BLOG 68: ALMOST FAMOUS

“And I'm not looking for trouble, I'm not looking for fame, I'm not looking for anything, maybe a little bit of personal gain” From The Left to the Right by TerrorVision

Spare a thought for those of us who have found themselves in the public eye and back out of it again at the end of the blink. Given a choice between fame or fortune, I’ve always rather favoured fortune. However the latter has always escaped not only my grasp but my orbit. My pursuits of fortune however have sometimes brushed the shoulder of fame and a little of the glitter remains. Something I have found rather annoying as I would much rather a little of the fortune.

However, in these celebrity obsessed times, I often hear people say how they would love to be famous. I find this an odd choice, surely if you are looking for a release from the chores of life, having fortune rather than fame would be better.

I have to say that having been close up to fame, I’ve always found it quite unappealing and therefore have never really had the push to go after it. My accidental fame bursts always put me in a place where people intruded on my life and I was rather grateful when it was over. Well… almost over. There are still days when I am Almost Famous.

Almost Famous is a rather odd place to be. People stare at you like they know you, then can’t quite place you so look away…then you catch them looking back at you. Thank goodness this is England, where the greatest national fear is being embarrassed, so a little eye contact is usually all it takes for folks to find something of great interest to do with their shoes! There is little currency to be had in having been Almost Famous, you can’t take it to the bank and it doesn’t even get you a decent table at The Ivy.

For me I have always valued my anonymity, but this is not so for some of my acquaintances who have not only achieved fame but held onto it. I would say though that this has given me a front seat to how the famous operate… and THAT remains something of value.

The first and possibly most important thing I learnt from the genuinely famous is that they always make sure people think that they are as important as they are. They have figured out that people will work hard for pay, but they will work even harder if they think someone who has achieved greatness is their friend.

When I was a backing dancer for A list solo artiste, I noticed he had a brilliant method of ensuring everyone was up for working 20hr days for 8hrs pay AND at only standard Equity rates.

He’d built up a public persona of being quite shy. As a consequence he was seldom around us common folk. But every now and again he’d make himself available to just one person – for a chat. I remember when I joined the tour when he dropped in on me to see how I was doing. He held eye contact when I was talking then suddenly broke it to stare at something in the middle distance then looked back at me with a slow motion shaking of the head. He then told a quick story about something that changed the course of his life, placed a palm on my shoulder and regretfully left me.

I have to admit, it worked on me. Nothing says ‘I am doing this because YOU matter to me’ than someone who is never around much taking time out to come to where YOU are. Nothing says sincere like looking someone in the eye, nothing says ‘I am astounded by what you have to say’ like darting your eyes and then returning them on full beam. Nothing says ‘I trust you’ like sharing an intimate story. Nothing says ‘I care’ better than an open palm on neutral areas like shoulders. And nothing says ‘I wish I had more time to spend with you …you fascinating soul’ than wrenching yourself away.

However, there is NOTHING like being on tour with someone to learn their routines! After a while you begin to notice patterns. We all got one of these routines during our first weeks on the tour… after that he was never available. And when we started to swop stories about how close we were with the big man… we’d al heard the SAME intimate story… and when we thought about it…it was TOTALLY irrelevant to what WE were saying. He’d managed to fake sincerity… and yet each of us still secretly believed that OUR routine was the genuine one and continued working till our feet bled just to please him. All these years later… he is still making dancers feet bleed, if this years Grammy’s were anything to go by!

Acting as if … this is big with people I have been around who maintain a high profile in the public eye. Back in the day, I lived in Chelsea. Now this was by accident and not design (I really was NOT that bright), but accident had placed me in exactly the right spot for a cultural revolution. A couple of guys that drank in our local pub decided that the time was right to open a nightclub that would reflect the changes going on around us. So the two of them borrowed suits, and smoothed down their punk-rock hair and convinced a bank to give them £35K to add to the £100K they had already raised for the club. There was no £100K… they just acted as if they had it. (Oh the good old days before electronic credit checks!)

Having secured the rental of a basement, the boys proceeded to feed the local newspapers with stories of a huge underground scene where wild happening occurred. The club had not yet even opened. The months went on and the boys put in a lot of work transforming the place – but outside signs were up saying closed for a private party. Meanwhile another media scam was executed. Chelsea being an area where rich and poor live cheek by jowl meant that they had access to daughters of the aristocracy. Always up for a laugh, a couple of these girls were encouraged to be photographed with us nobodies. Staged photographs of us girls linking arms, laughing wildly and carrying our shoes taken in the wee small hours were leaked to the society press… the term Wildchild was born. The club was now getting nationwide attention as the place to be… and it hadn’t even opened yet. The club opened as if it were just a regular night… the photos that appeared in every newspaper of the miles of queues were the first genuine photos of the place! The owners became the toast of London and started a trend that went right around the world.

By the way, the bank got their £35K back with interest within a month of opening… and I’d say the boys did pretty well. One is now an extremely successful music industry personality, and the other is a high ranking and much publicised government advisor.

More recently a famous person of my acquaintance maintains his name by standing on the shoulders of giants. This chap is a hairdresser who has crafted a reputation for being the stylist to the stars. This man is mighty famous on two continents and is a red carpet regular. I was shocked to discover that his profile would not be quite as high if he didn’t have a few tricks.

Whilst chatting in the dressing room of a TV station, I was surprised to learn that he had not actually met a celebrity with whom his name is very much linked. He confided he has NEVER actually said he knew this A lister. However he certainly ensures that he gives the impression he is in their inner circle. I’m not saying he has not styled real celebrities but in the main he maintains a high profile without leaving his salon. HOW? Well, the arrival of Twitter certainly helps. He just re-tweets what ever a celebrity is talking about! He also consults guidebooks for local flavour of where a celebrity is, reads live celebrity blogs and drops none too discreet caricatures of the names they drop. He uses unverifiable details and hints at scandal constantly. The impression this gives is that he is in the thick of an A list whirl!

Without such activity he would still be doing OK as his original salon was in a desirable area. However, on the back of such clever manipulation he is a regular consultant on make over TV programmes and has a line of products available in your high street chemist.

I could bore you with many more stories but they all have the same two things in common and I don’t wish to labour the point. The two things are that all persons involved are still household names – and all gave people what they wanted to believe. I think the two things are mutually exclusive… if lasting fame is what you are after.

It’s a funny thing fame. True the money would be nice, but the pitfalls are too big a price. Firstly, the work that goes into maintaining your profile is endless! Plus you have to accept that people will believe a version of you that may not be who you are. As a consequence total strangers will feel they are a part of your life and act like it. My friends in the public eye do seem to never get to the end of paying for their fame with these demands, so I find I just don’t envy them at all. I can honestly say being genuinely famous is not something I would ever like to be.

Being Almost Famous is quite famous enough thank-you. Being stared at while people furrow their brow trying to figure out if you are worth their attention, then deciding your not is about as bad as it gets. I have almost 99% anonymity and I like it that way. I get to push my trolley round Morrison’s, go out with my family and friends, plus get to make terrible faux-pas…all with no consequence at all.

However… maybe…just maybe… it would be nice to get a table at the Ivy that was NOT in the back of the Z-list room, where you get hit by the kitchen doors every time a waiter passes by!

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