Celebrity Crushes: Here Today And Gone Tomorrow

Celebrity crushes are usually here today and gone tomorrow. When I was growing up back in the eighties I had many favorite bands such as The Police, Culture Club, The Moody Blues, U2, Chicago, Foreigner, Boston, Men at Work, Duran Duran, but I never obsessed about these bands. Over the last few years we hear about kids begging their parents to take them to Hannah Montana and Justin Bieber concerts, and about parents haggling for tickets to these sold out concerts online and offline. Twenty-five years ago pre-teens had favorite musicians and movie stars, but the demand to go to their concerts and movies did not seem as obsessive. Well maybe with a few groups like New Kids On The Block, but I never remember people talking about them to the degree they talk about the more current teen idols. It seems people from more intense celebrity crushes these days at a much earlier age in the past. When I was eight I wanted to play with Barbie dolls, but I have heard girls around the same age talk about wanting to dress like adult movie stars and singers. Things seem more intense these days regarding celebrity crushes, or maybe it has always been this way?

However, maybe this has always happened to some degree because I remember when I was in first grade one girl in our class used to come to school dressed like Madonna and talk about how she wanted to look like her. However, this girl was the exception to the majority, and I remember most girls in my classes such wanting to act like little girls. Many people assume kids learn these things by watching cable and MTV, but I have exposed this form of media and never picked up on certain words until kids talked about these at school. I think children have always figured things out on their own too, so sheltering your kids from the TV and cutting them off from the Internet does not necessarily mean they will never watch a program that is forbidden by the parents. Actually, many kids sneak behind their parents back and watch certain types of programs because their parents tell them not to do it. My parents did not want my younger sisters to watch Steven King's It on television, but apparently, they snuck out and watched it anyway. Years later they admitted to doing this, and they only wanted to do it because my parents said they could not watch this movie. My youngest sister said it was a horrible movie and could not understand why anyone liked it.

I can sympathize with parents being concerned by showing overly violent movies to their kids because my parents were, but overall they let me watch many different programs and I turned out just fine. Actually watching these certain programs with parental approval and explanations made me realize how ridiculous characters can be on shows. Ironically I have noticed often it is the kids who are put on heavy TV or Internet restriction that have a tendency to be obsessed with certain TV programs because these are forbidden. However, many of the devoted fans of TV shows are also kids who watch certain programs every day, so sometimes it just depends on the person. Even adults often fall hard when it comes to obsessing about certain entertainers, but some people take it farther than others.

One of my favorite hubbers funnebone reminded me of the Hannah Montana obsession the other day, and I just wonder if sometimes people are too addicted to one particular person or personae. Funnebone is not a fan of Hannah Montana, but he has made some funny jokes about soaking Hannah Montana stationery in Old Spice. Who actually wants to buy stationery with a celebrity on it? I never felt that appeal, so I am just curious because I would rather have something cute like butterflies and kittens on my stationery. Today I actually make my own stationery, but even if I were to buy stationery I do not think I would buy a set with pictures of famous people on it. Most of us like a particular celebrity and watch their movies and listen to their music, but do you ever think maybe this goes too far? I think the majority of people can handle their fascination with a celebrity, but some are just way too overboard.

Will Hannah Montana still be really popular twenty years from now? There is a possibility she might be since many child hood stars continue to be obsessed about once they become adults. Today the Olsen twins are still highly discussed and photographed, and it is funny to think they started out as a pair of twins playing Michelle on Full House. In most cases, TV shows replace younger kids with older kids later on, but the Olsen twins were so popular that they were kept on. However, what happened to the twins that played the younger children on programs such as Growing Pains, Seventh Heaven, and Family Ties? We never hear about these actors because they were usually replaced with older kids the next season. I always thought it was funny how kids grow up so fast on sitcoms, which sort of made me stop watching certain situation comedies after awhile. Do not get me wrong I still occasionally enjoy watching sitcoms, but often I would be slightly irritated with how the writers forget certain crucial details or story lines or do they just think the viewers are would just forget certain details about the character? Anyway, it is interesting how certain actors become celebrities overnight, but other ones fade away over time. I can understand that certain actors and musicians have more appeal than others, but often I find myself being drawn to celebrities and musicians others are not as fascinated about.

Some people shake their heads and have no clue what I am talking about when I talk about this group. However, if you were a pre-teen or teenager in circa 1989/1990 I am sure you will remember them well. All the girls in my sixth-grade class used to gather around the juke box at lunch time play the songs by Milli Vanilli and New Kids On The Block. The girls went on and on about how cute these men were and how they would faint if they ever met them. My friends were so obsessed with Milli Vanilli and had us listen to the song Girl You Know It's True about twenty times in one day when I came over to her house! However, I just never got the obsession with Milli Vanilli, even though Rob Pilatus and Fab Morvan were cute enough guys.

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All the girls used to swoon about Milli Vanilli when I was in sixth grade, but one day they started hating them all because they found out they were lip singing. How can people be so fickle about a celebrity and love them one minute and then despise them the next? It was not Pilatus and Morvan's idea to lip sync to the music, but the idea of their manager who decided they would make better front men than the real singers. After this event, I just thought people seem really fickle when it come to celebrities and their interest is there one day and gone tomorrow. By the way, I heard in an interview that Fab Moravan has gone on to become a talented musician and songwriter in his own right, which was a nice thing to hear since I think people made way too big of a deal out of the lip-syncing debacle. Fab Moravan even wrote a special dedication song to Rob Pilatus, who died of a drug overdose back in 1998.

Moravan shares in an interview how when he signed on with Milli Vanilli he was a naïve eighteen-year-old that was persuaded to sign a contract in German, which he could not read, so he did not know he was going not going to be able to do his own singing. It was only when Moravan and Pilatus wanted to sing there own songs that their manager came forward and revealed the secret. I think this was an interesting interview to listen to because Moravan shares how Milli Vanilli was not the only European band at the type to lip sing in the late 1980s, but they just happened to get caught and were vilified for it. To me, this shows why people should not be fickle and create love affairs with actors and musicians because they are just people like everyone else. Celebrities make mistakes and will do things that disappoint you, so putting them on a lofty pedestal is just setting yourself up for disappointment.

In the year 1997 I had two college friends who was absolutely obsessed with the movie The English Patient. I usually enjoy most period pieces, but I have always been bored to tears when I see The English Patient because this movie just does not appeal to me. I really identified with the Seinfeld episode where everyone was trying to make Elaine go see the movie The English Patient because that is exactly what my friends were doing to me. However, when my friends talked about the movie they did not seem to like it for any reason in particular except for the fact Ralph Fiennes stars in this picture. Not only did I have to sit through this movie once, but one friend begged to see if twice. Yikes I just wanted to watch a comedy like Fools Rush In if I went to the movies, but none of my friends ever asked me what I wanted to see. Turns out these friends were not real friends in the long run and only wanted someone to hang out with them and do things they enjoyed, but that is another story.

Anyway I think Ralph Fiennes is a great actor and I find him handsome, but this is not enough reason for me to watch a movie I found boring the first time around. My friend from the dorms made me sit through two torturous viewings of The English Patient, so when an off campus friend called to say she wanted me to go see it I told her I had a paper to write. Why did I not just tell her the truth, well I was afraid to tell my friend no back then. Oh well, I am not like that anymore, but I have learned to actually express my interest and opinions when I do see friends, and I no longer go to movies I do not enjoy. However, one thing I find in the end is for all the obsession about Ralph Fiennes in The English Patient I rarely hear women swone over him anymore. Well from time to time I hear a women talk about how cute they are, but not on the same scale this movie first came out.  The same goes for Russell Crowe and Leonard Di Caprio, women no longer swoon over them the way they did a few years back. I am sure there is another up and coming actor people are holding a candle for right now, but I would not know who this because lately I have been only focusing on shows and projects I like. I must admit I am excited about the show Big Love coming back to HBO, but I am more interested in the story line and not attracted to the actors.

So who is the new object of affection for this week's new celebrity crush? A small number of people are so obsessed with their celebrities, but I wonder if ten years from now people will still be following Hannah Montana's every move. I think some of the more devoted fans might because people still love Alyssa Milano from the time she stared as a teen in Who's The Boss, but people need to give these celebrities a break. People are still talking about the photo shoot Miley Ray Sirus did, but for some reason they think she is Hannah Montana is real life. Give the girl a break and allow her to make her own life choices. Just because she does not conform to how you behave does not make her a bad person. She even apologized for doing that photo shoot, and I am not sure why she had to because it was much more tasteful compared what many other young starlets have done. As for adults I wonder why do some people write stories about how they will spend a romantic evening their favorite actor? I am just curious because I came across quite a few online stories like that recently. Does anyone else giggle when she read and hear about how obsessed people can be with a particular celebrity?