notes from underground

Another thing to consider about Criss Angel is the nature of his press coverage.  Usually when a celebrity or a star of the day is in the spotlight they are mauled by the paparazzi, the media, and there is no challenge too great for a photographer to capture a disclosing or defaming picture.  I mean Criss Angel is dating Holly Madison, has his own TV show, appears on all sorts of entertainment venues, yet I have never seen a picture in a magazine or tabloid or anywhere taken by a crazy photographer capturing Criss Angel hanging from a crane during one of his levitations of any other revealing picture.  How is it that Criss Angel is such a covert celebrity in this sense?

It is rather obvious that actors, stagehands, assistants, and confederates are hired and involved in many of Criss Angel’s illusions.  However something rather eerie about this whole scene, especially since Criss Angel is so big, is that I have never seen or heard of an eye witness account from any of these people anywhere revealing that they were involved in a Criss Angel illusion and then subsequently to have them divulge the secret of the trick. What gives?

I am absolutely mystified how regular hired people keep this secret so well.  I mean how much are they paying them and even then… It is uncanny  and really defies the regular operating procedure of the paparazzi and other elements of publicity surrounding celebrities, in which there is a usual effort to defame, point out scandels, or in this case, to prove someone a fake.  However, this is completely non-existant in regards to Criss Angel.

How is this possible?  How are the secrets of Criss Angels tricks not revealed by the paparazzi or similarly minded people?  I can’t believe for a second they have any respect for the esoteric nature of magic and thus remain silent. If nothing else, this kind of secrecy is more astounding and mysterious than his tricks; no celebrity is safe from the wrath and ire of the paparazzi.

Now that the fury and ire had been raised on my previous entry I would like to try and be a little more rational, calm and composed although there is really nothing rational about this whole situation.  I sit here tonight pondering the masses of people who drive the paparazzi to assail the celebs/stars which in turn shine upon the people offering them um…yeah offering them their star light.  To be honest the whole thing appears kind of like a circus and I find some solace in the fact that the celebs/stars often have a hard time of things and many a headache from being assailed by maddened cameramen which probably is a fair compensation for how much garbage about them is spread around and reaches my senses.  But this sustained pandemonium, this worship of starness, eludes me and I can’t figure out what exactly drives this whole process and why young girls shriek and scream at the new vampire on the block for example.  This irrational juggernaut roles on however and I stand scratching my head, bewildered, at times beating my head into the wall at the stupidity of it all which is just another stupidity.  If one had a choice not to think of certain things this would certainly be one thing I would choose not to dwell on.  But what am I missing here?  What exactly is this madness about?  My immediate instinct when I see these things is to destroy it.  I don’t want to sit here and talk about the value of things, but certainly the value of things in this world of stars and celebs is about as emphemeral as it gets, a star on the sidewalk on Hollywood will never outlive or be worth a Homer or The Illiad.  But this is not a rational argument or a good one for attempting to dissuad one of the people who is immersed in this maddness and is like trying to convince a third generation Christian that god doesn’t exist.  Certainly nothing anytime soon is going to erase this abomination from the landscape of this place.  When Goethe’s novel The Sorrow’s of Young Werther lit up Europe after he wrote it to the extent that people did homages to the locations in the book and to the supposed grave of young Werther at least there was some degree of taste then which I applaud.   But there is no similar taste that I have seen around these days.  I would love to hear from some star struck people about why they are how they are if they weren’t too offended by my last blog entry.  I would also like to discuss what I feel is lacking on the great stage but not tonight as I am out of time.

I want to begin with an idea of Friedrich Nietzsche’s in which he claims that a popular culture unites a people and provides a common ground.  I certainly don’t disagree with this but consider this of the commoners and the mindless masses who can endure to be entertained or rather preoccupied in such a manner.  Not that I consider myself vastly superior but without a doubt a step above these lowlings.   But what am I doing dallying with the spectacle, this terrible star glaring above the ground.  I am certainly content to reside underground in silence and anonymity being a “nobody” like Emily Dickinson (http://www.beyondbooks.com/lit71/1f.asp).  At times, on quite days I have poked my head above ground only to see the terrible star of celebrity glowing overhead and immediately a rage and and impulse to strike and destroy was experienced.  I know there are many other people too out there enduring this glare and often times are over sensitive to this light and as a result are upset, habitually bothered, and chafed by it.  Allow me to quote from Nietzsche again, from the forward of Twilight of the Idols:  the underground “compels one every instant to run out into the sunshine so as to shake off a seriousness grown all to oppressive.  Every expedient for doing so is justified, every occasion a joyful occasion.  Above all war.  War has always been the grand sagacity of every spirit which has grown too inward and too profound; its curative power lies even in the wounds one receives…This book too…is above all a relaxation, a sunspot, an escapade into the idle hours of a” fallen nobody in the underground. So as it is, I have decided officially to go to war with this celebrity, gossip, Hollywood and star culture I hate.  But first I must have a good laugh at myself for making such vehement declarations  into the vastness of the web in which not a soul hears a word.  Nevertheless, this blog entry begins my march, a raising of war insignia, if you will, towards this end.