Originally posted by Pook
Follow the money. Hollywood relationships, as is Hollywood itself, is little more than a publicity stunt. "But Pook, they *really* love each other!" Hahaha! And I am the giant tooth-fairy!
I totally disagree.
People fall in love (or lust) with people around them, people in their lives. What do common people say but that they met their significant other at work, in school, and so forth. Teenage boys fall for girls in their same high school. And so forth. It’s about geographic proximity and it’s no different than in Hollywood. Why must celebrities fall in love with some ordinary person when the people they spend the most time with... are celebrities (or producers, directors, etc)? Why would it be any different?
Also, I’ve heard from actors who say that when working on a movie there is a blurring of reality. When two actors—say, Russell Crowe and Meg Ryan—play intimate roles involving kissing, sex, and otherwise portraying an intimate relationship, there is a common inability to distinguish the actor from their role—after all, they spend an inordinate amount of time together, acting out a “relationship”; that they think that on-screen relationship, that on-screen persona
is real. This explains why flings are prevalent and why relationships often end after filming wraps up, as the actors come to realize how false was their perception of reality.
The reverse is true, too. People wonder why people have a fascination for celebrities and celebrities wonder why people invade and are so curious about their private life. Humans have a need for community and in this impersonal society where no one knows or acknowledges another, whether it be walking in a mall or traveling in a subway; when people watch movies—especially ones plentiful of close-ups, watch the E! channel, read interviews in magazines, they come to feel they ‘know’ that celebrity. Back in college I once conducted a massive research paper on the history of film and I recall that the public fascination of celebrities did not exist until the close-up was invented, because it was with the close-up that audiences felt close, intimate, with the actor.