Luckily for me, screening invites flooding my inbox is a regular and somewhat glorious occurance. Some I can’t wait to see, some I’m not too bothered about and others I’ve never heard of nor do I have a scooby doo what they’re about and Me and Orson Welles fell straight into both the second and third category. Mainly because I’ve never really been fond of Orson Welles and also because it just didn’t seem like my cup of tea. So why did I RSVP immediately and give up a perfectly good Tuesday evening usually spent with the likes of my 25th Anniversary 2-Disc special edition DVD of Footloose to sit through something I have absolutely no interest in?
Well, I was intrigued because this film marks the first “serious” role for the oh-so-pretty, bonafide all American tween wet dream Zac Efron. Yep, after making his name in Disney’s painfully chaste High School Musical series and the surprisingly fun film adaptation of Hairspray is saying goodbye to to musicals and kids films to be take more serious roles in an effort to add some longetivity to his career. Hmm, I did about a million eye rolls just writing that but it does bring up an interesting point, does being a hearthrob/sex symbol/conventionally hot person make it impossible to be a great actor?
Never a week goes by when I log on to my favourite trashy celebrity blogs (don’t judge me) and see some young starlet cursing her good looks because she can’t get a good role that will help her take prime location amongst Meryl Streep, Cate Blanchett et al. Please, maybe if they spent less time posing in bikinis and taking roles in films that only require that they wear a bikini someone would take them seriously. I nearly choked on my own spit when Megan Fox referred to herself as an ‘actress’, because apparently bending over a bike in a pair of shorts requires real gravitas. But maybe I’m being too harsh, take a look at her CV for yourself.
On the upside, it would appear that being a lads’ mag favourite doesn’t do anything for your box office appeal if the success – or lack of – Jennifer’s Body is anything to go by. Many including myself thought that Megan Fox’s immense popularity would be enough to get a decent amount of bums in seats even if Diablo Cody’s follow up to Juno was as bad as the critics said. Apparently not even the promise of a little girl-on-girl action was enough to get the target audience interested, and the filmed limped into the box office top 10, which is making everyone’s earlier assumptions that Fox’s career will only remain hot for as long as she is gather steam.
But it’s not just the ladies who bemoan what God gave them. Johnny Depp hated his pretty boy image in the early days and soon ditched that status after hooking up with Tim Burton, although interestingly even playing cult directors with a penchant for angora sweaters and the crazy pirate son of Keith Richards didn’t do enough to sway his hotness, and he still remains a huge sex symbol today.
Leonardo DiCaprio was the Zac Efron of his day after Baz Lurhman’s Romeo + Juliet and the almighty Titanic, and adorned many teenage girls’ school diaries in sticker form thanks to Smash Hits (oh, the memories). But after having an insane fan handcuff herself to his ankle at an airport he came to the conclusion that actor and movie star are two very different things.
Arguably one of the finest actresses ever, Bette Davis famously claimed that it was a good thing she was talented as her looks alone would’ve gotten her nowhere (tell that to Kim Carnes) whilst Marilyn Monroe, undoubtedly the biggest female sex symbol of the twentieth century, if not of all time, bemoaned the fact that no-one took her seriously and she was always left playing the ditzy blonde. Although considering how she got where she did, it’s hardly surprising that she was saddled with that tag.
Whilst it is possible to be both a sex symbol and a serious filmmaking force to be reckoned with (why hello there, Dr. Ross) it remains to be seen whether Zacquisha can be the next Johnny/Leo/George but surely the fact that he’s trying to break through is a sign of some intelligent desire to get ahead, right? No one thought Leo would still be around today so maybe he and Megan are the next Meryl and Sean. And even if they aren’t there are plenty of magazine covers to be filled.
What do you think people? Is damn right gorgeousness a ticket to a short but big career or can there be more to some books than just their covers?
