Jackson, Lennon and Elvis

by James Hirsen

Media coverage of the death of Michael Jackson has reached a fever pitch with his memorial service that is scheduled to take place this week in Los Angeles.

Fans from all over the world have registered for the chance to receive tickets to attend the event, although only 11,000 people will actually be allowed into the Staples Center.

All three networks will broadcast live coverage of the service with their primetime attendant anchors present at the arena.

The cable news channels will feature wall-to-wall coverage of the event, too, and the memorial service will likely be the lead story on the evening news everywhere.

As we have all witnessed, numerous stories of significance involving foreign policy and domestic legislation have been shunted aside in favor of Jackson interviews, retrospectives and specials. This is part and parcel of what our celebrity loving country has come to expect.

Regrettably, the tragic scenario has played out a number of times before. A music icon dies suddenly and unexpectedly, and under a mysterious set of circumstances. Along with Jackson, two other legendary stars come to mind, and their passing had the same dramatic effect on the public and the culture.

It was a chilly December day when John Lennon and his wife Yoko Ono finished a routine recording session. They had no idea how deep a darkness would soon fall.

The world at the time was consumed with things other than a former Beatle’s solo career. A new leader, Ronald Reagan, had just been elected President of the United States, with a full slate of issues ahead of him that included a faltering economy and enemies abroad.

As John and Yoko returned to their Manhattan apartment at the Dakota, a disturbed fan, Mark David Chapman, sent four hollow point bullets racing Lennon’s way. Police took the legendary musician to the hospital where he was pronounced dead.

The media behaved quite differently the day the Lennon music died. The New Media was not yet in force. Cable news programming was still in formation. Much of the public heard the word of Lennon’s death from Howard Cosell during a broadcast of “Monday Night Football.”

Still, news of the former Beatle’s passing spread fast. It was the lead story on all of the major networks and above the fold in newspapers around the world.

As the sad news traveled, crowds gathered outside the Dakota. Much like the throngs who mourned for Jackson in New York, London and L.A., Lennon fans sang songs and recited lyrics in his honor. Yoko Ono asked the mourners to return the next Sunday for a memorial for John. That Sunday, Central Park was overrun with over 100,000 people. A similar gathering took place in John’s hometown of Liverpool with 30,000 people in attendance.

Many radio stations played Lennon music exclusively for several days in a row.

Although John’s death was similar to Michael’s in terms of public reaction, media coverage and cultural impact, another pop music icon passed on under much more eerily parallel circumstances.

His career was fading. His performances had fallen far below expectations with the resultant criticism from the entertainment press. He appeared unhealthy, but he and his handlers decided it was time for a summer comeback tour.

Just like in Jackson’s case, the tour never happened. In August of 1977, Elvis Presley was found dead on the floor of his Graceland home by his fiancee, Ginger Alden.

His death was the lead story on all of the broadcast networks except for CBS, which made it second to a Panama Canal story, possibly because Walter Cronkite was away on vacation.

For years insiders at the CBS newsroom were said to have repeated the words “remember Elvis,” because the network felt as if it had been remiss in its coverage of the star.

The day the Elvis music died dominated the media cycle for weeks on end. Much like the death of Jackson, the cause of Elvis’s death would remain a mystery and consume massive amounts of media airtime.

Early reporting indicated that Presley died from a cardiac arrhythmia, which fit with the excess weight he was carrying. But an autopsy of the legendary singer showed large quantities of a host of drugs including Morphine, Demerol, Valium, Codeine and Quaaludes, some of which were also found in Jackson’s home.

The passing of Jackson, Lennon and Elvis invites the kind of speculation that, like their iconic images, goes on forever.

James Hirsen, J.D., M.A. in media psychology, is a media analyst, 
teacher of mass media and entertainment law at Biola University, 
and professor at Trinity Law School. 

Tweeting with the Stars

Lately Twitter has been getting a terrabyte’s worth of celebrity buzz.

After a tweeting addiction got pinned with the blame for John Mayer’s breakup with Jennifer Anniston, Mayer opined that posting on the micro blogging social network is “inherently silly and inherently dumb.”

He proceeded to put up a non-silly and fairly astute post on the subject of self-esteem.

“Living by the power of other people’s suggestion will slowly kill you. Genuine self esteem isn’t a roller coaster. It comes from within,” Mayer texted.

Look for esteem or something like it to end up in a new Mayer song.

Meanwhile Demi Moore’s Twitter wits may have helped save a life.

A distressed woman had sent the “Charlie’s Angels” star an ominous Twitter message that read: “Getting a knife, a big one that is sharp. Going to cut my arm down the whole arm so it doesn’t waste time.”

The alert actress and Ashton Kutcher spouse forwarded the terrible tweet to her 350,000 Twitter followers, adding this supplemental message: “Hope you are joking. Everyone I was very torn about responding or retweeting that woman’s post but felt uncomfortable just letting it go.”

Demi’s followers sprang into action and contacted the police who were able to find the woman and prevent the potential suicide.

“Thanks everyone for reaching out to the San Jose PD,” Moore later tweeted. “I am told they are aware and no need to call anymore. I do not know this woman…”

“It is my understanding that the situation was not a joke and that through the collective efforts here action was taken to provide help!” Moore added.

It just goes to show that social networks can be used for more than mere amusement.

They can be twitterly important and at times tweetastic.

BTY, I’m a twitterer, too, and if you’re so inclined please forward me your choicest news twips and H-tweets.

Twanks.

James Hirsen is a media analyst, teacher of mass media and entertainment law at Biola University and professor at Trinity Law School.

Jimmy Kimmel Gets the Rush Limbaugh Treatment

ABC late-night host Jimmy Kimmel was essentially fired from his position as comedic color commentator on ESPN’s Monday Night Football.

After two editions of the show, Kimmel was let go for a quip about former QB and announcer Joe Theismann, in which he said that Theismann, who was let go last season, was “watching from his living room with steam coming from his ears.”

The next day, Monday Night Football producer Jay Rothman characterized Kimmel’s joke as “classless and disappointing,” adding that “it was cheap.”

Rothman confirmed Kimmel won’t be back.

This is reminiscent of 2003, when ESPN bowed to pressure and accepted Rush Limbaugh’s resignation after the talk show host directed commentary at the media about quarterback Donovan McNabb’s overly favorable press coverage.

Sports talk used to be the last bastion of freeform ranting.

Looks like PC-itis has really infected the announcing booth when a commentator gets let go for expressing an opinion and a comedian gets fired for telling a joke.

On another ambiguously funny note, Stephen Colbert was teasing as usual when he announced that he’s a candidate for the U.S. presidency.

But the law could create some serious trouble for the satirical talk show host.

Congress has created a load of complex election laws that Colbert may have already triggered with his latest politically charged prank.

The Comedy Central notable executed the necessary documents to have his name added to both the Democratic and Republican primary ballots in South Carolina. In addition, he set up a Web site for his budding campaign while at the same time declaring that he was crossing out the part of an oath stating that he would not “knowingly violate any election law.”

Colbert appears to be mildly serious. He indicated that he has sought the advice of an election law firm, Wiley Rein. The caricaturist switched to his campaign site a petition seeking signatures from the show’s Web site, based on his lawyers’ recommendations.

If Colbert actually follows through as he has promised and pays the fees ($2,500) and collects enough signatures (3000), campaign finance laws will expose his show and network to violations that could even involve criminal penalties.

To the extent that Colbert’s cable show promotes his candidacy, it could arguably be viewed as an illegal “in-kind” contribution from Comedy Central.

The whole problem might be mitigated if Colbert would do something he almost never does—admit it was just a joke.

Brad Pitt’s Southern Sadness Suspicions

Brad Pitt has been out promoting his latest flick with the long-winded title, “The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford.”

In an interview on ABC’s “Good Morning America,” Pitt shared some of his thoughts on being a dad. He also talked about how fatherhood has helped him overcome a sadness that he has had since he was a boy growing up in Missouri.

Pitt’s onscreen character Jesse James also grew up in the Show Me State, which evidently spurred the actor into examining his past and the region of his childhood.

Pitt spoke of something he characterized as the South’s “congenital sadness.”

“It’s something that I feel in my grandparents, in the people I’ve met, in a Southern way of life,” Pitt said.

Interestingly, he sees the Christian faith as an antidote for Southern woe.

“It’s something pervasive, an undercurrent that I think Christianity answers,” Pitt professed.

O.J. Simpson’s Courtroom Fate

A poetic turn toward justice seems to have taken place in the strange saga of O.J. Simpson.

The former athlete, actor and murder defendant was recently arrested on multiple felony counts. The charges involve serious felonies—robbery with a deadly weapon, conspiracy to commit robbery and burglary with a firearm.

The Las Vegas police followed textbook criminal procedure, carefully arresting, charging and questioning the accomplice and obtaining two firearms and other evidence before going after O.J.

The accomplice, Walter Alexander, was arrested on two counts of robbery with a deadly weapon, two counts of assault with a deadly weapon, conspiracy to commit robbery and burglary with a deadly weapon, enough charges to induce a deal with prosecutors.

Simpson seems to have a strange strain of narcissism that makes him think he is immune to the workings of the justice system. “I’m not walking around feeling sad or anything. I’ve done nothing wrong,” he told the Los Angeles Times.

Ironically, O.J.’s arrest comes as his book, “If I Did It,” a hypothetical account of his ex-wife’s murder, hits the bookstores.

In 1997 a civil jury found O.J. responsible for the deaths of wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ron Goldman and ordered him to pay the families of the victims $33 million. Goldman’s sister Kim said she is not surprised by the robbery allegations because Simpson “thinks he can do no wrong.”

If the current case goes to trial, any actions taken by O.J. in avoidance of payment of the judgment would become relevant. If he had been involved in autographing memorabilia and secretly selling it to avoid paying the judgment, additional criminal charges could ensue.

David Cook, a Goldman family lawyer, said he plans to go to court to make sure the mementos were not sold but instead turned over to the family to be used to help settle the civil judgment.

Even though it is in the early stages, this O.J. trial may drastically differ from the “Trial of the Century.” O.J. will probably be unable to afford a “dream team” of lawyers, Nevada prosecutors will likely be more proficient and the judge less star struck than counterparts in the murder trial, a D.A. will be less inclined to permit a change of venue to another jurisdiction and, with any luck, cameras in the courtroom will be disallowed.

O.J. has already admitted to some of the crimes of which he is accused. He said that he entered a man’s room with a group of friends, one of whom was posing as a potential buyer, after being tipped off that some of his personal items were for sale there. He also said his friends helped him carry the items from the room, although he claims no guns were involved.

When all is said and done, Orenthal James Simpson may go to prison for a long stretch this time around, a punishment that would fit—like a glove.

Jessica Alba’s Kissing for Dummies

She’s one of the hottest female stars and he’s one of the hottest stand-up comics.

Jessica Alba and Dane Cook appear together in the Lions Gate film “Good Luck Chuck,” which is about a guy who discovers that every girl he gets involved with marries the next man she dates.

In the movie, Alba plays the role of a woman that Cook’s character himself would like to marry.

In real life, Alba actually handed Cook some new comedy material on a silver platter when she was asked about the love scenes that she did with the comedian.

“Kissing? Well…,” Alba tells Fox News, “I don’t really remember. It was like kissing a dummy.”

Puppet puckering aside, Alba is a romantic when it comes to the way stories are told in movies.

“The films I do always have a happy ending,” she says, adding that she hopes “it reflects back to real life.”

Papa Gorbachev’s Got a Brand New Bag

Hollywood is not the only place former communists are drawn to.

Louis Vuitton, the French manufacturer of chichi leather goods and other high-end paraphernalia, has chosen its new celebrity rep.

If you’re thinking Jessica Biel, Scarlett Johansson or Reese Witherspoon, you’re off the mark. The latest face of Louis Vuitton is actually Mikhail Gorbachev.

Not just a former Soviet leader and environmental activist anymore, Gorbachev will be featured in a Louis Vuitton ad campaign for the designer brand.

The commie chic celeb will have some big-name co-stars in the advertisements, like legendary French actress Catherine Deneuve and supermodel Steffi Graf and her tennis champ spouse Andre Agassi.

Gorbachev will be seen riding in a car with a Louis Vuitton bag at his side, and in the background will be the oh-so-untrendy Berlin Wall.

Let Murdock Buy the WSJ

Has Rupert Murdock been so completely demonized over his ownership of the Fox News Channel so that a perfectly reasonble media deal?l

Left-Wing Pressures Fox News Advertisers

The fringe of the Internet Left has just launched a new campaign against the Fox News Channel.

The DailyKos, MoveOn, Campaign for America’s Future and other way-out lefty sites are asking rabid fans to determine which companies are sponsors on Fox. They then plan to launch a phone calling campaign.

These are the same groups that urged Democrat presidential candidates not to appear at any Fox sponsored debate. The candidates caved in to their demands.

The groups are purportedly trying to convince Home Depot to stop its Fox advertising, the bent-headed thinking being that the company shouldn’t be advertising on a network that in any way questions global warming.

Home Depot has a reputation for promoting environmentally friendly products.

Most of the lib anger has been directed at Fox’s Bill O’Reilly because he has exposed left-wing bloggers for their hate mongering.

MoveOn.org spokesman Adam Green’s wobbly way of cogitating was revealed when he told the Associated Press, “We’re not trying to silence anybody. Rush Limbaugh has a right to be on the air – he admits his point of view. Fox doesn’t.”

Meanwhile on the network TV front, when a popular late-night TV show celebrates an anniversary, who are left-leaning entertainment powers that be going to call to help mark the special day? Dem presidential contender Hillary Clinton, of course.

This is exactly what CBS’ “Late Show with David Letterman” has in store for viewers who tune in on August 30.

New York’s junior senator will be seated in Letterman’s guest chair, getting some free campaign promo and helping Dave observe the 14th anniversary of the show.

It just so happens that the show ranks as one of the most popular late-night programs on the air.

Consequently, it is a coveted venue for national political figures.

Late-night shows like Letterman’s, Jon Stewart’s and Jay Leno’s have become TV spots that politicians seek because of the exposure provided and scope of audience potentially reached.

Letterman is apparently quite fond of both Bill and Hill.

Hillary’s main campaign squeeze and advisor spouse Bill appeared on Letterman’s show on the first anniversary of the 9/11 attacks and was also a guest on a 2005 show to talk about his quadruple bypass.

As for Hillary, the August appearance will be her seventh.

Hollywood’s Hidden Villains

Check out this brilliant piece by Nick Cohen in The Observer:

Screens that flicker and fail to challenge

In Die Hard 4.0, a cyber-terrorist paralyses the eastern seaboard of the United States. The lights go out all over New York, roads are gridlocked and airports closed, and a panicking citizenry hears rumours of anthrax attacks.

If this sounds a touch familiar, the writers and director are careful to emphasise that resemblances to 9/11 only go so far. The criminal mastermind isn’t an Islamist, but Thomas Gabriel, a deranged computer genius. When the US government refuses to fund his research, he cries ‘one day you will be sorry you spurned me’, or words to that effect. Gabriel doesn’t have a political motive for throwing the nation into chaos. He wants to steal billions of dollars to satisfy his wounded pride, not destroy the Great Satan. Indeed, Gabriel insists to Bruce Willis that he’s a patriot of sorts who has ‘done America a favour’. If he hadn’t revealed the weaknesses in the computer defences to the authorities, ‘some religious nut job’ trying to bring an apocalypse might have found them instead.

What specific types of ‘religious nut jobs’ want to bring apocalypse to the United States, the Die Hard team don’t say, and their silence is everywhere in Hollywood, and at first glance baffling.

The global mayhem since 9/11 has not affected film in America, nor television in Britain, to anything like the degree a reasonably well-informed media buff would have predicted on the day. Hollywood has produced documentaries, from Paul Greengrass’s poignant United 93, which recaptures the uprising by passengers against their hijackers, to Michael Moore’s seedy Fahrenheit 9/11, which portrays Saddam Hussein’s Iraq as a happy land of playful children and blushing lovers. But when we turn to Hollywood fiction we find that the ‘war on terror’, or whatever it is we’re meant to call it these days, has barely shown its face.

The absence is all the more perplexing because before 9/11, when there had been no serious Islamist assault on America, Middle Eastern villains were so common in films Hollywood faced plausible charges of anti-Arab racism. In Back to the Future, Executive Decision, True Lies and dozens of others, Arabs were off-the-peg bad guys. Yet after 9/11, the stereotypes weren’t fleshed out with an all-too-real psychopathic ideology, but abandoned.

Writing in the Los Angeles Times Andrew Klavan, a Hollywood screenwriter of a conservative bent, blamed liberal nervousness. ‘In order to honestly dramatise the simple truth about this existential struggle, you have to depict right-minded Americans – some of whom may be white and male and Christian – hunting down and killing dark-skinned villains of a false and wicked creed. That’s what’s happening, on a good day anyway, so that’s what you’d have to show. Movie-makers are reluctant to do that because, even though it’s the truth, on screen it might appear bigoted and jingoistic.’

Maybe, but Hollywood’s alleged political correctness was not in evidence before 9/11 and, in any case, Bruce Willis is a gung-ho American conservative, not a comrade of George Clooney. A hard-headed liberal might say that the real reason for the down-playing of the conflict is that Hollywood is a global business. American television can show Islamists in 24 and other thrillers because it sells primarily to the domestic market. Movies must sell everywhere and a world which is appalled by the second Iraq war and will not pay to see America venerated – and nor will many Americans for that matter.

I’m sure there’s truth in that argument too, but it misses how dislocating the war on terror seems when viewed from the comfort of the rich world’s democracies. From the 9/11 atrocities on, the dimmest citizens could be in no doubt that forces were swirling around the globe that would murder them without restraint. Yet after 9/11, they haven’t been murdered in significant numbers. I don’t mean any offence to the bereaved of the attacks on London and Madrid, but when set against the astonishing scale of the Iraqi massacres the casualties have been tiny. The rich world is coping with a relatively low level of violence, while all the time knowing that fantastic violence remains possible.

This leads to a frantic desire to appease and deny. To pretend we’re the ‘root cause’ of the threat or say that the it has been manipulated by cynical politicians would be natural responses in normal circumstances. After America and Britain launched the second Iraq war on the worst intelligence since the US military dismissed the possibility of a Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour, a global outbreak of wishful thinking and conspiracy theory was inevitable.

You can see this better in BBC dramas than in Hollywood films. The 2006 series of Spooks, for example, showed Islamist suicide bombers taking over the Saudi Arabian embassy. Nothing too far-fetched in that; real MI5 agents are running themselves ragged as they try to close down terror cells. The BBC’s novel twist was that its fictional MI5 agents discovered that the Islamists weren’t Islamists at all, just Mossad agents in disguise engaged in the perennial Jewish conspiracy.

Meanwhile, the actor playing Guy of Gisborne in the BBC’s reworking of Robin Hood for the 21st century explained that the old story was now about ‘the perpetuation of terror’ by the powerful. ‘It’s almost in the bad guys’ interests to keep Robin alive – like the modern situation with terrorists. Guy and the Sheriff need him as a scapegoat, to keep fear in the hearts of the people’.

I’m not sure if he meant that Robin and his Merry Men were Osama and his Merry Islamists, but the BBC certainly wanted viewers to believe that the government was the real villain, hyping up the threat to justify placing the British under the iron heel of the national security state. See through that lie, and we could relax.

The BBC’s logic is absurd when I write it out on paper but it makes psychological sense on the screen. Given the state of unrealised fear we live in, it feels reasonable in London and Hollywood to avoid provoking enemies we rarely see. Better to ignore them instead or blame them on the government or Jewish conspiracies and then, with luck, they will leave us alone, and confine their bombs to the poor world.

It would be nice if that were true.