeth into.
Nobody knows better how to monetize their products than the Hollywood studios. What next? Trailers for trailers? Wait, I think we may already have those. Almost. Teaser used to be short trailers. Now they build anticipation for the full-length trailers as well as the film itself.
The lines continually blur.
Share This
Today I read in Filmmaker Magazine how the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences stated in a recent newsletter that it was considering making films released day & date theatrically and in other formats ineligible for Oscar consideration. The article went on to say how such a ruling would be a big blow in favor of the studios in stifling indie competition.
Wow. I could go on and on about just how cheap such a ploy would be against the indies (small indies, at least, since the larger ones and studio-based specialty divisions would definitely maintain their theatrical runs first). Day & date is just the release strategy necessary to give some smaller indies the chance of financial profit, and perhaps the only way some of them will ever see any theatrical release in addition to video / television / internet. Should these films be forced to take themselves out of Oscar contention so that they can see some financial success?
But what really blew my mind was the backward thinking such a rule entails. We live in a day when web and mobile delivered video is taking off to such a degree that the networks are posting episodes of their series on broadband immediately after airing. Why be narrow-minded? I understand wanting to protect the theatrical experience in the face of declining attendance–after all, when done right, there is no better way to watch a movie than in a theatre. But with that goal in mind, wouldn’t it be better to make theatrical distribution as accessible to as many films as possible? I won’t even start into my rant and rave about what needs to be done to improve the audience’s viewing experience (and how that would in turn improve attendance).
The Oscars, if any change is to be made, should strive to honor and reward achievement in filmmaking at all levels, no matter how it is distributed.
Share This
