Aug 22 2010
Being There was the last Peter Sellers film released when he was alive. It stars Sellers as Chance the Gardener, a simpleton assumed to be someone he’s not and propelled to fame, after being hit by a car as he’s watching himself on the television of a storefront video camera. It ends with Sellers walking on water, next in line as president. My favorite part is Chance walking out of his house into the city for the first time in his life, an old man, with the soundtrack pumping Deodato’s Thus Sprach Zarathustra - a piece more commonly associated with apes gaining consciousness in 2001. I think about Chance when I walk into a grocery store now or hear something about Sarah Palin. I can’t buy groceries without being accosted at checkout with an image of some famous bullshit nobody who lost 15 pounds, a famous bullshit nobody who was on reality television once and is now a star and, let’s face it, was the real reason ten million viewers watched The Today Show yesterday morning - yeah, Today might have led with a geopolitical/economic/ecological disaster story but WHO CARES, they tuned in for the country singer crooning in the street (so authentic!) and the interview with the famous bullshit nobody (so real!). We are surrounded by famous bullshit nobodies, famous simply because they stumbled on television or television stumbled on them. No talent required. In fact, simpletons excel, because they’re more watchable, more trustworthy. And fame begets fame. Reality begets reality. While Chance was innocuously dumb, too many bullshit simpletons today are poisonous - xenophobic, bigoted, ignorant and egotistical weasels who equate being famous with being right, weasels who make you wonder ‘why is anyone still talking about her? don’t people understand how empty her head is? or is that why everybody trusts and likes her?’ Celebrity used to require a modicum of talent, but now the talentless command celebrity, and celebrity is news. We propel those who have spent their lives isolated from the world to lead it, to lead us. We like to watch.

Being There was the last Peter Sellers film released when he was alive. It stars Sellers as Chance the Gardener, a simpleton assumed to be someone he’s not and propelled to fame, after being hit by a car as he’s watching himself on the television of a storefront video camera. It ends with Sellers walking on water, next in line as president.

My favorite part is Chance walking out of his house into the city for the first time in his life, an old man, with the soundtrack pumping Deodato’s Thus Sprach Zarathustra - a piece more commonly associated with apes gaining consciousness in 2001.

I think about Chance when I walk into a grocery store now or hear something about Sarah Palin. I can’t buy groceries without being accosted at checkout with an image of some famous bullshit nobody who lost 15 pounds, a famous bullshit nobody who was on reality television once and is now a star and, let’s face it, was the real reason ten million viewers watched The Today Show yesterday morning - yeah, Today might have led with a geopolitical/economic/ecological disaster story but WHO CARES, they tuned in for the country singer crooning in the street (so authentic!) and the interview with the famous bullshit nobody (so real!).

We are surrounded by famous bullshit nobodies, famous simply because they stumbled on television or television stumbled on them. No talent required. In fact, simpletons excel, because they’re more watchable, more trustworthy. And fame begets fame. Reality begets reality.

While Chance was innocuously dumb, too many bullshit simpletons today are poisonous - xenophobic, bigoted, ignorant and egotistical weasels who equate being famous with being right, weasels who make you wonder ‘why is anyone still talking about her? don’t people understand how empty her head is? or is that why everybody trusts and likes her?’

Celebrity used to require a modicum of talent, but now the talentless command celebrity, and celebrity is news. We propel those who have spent their lives isolated from the world to lead it, to lead us. We like to watch.

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