How To Be A Movie Star In Your Own Life (part 3)
Hire a good publicist. Birth, Marriage, and Death - in the old days, that's how often members of society wanted to be in the press. Now, with the advent of cable television, youtube, Us Weekly, Perez Hilton, video stalkerazzi, the Forbes list, IPOs, gawker.com, the opportunities to end up in the media are endless. Is this a good thing? Probably not. All the stuff we know about celebrities and out public figures today is just noise. And once the press gets a hold of you, they can lift you up, but they can also - and probably will - be the first to drag you down, as we see in the increasingly public dramas of Brittney, Lindsay, Paris, etc. Being a publicity hound can backfire, so choose your appearances carefully.
For this reason (among others), AH generally disliked dealing with the press. She was just too private a person and, as she became more famous, grew wary of the intrusive questions she was forced to endure (mostly about the state of her marriage to Mel - or lack thereof). In fact, once she married her second husband, Dr. Andrea Dotti, in 1969, and moved to Rome, she limited interviews to half an hour because she believed that after that, the reporter would start asking personal questions.
But - and here is her dichotomy - if she had to promote a movie, or a good cause like UNICEF, she was more than happy to speak to the press, because she knew she could use her fame to do some good.
And if you don't hire a publicist, be your own good publicist. If you are about to do something in public, ask yourself, "What would Audrey do?" And if that doesn't give you pause, think about how it would look on the front page of the New York Post or the National Enquirer. And act accordingly.
Throw a tantrum once in a while. Okay, AH never did this, but if you occasionally throw a tantrum, if can be extremely memorable, especially if you don't normally behave like a diva. the only known instance of Audrey behaving badly (for Audrey, we mean) was during the extremely arduous filming of My Fair Lady. She had been training nonstop for several months, in addition to singing lessons, dancing lessons, elocution lessons with a professor from UCLA, putting up with Rex Harrison's ego, and practically carrying the entire picture herself. One fateful day, the musical director, Andre Previn - possibly taking pity on all of her hard work - finally let her know that her singing voice was not going to be used in the film. (Instead, her singing would be dubbed by Marni Nixon, although AH can be heard in the restored 1994 MFL print.) She said, "Oh," walked off the set, out the door, and went home.
The next day she returned and apologized.
Hire a good publicist. Birth, Marriage, and Death - in the old days, that's how often members of society wanted to be in the press. Now, with the advent of cable television, youtube, Us Weekly, Perez Hilton, video stalkerazzi, the Forbes list, IPOs, gawker.com, the opportunities to end up in the media are endless. Is this a good thing? Probably not. All the stuff we know about celebrities and out public figures today is just noise. And once the press gets a hold of you, they can lift you up, but they can also - and probably will - be the first to drag you down, as we see in the increasingly public dramas of Brittney, Lindsay, Paris, etc. Being a publicity hound can backfire, so choose your appearances carefully.
For this reason (among others), AH generally disliked dealing with the press. She was just too private a person and, as she became more famous, grew wary of the intrusive questions she was forced to endure (mostly about the state of her marriage to Mel - or lack thereof). In fact, once she married her second husband, Dr. Andrea Dotti, in 1969, and moved to Rome, she limited interviews to half an hour because she believed that after that, the reporter would start asking personal questions.
But - and here is her dichotomy - if she had to promote a movie, or a good cause like UNICEF, she was more than happy to speak to the press, because she knew she could use her fame to do some good.
And if you don't hire a publicist, be your own good publicist. If you are about to do something in public, ask yourself, "What would Audrey do?" And if that doesn't give you pause, think about how it would look on the front page of the New York Post or the National Enquirer. And act accordingly.
Throw a tantrum once in a while. Okay, AH never did this, but if you occasionally throw a tantrum, if can be extremely memorable, especially if you don't normally behave like a diva. the only known instance of Audrey behaving badly (for Audrey, we mean) was during the extremely arduous filming of My Fair Lady. She had been training nonstop for several months, in addition to singing lessons, dancing lessons, elocution lessons with a professor from UCLA, putting up with Rex Harrison's ego, and practically carrying the entire picture herself. One fateful day, the musical director, Andre Previn - possibly taking pity on all of her hard work - finally let her know that her singing voice was not going to be used in the film. (Instead, her singing would be dubbed by Marni Nixon, although AH can be heard in the restored 1994 MFL print.) She said, "Oh," walked off the set, out the door, and went home.
The next day she returned and apologized.
**all information comes from the book: What Would Audrey Do by Pamela Keogh
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