I’m gonna make you a star baby

As in every field, there are good artists and then there are the brilliant ones. That is, the ones who transform our reality simply because they exist. Andre Tanker, Sade, Bob Marley, Michael Jackson, Shah Rukh Khan, Minshall, Sparrow, Rudder, Miles Davis, Astor Johnson … are just some of the names. Of course, the list from music, film and theatre is endless, stretching as far back as the early 1900s with performers such as African American Josephine Baker who used her sensuality to shatter traditional notions about women at that time.

But we had this discussion because of the seemingly growing culture in TT of being a star, how it is affecting our own creative process and negatively influencing younger artists. A star is described by one author as an individual who has attained “considerable prominence and success in their field and whose earnings … are significantly greater than the earnings of their competitors”. This then is the goal of many artists, to attain that level of stardom. It is a desire that has infiltrated the artistic world for a long time; for instance, many of the early Hollywood films portrayed agents who would promise unsuspecting actors that they would ‘make them a star’, only for the entire deal to go sour as the individual is exploited financially, sexually or in some other manner.

Stardom is desirable, but there are problems with it. Recent studies on the phenomenon have shown the extent to which ‘stars’ are manufactured, created to be ‘consumed’ by various target markets. Richard de Cordova notes that the term ‘star’ was first used around 1914 in relation to American cinema. For him the star is really “an economic product of a profit driven system”, fuelled by the desire of the audience to see more of what it enjoys. Importantly, the ‘star’ is the result of a carefully managed image, not necessarily the true person.

The desire for stardom affects us here at home in a numerous ways. Typically, the biggest offenders seem to believe that they need to be involved in as many productions as possible, which is apparently a sign of their ability to manage multiple roles and therefore their own skill as an artist. What inevitably happens is that because they give a small amount of time to any one artistic venture, there is never really an opportunity to truly explore the depths of the performance, be it as a character in theatre or film or as a musician, dancer or singer.

Then there is the chronic lateness in the industry. This is part of the fall-out from the first problem.

It is not possible to be on time, and remain focused if you are juggling several artistic commitments, traffic, work family life and more. But perhaps worse of all, is the phenomenon of the brilliant performer who believes that it is acceptable to avoid the rehearsal process and only appear just before the show. More than insulting the producers of the event, and possible even breaking ones’ contract, it disrespects the other performers who make sacrifices to be there. It says to everyone else that they are not as important and diminishes their efforts.

The man behind the curtain in the Wizard of Oz has become a metaphor for the contradiction between the truth and what we are led to believe is real. Stardom has largely been revealed as an illusion; artists therefore need to figure out very early in their careers, on which side of the curtain they choose to perform.

Dara Healy is a performance a r t i s t a n d founder of the N G O , the Ind i g e - n o u s Creative A r t s Network – ICAN.