Notes - The Drama of Celebrity - Performance, Fandom, and Influence

Sharon Marcus | March 14, 2026

Chapter 1: Defiance

The Strategic Use of Rule-Breaking

Celebrity status is frequently the result of individuals rising to fame by openly breaking the most cherished cultural rules. Patterns of defiant celebrity are visible in John Lennon’s 1966 assertion that the Beatles were bigger than Jesus and Madonna’s 2015 proclamation that she has never followed the rules. Defiance often brings significant rewards, as demonstrated by Donald Trump becoming President of the United States despite his nonconformist behavior in national debates. In the 1950s, James Dean gained cult status through both his nonconformist characters and his real-life rebelliousness. Madonna utilized profanity on late-night television to increase her profile, and Kim Kardashian’s naked magazine spread nearly "broke the internet". Marlon Brando challenged the uniform gray flannel suits of the 1950s by choosing to wear tight T-shirts and black leather jackets. Lady Gaga attracted international attention by wearing a red-latfit to meet Queen Elizabeth II and later appearing in a dress made of raw beef.

Symbols of Resistance and Professional Risks

Defiant actions can transform a figure into a symbol of resistance against an unjust social order, as seen with Muhammad Ali’s refusal to defer to white expectations and his decision to face jail rather than join the army. Sinead O’Connor protested child abuse by ripping up a picture of the Pope on live television, which increased her notoriety. This serves as a warning that while defiance can increase appeal with some publics, it can also lead to professional suffering, as O’Connor's career was significantly damaged by her protests. Even outrageous behavior that attracts millions of critics can garner an equal number of admirers who view the celebrity as an unapologetic maverick.

Celebrity and the State of Social Exception

Society often allows for a certain degree of sanctioned "recalcitrance" because individuals establish their identity by positioning themselainst social claims. Defiant celebrities model an emotional attitude of indifference to the potential consequences of their nonconformity. Sarah Bernhardt famously boasted that she did exactly as she pleased on all occasions, untrammeled by considerations of what others might think. By performing shamelessness, defiant stars demand credit for their indifference to exposure or censure. This dynamic appeals to a widespread human wish to be a "freeloader"—one who reaps the benefits of social belonging without paying the price of social admission and conformity.

While some celebrities use their influence to fight discrimination or support humanitarian causes, society tends to tolerate defiance best when it does not seek broad social effects. These stars occupy a "state of social exception," creating a highly visible zone of freedom for themselves without extending those liberties to anyone else. In this state, an individual suspends adherence to a social norm while still asserting their membershiin society. Unlike a political state of exception, which involves military or police violence, a social exception has a limited scope and does not usually aim to institute new social norms for the general public.

The Evolution of the Celebrity Rebel

The practice of using blatant defiance to garner mass admiration dates back to the eighteenth century. Oscar Wilde was rewarded for his overt repudiation of normalcy, wearing velvet jackets and shoes trimmed with bows while preaching that the art of life was the art of defiance. Wilde marketed his outrageousness as a way to annoy the public, noting that they enjoyed being annoyed. Earlier in the century, George Sand attracted notoriety by dressing as a man, while the poet Lord Byron became a prototypical rebel through his sexual bravado and displayed pleasure in nonconformity. Byron purposefully shocked the public out of a conscious sense that it was a means of procuring admiration. His fame was solidified when he hinted that his work was a confessional self-portrait.

Sarah Bernhardt’s Physical and Professional Independence

In the 1860s, Sarah Bernhardt was initially rejected by theater managers for being "too thin," a physical trait that journalists later mocked with anti-Semitic undertones. Rather than hiding her body, she chose to display it in tight clothing and confrontational poses that challenged the masculine privilege of evaluating women based on appearance alone. She found that theatergoers loved her specifically for these defiant ways despite her bad press. Bernhardt’s defiance extended to her personal life; she had a son without being married, supported herself financially, and reportedly slept in a satin-lined coffin.

Bernhardt further established her independence by breaking her contract with the national theater to tour as a free agent and managing her own troupes. She won back the French press during a tour in Denmark by rebuffing a Prussian minister’s toast, positioning herself as a warrior for France and earning the title of tNew Joan of Arc"**. In her professional work, she gravitated toward roles featuring "luxurious criminality" and passion over conventional conduct.

Bypassing Gatekeepers through Direct Appeals

Celebrities often strive to influence or evade media gatekeepers who exercise top-down control. Marilyn Monroe effectively neutralized an attempt to weaken her bargaining position by bypassing her studio and going straight to the public to entertain troops in Korea. Bernhardt utilized laws that required editors to publish letters from their subjects, turning newspapers that attacked her into megaphones for her own speech. These direct appeals to the public can enlighten public opinion and ensure that the motives behind a star's decisions are not mistaken. The public’s applause and financial support remain a power that can create celebrity regardless of newspaper coverage or studio releases.

Chapter 2: Sensation

The Paradox of Submission

Audiences throughout history have actively sought out the experience of being completely overwhelmed and dominated by a charismatic performer. This sensation is not merely a passive reaction; rather, it is a deliberate use of agency by the spectator in order to temporarily lose that same agency to a star. Historical accounts describe spectators falling into hysterics, being "carried from the theater in a frenzy," or feeling completely "enchained" by the power of actors like Sarah Siddons, Adelaide Ristori, and Rachel. This hypnotic effect is not confined to the stage; it extends to politicians, preachers, and public speakers who possess the "power to move and bear down a whole audience". In more modern contexts, this same dynamic of rapturous submission can be seen in the physical responses of fans to Anna Pavlova, Frank Sinatra, Elvis Presley, and James Brown.

Illiberal Agency and Domination

While many theories of celebrity focus on stars as liberal "role models" who empower their fans through rational inspiration, much of celebrity culture operates on an "illiberal" model of agency. This type of agency is volatile, tempestuous, and explicitly hierarchical, involving a star who willfully exercises power to dominate a public that takes pleasure in feeling emotions it cannot control. In this interaction, the star is "indomitable" and the audience is "mesmerized". There is a significant warning inherent in this dynamic: while this surrender of autonomy can be liberating in an artistic context, the same techniques of media access and charismatic influence can result in political demagoguery when used by figures like Charles Lindbergh or Donald Trump.

The Evolution of Sensational Acting

The 18th century favored a classical, statuesque acting style that prioritized elocution and words over physical embodiment. However, the rise of populist democracy in the 19th century brought about a shift toward "sensation," where physical movement, acrobatic virtuosity, and visceral vitality replaced the depiction of abstract ideas. This "aesthetic of illegitimacy" used electricity and fire as common metaphors to describe actors who could deliver "electric shocks" to their audiences. Performers like Edmund Kean and Edwin Forrest broke away from regulated gestures, instead using "passionate exclamation" and "frenetic action" to inspire idolatry in working-class audiences.

Techniques of Exteriority

The power to move an audience is not a mysterious or accidental quality but the result of carefully executed physical techniques. These are defined as "exteriority effects"—arresting facial expressions, vocal acrobatics, and riveting bodily movements that fix the public’s attention. Sarah Bernhardt was a master of these techniques, often showcasing her executive power by personally managing every detail of her performances, from sawing down chair legs to the perfect height to physically wrenches a co-actor's head to the precise posture for maximum effect.

There are four specific practical applications of these techniques that can be used to command total attention:

Hyperextension: Moving body parts in opposing directions simultaneously (e.g., looking one way while the hands wander in another).
Tempo Variation: Alternating between rushing and pausing, or hammering words out and then elongating them into a chant.
Framing: Fixing the audience's gaze by isolating specific body parts or using dramatic entrances and exits to alternate between presence and absence.
Mobility: Using exaggerated and fluid movement to simulate "liveness" and prevent the audience from ever looking away.

The Murder Scene in "La Tosca" as a Masterclass

The murder scene in Sardou's La Tosca provides a clear example of how these effects work in tandem to manipulate audience sensation. After the protagonist murders the police chief, she scrubs the blood from her hand "finger by finger," an action she protracts "almost unbearably" to force the spectators into a rapt, submitting silence. By moving with the methodical speed of a "tired housewife," while maintaining a "ghastly" and "wan" face, she frames the audience's focus through intense tempo control. Her famous exit—an "undulating movement of a reptile" through a half-closed door—slowly reframes her body as she disappears, creating a sense of fleeting plenitude and imminent loss that rivets the beholder. This uneven distribution of agency, where the character commands the stage even in silence, places the star at the apex of a sensational hierarchy.

Chapter 3: SAVAGERY

The Myth of Mass Hysteria

Media coverage has long depicted the intense popularity of celebrities as a form of mass hysteria or lunacy. In 1957, for instance, press reports characterized Elvis Presley’s fans as a "demented army" and a "seething mob," attributing their excitement to a "savage jungle beat". Such accounts frequently prioritized the reactions of the crowd over the performance itself, describing "fresh-faced girls" as quivering and reaching out for "salvation". These portrayals of "disgusting exhibitions" and "mass hysteria" were often significant overreactions to what law enforcement sometimes described as merely "excited kids". The tendency to cast fans as "writhing, frenzied idiots" serves to delegitimize the celebrity’s influence by framing it as a threat to reason and public order.

The Media as Cultural Gatekeeper

Newspapermen and pundits often disdain celebrity culture as an anarchic force that encourages both stars and fans to run wild. By portraying fans as "bestial gatecrashers" or "herd[s] of cattle," media workers attempt to reassert their own agency as cultural gatekeepers. This hostility is particularly prevalent when celebrities find ways to connect directly with the public, bypassing established media channels. Journalists who fear losing their authority may mock colleagues who "gush like fans," implying that such behavior is an insult to a "mature, restrained, and reasonable" public. Consequently, the press uses the genre of caricature to assert independence, often depicting celebrities and their admirers as objects of repugnance rather than admiration.

Celebrities as Sideshow Freaks

To diminish the merit of stars, skeptical journalists often categorize them as "sideshow attractions" better suited for a circus or a "colonial exhibition" than a legitimate theater. Sarah Bernhardt, despite her background in classical tragedy, was frequently compared to a "freak," a "tiger tamer," or even a "microscopic artist" in a flea circus. This "freak show" narrative persisted throughout her career, even leading theater managers to suggest a "Post-Amputation Tour" after she lost a leg, predicting that the public's curiosity about her "cork leg" would ensure commercial success. Such comparisons to "charlatanry" and "traveling shows" are intended to strip the celebrity of artistic dignity and frame them as a mere "curiosity".

Racism and Anti-Semitism as Rhetorical Weapons

Journalists seeking to make celebrities appear "repugnant" frequently rely on racial and ethnic stereotypes. In late nineteenth-century France, anti-Semitic sentiment was weaponized against Sarah Bernhardt, with caricatures highlighting a "prominent nose" and "unruly hair" to link her commercial success to "inherent" greed or "dirty" ambition. Media workers depicted her as a "savage" or an interloper who dominated the public to destroy it, comparing her to biblical figures like Judith beheading Holophernes. These attacks were not limited to the star herself but extended to the "feeble heads" of the public, whom the press described as "prone to slavery" and lacking the strength required for free citizenship.

The Caricature of Political Chaos

Caricaturists often imagined celebrity mania as a force that could trigger political revolt among "subordinate groups" such as women, African Americans, Native Americans, and Mormons. Elaborate cartoons depicted Sarah Bernhardt leading "demented" armies of Sioux warriors to scalp U.S. senators or inspiring Mormon wives to burn Salt Lake City and establish polyandry. These images reflected deep-seated anxieties among white, elite men that celebrity-driven democracy might combine the worst aspects of monarchy and "mob rule". By portraying fandom as a "martial campaign" or a "civil war" that enforce subordination to a star, journalists framed celebrity worship as a regression from "emancipated citizenship" back to savagery or even slavery.

The Powerlessness of Popularity

A contrasting strategy used to debase celebrities was to depict their popularity as a source of pathetic powerlessness. Some caricatures showed stars as victims of their "savage" fans, depicted as being gagged, force-fed, or even eaten by "literally crazy" admirers. In these scenarios, the star's agency is completely erased, and they are eventually reduced to the "lowliest kind of popular attraction," such as a "giant woman at a fair". This approach deflates the celebrity’s achievements by suggesting they are merely "targets" for the cruel sports of the "natives".

The Reactive Nature of Caricature

Despite the aggressive devaluation of stars, caricature is an essentially reactive and parasitic form that actually reinforces the power it seeks to mock. These outlandish inventions—ranging from Native Americans waging armed revolt to fans being "cattle"—bore little relationship to reality. In fact, there is no evidence that groups like Native Americans were particularly strong fans of Bernhardt; instead, these narratives were racist and imperialist fantasies used to diminish the merit of the celebrity. While theater reviews provided painstaking accounts of actual performances, cartoons focused on "news that everyone already knows" to create scenarios where celebrity worship posed a "mortal danger" to the powerful and powerless alike.

Chapter 4: Intimacy

The Drama of Fandom and the Spectrum of Agency

Celebrity culture thrives on drama for fans just as much as for stars. While media accounts often focus on extreme cases—such as devotees who tattoo album covers on their skin or stalkers who threaten safety—these outliers do not represent the typical fan. Traditional academic theories often present a binary choice: fans are either "passive consumers" manipulated by the industry or "creative producers" who resist dominant culture. However, most fans inhabit a middle state characterized by collection, arrangement, and contemplation. This form of engagement blurs the lines between reading and writing, or production and consumption.

A non-obvious point regarding active fandom is that those who hyperactively pursue celebrities often reinforce existing social hierarchies rather than challenging them. These fans frequently replicate the domineering belief that public figures exist solely for the pleasure of others. Most fans are actually "tranquil daydreamers" who find more satisfaction in communing with representations of stars than in pursuing them in real life.

Basking in Ephemera: The Art of the Scrapbook

Fans primarily seek intimacy through the vast amount of material goods generated by celebrity culture. Between the late 1880s and the early 1920s, theatrical scrapbooks became a major craze, serving as extraordinary evidence of what ordinary fans actually do. These albums allowed fans to track their own personal outings, document theater history, and bask in the vivid imagery of their favorite performers.

A key practical application of scrapbooking is "resituation," which involves moving an object from its original location (like a magazine) to a new one (like an album) without changing the medium. This act adds personal value by marking a specific instance of attention and appreciation. Some compilers used advanced techniques to simulate life and proximity:

Contouring and Silhouetting: Using scissors to cut out an actor's figure so it "pops" off the page, making the image seem as though it might escape the album's confines.
Montage: Arranging multiple views of a star—frontal, profile, and production stills—to create a sense of multi-faceted familiarity.
Manipulating Sightlines: Cutting out individual faces and placing them closer together to simulate private moments or romantic scenes between actors who were also couples in real life.

The physical act of handling these materials through scissor work and gluing represents a desire to bridge the gap between fan and star through touch.

Approaching Celebrity through Sightings and Dreams

Celebrities are so pervasive in the mental landscape that they frequently enter the dreams of ordinary people. Historical records show individuals dreaming of mundane intimate encounters with royalty, such as William Allingham dreaming of dining on custard pudding with Queen Victoria. This suggests that media saturation has collapsed the traditional distinctions between strangers and intimates for centuries.

In waking life, "celebrity sightings" cast a romantic thrill over mundane events. However, this leads to a significant warning: the public recognition of a famous person often spawns an aggressive desire to be recognized back, which can cause fans to suspend social decorum. Famous figures often feel a sense of discomfort and "horror" at being mobbed in public, feeling like "public property" while sensing that no one truly cares for their actual personhood.

The Craze for Correspondence and Autographs

The 19th-century postal system enabled a new level of contact between stars and the public. As postage rates dropped, strangers began to deluge celebrities with letters requesting autographs, money, or marriage. Autographs were particularly prized because they transformed abstract newspaper print into a "distinctive bodily trace" of the star.

While some fans sought favors, others used their agency to bestow gifts upon their idols. Sarah Bernhardt's female admirers, for instance, combined their efforts to present her with expensive jewelry. This interaction allowed fans to position themselves as participants in a celebrity's life rather than mere onlookers. In extreme and often spurious cases reported by the press, this desire for intimacy morphed into "stalking" narratives, such as a fictional account of an Indian prince kidnapping Bernhardt to force a private performance.

Sexual Fantasy and the Power of the Gaze

Fandom often involves a sexual component, though the dynamics vary by gender. In the late 19th century, male-oriented humor magazines often portrayed female stars as erotically available, likening them to commodities or "horseflesh" to be judged and consumed. Male fans were often depicted "besieging" stage doors and demanding roles as "Sarah’s Young Man".

Conversely, female fans also wielded "the power of the look". They directed intense attention toward both male and female performers, sometimes jumping over partitions in theaters to approach stars as closely as possible. As certain stars aged, their fan base often became more predominantly female; by the time Sarah Bernhardt was in her seventies, the "middle-aged woman" was considered the backbone of her audience.

Courting Repulsion as a Tactic of Resistance

Celebrities devised specific methods to resist being treated as mere erotic attractions and to maintain a degree of privacy. A primary strategy was "courting repulsion" by actively embracing the grotesque or the "ugly" in their work. Sarah Bernhardt famously used this technique:

Onstage: She requested roles that muffled her beauty, such as playing a blind grandmother who kills her own granddaughter to save her from torture.
Offstage: She created sculptures and paintings of haggard mourners or young women being seduced by skeletons to fascinate the public while simultaneously repelling them.

By juxtaposing life and death or beauty and decay, stars could seize the public's attention while interfering with the simple visual pleasure of fans who wanted to view them as purely objects for the taking. These tactics allowed the star to remain a "ruling personality" over their own image rather than a passive double.

Chapter 5: Multiplication

The Paradox of Replication and Singularity

A common but mistaken belief is that multiplying a star's image dilutes their celebrity and undermines their uniqueness. In reality, multiplication is the very engine of singularity; once a star has secured public interest through merit or sensation, the more copies of their image that exist, the more their celebrity grows. Marilyn Monroe serves as a primary example of this phenomenon, as she was celebrated as "the most photographed girl in the world," often appearing in articles featuring serial poses from a single shoot. Her professional name even embodied this replication, as the initials "MM" are a vertical mirror of each other.

The Halo of the Multiple

While traditional art theory, such as Walter Benjamin's, suggests that mechanical reproduction destroys the "aura" of a unique object, celebrity culture operates on the "halo of the multiple". Instead of copies dimming a star’s light, they brighten it, making the individual seem matchless and exceptional because they are seen by so many. This process creates a meta-celebrity identity that toggles between the singular person and the multiple representations, concentrating their identity rather than diluting it. Andy Warhol captured this by silkscreening grids of icons like Monroe and Elizabeth Taylor, repeating the same image to highlight that reproduction is intrinsic to stardom.

Historical Context of Proliferation

Celebrity culture expands whenever new technology makes copies cheaper and faster to distribute. By the 1840s, improvements in printing allowed for the mass distribution of celebrity likenesses on everything from porcelain figurines and walking sticks to snuffboxes and decorative tiles. The rise of commercial photography in the 1860s accelerated this; one London studio sold roughly 500,000 portraits per year during that decade. Unlike earlier eras where portraits of a star like Sarah Siddons bore little resemblance to one another, photography allowed stars like Sarah Bernhardt to impress a consistent, distinctive visual identity upon the global public.

Sarah Bernhardt’s Multiplied Image

No star manipulated multiplication more effectively in the nineteenth century than Sarah Bernhardt. She worked with leading photographers in every major capital she visited, ensuring consistency in her poses, expressions, and costumes to maintain control over her image. She frequently played multiple roles in a single week, or even a single night in her old age, creating a sensation of "many Bernhardts" existing simultaneously. Multiplicity became a visual theme in her publicity; for instance, a 1896 cartoon depicted her wearing a dress imprinted with sketches of herself in her most iconic roles, effectively acting as a screen for her own self-citations.

Strategies for Distinctive Typing

Multiplication allows a celebrity to establish a "type"—a set of identifiable traits that persist from one role to the next. This typing makes them easier to copy but also highlights their uniqueness compared to others.

Historical Competition: New performers establish themselves by imitating and then attempting to surpass great predecessors in identifying roles. Bernhardt consciously courted comparison with Rachel Felix by performing roles identified with her, such as Phèdre, to settle her own claims as an incomparable artist.
Shadow Repertory: Living stars often adopt roles successful for their contemporaries to measure their skills against one another.
Mirror Repertory: This involved performers playing the same role simultaneously in the same city, stimulating public curiosity and allowing audiences to judge relative merits. For example, Fanny Davenport made a career following Bernhardt across the United States, performing English versions of Bernhardt's French roles.

Practical Applications in Visual Posing

The way a star is photographed or rendered can either strengthen or weaken their singularity.

The Confrontational Gaze: While typical nineteenth-century female performers were depicted with eyes cast upward or away, Bernhardt adopted a direct, confrontational gaze. This appropriated the self-assertion usually reserved for male portraits and positioned her as the governing personality of her own image.
Warnings Against the Mirror Pose: One common visual convention to avoid is the mirror pose, where a performer is pictured alongside their reflection. This pose often undermines distinctiveness by fragmenting the figure and evoking clichés of vanity. Bernhardt systematically avoided this, and in one rare instance where she stood before a mirror, her back was to it, making the reflection invisible.
Isolation in the Frame: Bernhardt further emphasized her uniqueness by rarely posing with costars, instead appearing alone or with animals to command the viewer's undivided attention.

Consumer Culture and Imitation

Multiplication makes celebrities available for imitation by the public, transforming them into types that can be replicated through consumer goods. By the 1870s, fashion magazines provided detailed patterns for readers to copy the dresses and ruffles of famous actresses. This connection between replication and celebrity meant that a star’s name became a brand; Bernhardt’s name was attached to gloves, carriages, and even cigars, with the elongated shape of the cigars serving as a "delicate compliment" to her thin physique. Through these multiples, fans could approximate a star's essence by adopting their appearance.

Chapter 6: Imitation

The Desire to Emulate

Ordinary individuals have long used celebrities as templates for their own self-construction, multiplying the image of the star through their own bodies. In the 1910s, women bobbed their hair to mimic dancer Irene Castle or purchased "Billie Burke dresses" to capture a piece of that theater star’s allure. By 1964, the phenomenon of Beatlemania saw thousands of British boys purchasing $1.85 haircuts and wigs to resemble their idols, with some even choosing school expulsion over surrendering their "bowl cut". While critics like Theodor Adorno dismissed this as a surrender of agency—viewing mimesis as a "motor reflex spasm" of a victimized public—many participants found it to be a democratizing tool. Practical applications of this emulation include using celebrity biographies to find solutions for personal struggles, such as eating disorders, or using movie stars as models for expressing skeleton emotions like skepticism, skeletalSK skepticism, or defiance.

The Labor of Impersonation

Imitation is a deliberate choice and a difficult skill rather than an effortless reflex. This is illustrated by an anecdote involving the novelist Henry James, who, despite his public critiques of celebrity culture, frequently amused friends by attempting to replicate Sarah Bernhardt's famously sinuous exit in the play La Tosca. James's attempt failed because he forgot that his "plump figure" could not squeeze through the narrow crack in a door that the "divine Sarah" navigated with ease. This failure highlights a non-obvious point: imitation is a "representation"—an artistic interpretation that requires specific physical and creative capacities. Furthermore, the ridicule James faced for his failed attempt serves as a warning that imitation is a privilege often policed by social norms; his effort to "be Sarah" was met with a form of "gay shaming" that underscored the gap between his body and the female star’s.

Commodifying the Persona

The 18th century marked a shift from portraits that emphasized classical ideals to those highlighting unique, imitable traits, such as Jean-Jacques Rousseau's unusual cap or Lord Byron's open shirt collar. These distinctive types made it easy for the public to "sculpt the physical self" by copying specific details. Celebrities frequently leveraged this desire through endorsements, lending their names to products that promised to transmit their essence to the consumer. Sarah Bernhardt endorsed everything from hair-wavers and perfumes to Edison Record players, while actors like Edwin Forrest saw their names attached to locomotives and fire engines. These products invited fans to believe that they could "make it THEIR powder," as Mary Pickford advertised, bridging the gap between the glamorous few and the anonymous many.

The Politics of Fashion

In the 19th century, costumes were an arena of autonomous self-expression for actors, who were responsible for purchasing and often designing their own wardrobes. Bernhardt, for example, claimed to design all her own gowns to express specific "moods" and "never copied anyone else". Her sartorial innovations—such as white kid gloves or specific sleeve designs—often became universal fashion norms after being featured in theater programs and magazines. However, a tension existed between women’s fashion magazines, which encouraged this imitation, and men’s humor publications, which ridiculed it. Satirists often portrayed women who imitated stars as being "above their station," suggesting that their attempts to copy a star's independence or look only exposed their inherent social and physical inferiority.

Racial Exclusion and Caricature

The freedom to imitate celebrities was often restricted by racial hierarchies, with dominant groups seeking to deny oppressed peoples the right to emulate their "betters". An 1881 advertisement for "La Diaphane" rice powder endorsed by Bernhardt provides a stark example; it featured a caricature of two black women trying to use the powder to "whiten" themselves, mocking the idea that they could ever achieve the delicate beauty associated with the star. Similarly, caricatures of "ethnic" Oscar Wildes (Jewish, German, Irish, or African American) were used to laugh at the supposed distance between the refined celebrity and the "abject" imitators. These images served as a warning that while the desire to imitate might be universal, the social "right" to succeed at it was reserved for white, middle-class audiences.

Minstrelsy and the Reversal of Merit

While nonwhite groups were mocked for imitating white stars, white men were rewarded for imitating nonwhite people and women through blackface minstrelsy. These acts often featured white men in "wench" roles, parodying stars like Jenny Lind or Adelina Patti. A popular parody called "Sarah Heartburn" (or "Sarah Barnyard") transformed Bernhardt’s high-tragedy Camille into a low-brow farce. In these performances, the grace of the "white original" was contrasted with the clumsy, "grotesque" antics of the blackface imitator, who might present a "mock Camille" offering a lettuce instead of a flower. This used imitation to reinforce racial status; the act only ended when the performer smeared off his makeup to reveal his white male identity, proving that his superior status remained intact despite the "Topsy-turvy" impersonation.

Chapter 7: Judgment

The Myth of the Passive Audience

Digital media allows billions to post instantaneous, often harsh, critiques of performers, creating a perception that audiences have finally been liberated from a two-century-long period of docility. This narrative suggests that 19th-century theatergoers became increasingly quiet and deferential, followed by 20th-century television viewers who passively absorbed broadcast programming. However, historical documents like fan mail and scrapbooks reveal that spectators never truly lost their "critical edge". Even when they stopped rioting or heckling, they continued to pass rigorous judgment on celebrities and made their views known through private and semi-public records.

The Gendered Devaluation of Celebrity

A significant insight regarding modern critiques is that they are often driven by unconscious gender bias. Pundits who dismiss celebrity culture as vacuous typically target female stars with large female fan bases, such as the Kardashians or Britney Spears, labeling them as "famous for being famous". This association of "indiscriminate fandom" with women dates back to at least the 1890s, when reporters mocked "matinee girls" for their crushes. In contrast, when fans are portrayed as a "gaggle of giggling girls," the stars they admire are frequently dismissed by the press as talentless, regardless of their actual merit or longevity. Warning: This historical pattern shows that the more feminized a fan base becomes, the less seriously both the star and the phenomenon of celebrity are treated by the media.

Celebrity as a Positive Designation of Merit

Historically, the term "celebrity" had mostly positive connotations and was deeply associated with achievement. In the 19th century, male celebrities vastly outnumbered females, and the category included politicians, scientists, and authors like Abraham Lincoln and Alexander von Humboldt. During this era, serious dramatic acting was viewed as a worthy, merit-based profession rather than a superficial pursuit. Publics were encouraged to be worshipful of "heroes," and even the most elitist figures often participated in "amateur theatricals" to gain the poise and expressiveness they admired in professional actors.

Fan Mail as Amateur Drama Criticism

Detailed analysis of fan mail, such as letters saved by Edwin Booth, proves that 19th-century audiences were highly discerning and strategic. Rather than just sending "mash notes," many fans provided sophisticated performance reviews, offering advice on how to improve specific roles.

Examples of Critical Feedback: Correspondents advised Booth to study his fellow actors to improve word clarity, suggested he wear spectacles for realism in certain roles, and even critiqued his physical movements, such as recommending a "larger hump" or a "more infirm gait" for Richard III.
Non-Obvious Point: Some fans positioned themselves as superior judges to professional reviewers, ranking different critics based on their truthfulness and accuracy.

Practical Applications of Evaluation

Audience members used theatergoing as a tool for personal and intellectual training. For instance, some fans would see the same play multiple times with different goals: first for enchantment, second for recollection, third for criticism, and fourth for comparison. Practical Application: This systematic approach allowed them to identify when a performance was becoming "less reality, more acting" due to repetition. Some fans even used their attendance to advocate for logistical changes, such as requesting specific matinee times to accommodate religious observances like Lent or the Jewish Sabbath.

Evaluative Culture in Scrapbooks

Scrapbooks served as the 19th-century equivalent of an interactive database where fans recorded and "graded" every play and performer they witnessed.

Grading Systems: Compilers often assigned ranks such as "good," "fair," "poor," or "fine". One New York woman used then-modern slang to dismiss performances as "punk," "rotten," or "vile".
Visual Hierarchies: Scrapbookers expressed judgment through layout, sometimes dedicating a full, centered page to a single superstar like Sarah Bernhardt while crowding four or five lesser performers onto a single leaf.
Specific Annotations: These records often included biting capsule reviews, such as noting a performer had a "good voice" but was "not magnetic," or identifying the exact act and scene where a "careful" but "cold" actress did her best work.

Ultimately, these records demonstrate that the drama of celebrity was a contest for agency where every participant—the actor, the theatergoer, and the media worker—strove to prove their intelligence and critical acumen.

Chapter 8: Merit

Measuring Excellence in Celebrity Culture

In the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, entertainment industries developed institutionalized ways to rank performers, such as the Oscars, Emmys, and Grammys. Digital media further simplified this measurement through data points like stars, likes, and subscriber counts, which lend authority to a performer's standing regardless of how widely they are known. However, celebrity culture existed long before these formal metrics and voting procedures. In the nineteenth century, when celebrity was experiencing its first major growth spurt, publics and media workers used sophisticated comparative strategies to evaluate the qualitative merits of star performers. Far from relying on personality alone, theatrical stars actively encouraged these judgments to prove their renown was earned through superior skill.

The Function of Global Repertory

A relatively stable international repertory of plays performed across the nineteenth century made it nearly impossible for audiences not to compare different actors in the same roles. This system differs sharply from twentieth-century film and television, where a single actor often claims a monopoly on a role they originate, and performers are valued more for their versatility across different roles rather than their interpretation of a standard one. In contrast, nineteenth-century fans expected to see many different interpretations of "titan" roles like Hamlet or Camille. While stars did identify with specific parts, they also had to prove their worth by tackling roles played by many others. This core group of works was translated into many languages and staged globally, allowing theatergoers from Philadelphia to Lisbon to compare how various "stars" interpreted identical scenes or vocal passages. Professional reviewers and amateur fans alike used these comparisons to place an actor within a wider pool of contenders, demonstrating that nineteenth-century stardom was viewed as a test of measurable, comparable skills.

Historical Competition: Reincarnation and Usurpation

Celebrity merit was often established through historical competition, where a newcomer was measured against the greatest actors of the recent past. This process required an actor to first emphasize their likeness to a legendary predecessor before unfolding a distinctive persona that could eventually eclipse them. For instance, Sarah Bernhardt was frequently compared to her great predecessor, the tragedian Rachel, and her early success was often validated by critics deeming her acting "worthy of Rachel". Such contests did not necessarily result in a unanimous victor, but the debate itself served to sharpen public observation of acting talent. By the early twentieth century, Bernhardt herself became the global standard against which other actresses were measured.

Shadow Repertory: Competing with the Living

Performers also engaged in shadow repertory by adopting roles currently being played with success by other living stars. Younger performers used this to acquire gravitas by being compared to established figures, while older stars used it to appear more modern. A prime example was the role of Marguerite Gautier in La Dame aux camélias (Camille), which was so ubiquitous that the "least adept" spectator could understand, compare, and criticize different interpretations. This enabled critics to discern the specific "type" of each performer, such as Bernhardt's "exaggerated" style versus Eleonora Duse's "fragile" interpretation.

Mirror Repertory: Direct Theatrical Face-Offs

In mirror repertory, stars placed themselves in direct competition by playing the same roles simultaneously in the same city, often at different theaters. These direct face-offs stimulated public curiosity and increased ticket sales rather than dividing the audience. For example, Fanny Davenport built a career in the United States by performing English versions of the same plays Bernhardt staged in French, often appearing in the same cities just before or after the French star. In one notable 1901 tour, Bernhardt and Maude Adams performed L'Aiglon a week apart in the same theaters, encouraging reviewers to analyze the dissimilarities between their "rival performances". Some critics favored Adams for her physical suitability to the role, while others awarded the "palm" for artistry to Bernhardt.

Global Performance Networks and Cultural Standing

The emergence of transoceanic telegraphs, steamships, and extensive railway networks allowed celebrity performers to become highly portable, creating a truly global comparison pool. This global circuit allowed audiences to study various styles of acting from many nations, which critics believed improved general taste and discernment. International fame also bolstered a performer’s prestige in their home country, as they were seen as "missionaries" or "ambassadors" for their national culture. Furthermore, the ability to appreciate a world-class foreign artist became a measure of a city's own merit and lack of provincialism. Metropolis centers like Chicago and even smaller regions in the "Corn Belt" vied with one another over turnout and turnout quality for star visits, using these events to vindicate their own "intelligence and refinement".

The Transformation of Merit Metrics

The widespread nineteenth-century use of historical, shadow, and mirror repertory successfully knit the concept of celebrity to qualitative merit through nuanced, individual comparison. In this era, everyone from the star performer to the "giggling" fan was seen as exercising agency in a collective debate about value. This contrasts with contemporary celebrity culture, which often reduces merit to quantitative metrics—money earned, records broken, or social media followers gained. While modern observers often dismiss celebrity as the enemy of art, the nineteenth-century consensus was that enduring fame was the result of genuine and highly esteemed talent.