"The Tragedy of Clara Bow's Life"

[BettyLouSpence]

From a 1935 anti-Hollywood polemic called Sodom and Gomorrah: The Story of Hollywood. In this chapter the author not only criticizes fan mag articles as nothing more than vapid clickbait-y encomiums, but takes a stab at writing one himself to really hammer the point home. Page 152 is the beginning of his "article", The Tragedy of Clara Bow's Life, and it is positively dripping with snark. Enjoy!

https://archive.org/details/sodomgomorr ... 2/mode/2up

You can also read it here, under this spoiler:

► Show Spoiler

[donnie]

Wow, that's hilarious. And revealing—not of Clara, but of the methods of the movie mag writers. It's amazing that so much can be said about nothing, if you really try. The funniest thing, though, was Clara's high-sounding, philosophical declarations.

Question: How much of this sort of thing do you think is still going on—albeit on a more sophisticated level? Of course, there are the tabloids, but that's more lurid/scandal-oriented.

[BettyLouSpence]

There are so many great quotes from this. My favorite is:

"And let me say right here, my patient reader, that Clara Bow is Hollywood's greatest philosopher. Emanuel Kant would've idolized her. Schopenhauer would've adored her. And as for the the Greeks, well, the Greeks had a word for it."

I think I might make this one my signature

Question: How much of this sort of thing do you think is still going on—albeit on a more sophisticated level? Of course, there are the tabloids, but that's more lurid/scandal-oriented.

It still goes on, I've certainly seen my share of fawning articles on specific celebs, though it seems to be limited to gushing over their fashion sense or their families (especially if they've just had a baby). Oh, and clickbait (looking at you, Buzzfeed). Clickbait never changes.