In my most recent tutorial with José we discussed further the themes I may want to feature in my piece – he suggested that as I am interested in making something to do with fame and celebrity I may want to explore the work of Kenneth Anger, and in particular his book ‘Hollywood Babylon’ which chronicles the “darkest and best kept secrets” of Hollywood from the 1910’s to the 1960’s.
Anger was a filmmaker born in 1927, who grew up as a child actor in Hollywood and went on to direct a series of surrealist and erotic films known as the “Magick Lantern Cycle”, made between 1947 and 1981. These films, such as “Fireworks” were pioneering in their representation of queer culture, at a time when homosexuality was illegal in the US.
‘Hollywood Babylon’ details, in a mostly chronological order, many stories of the seedy, darker underbelly of Hollywood during the first half of the 20th century, at a time when celebrity scandal was still a novelty and stars were a lot more idealised than they are today. It allows for an interesting insight into the lives of celebrities whose careers were ruined, and sometimes lives ended, by the city they chose to inhabit, the adulation they chased, and the hedonistic habits they formed – as Anger about said Hollywood in a retrospective documentary in 1991, “it’s provided me with… wonderful little insights into the human condition”. The book highlights the murky nature of humanity that inhabits all of us in different forms – after reading through, it is easy to see how David Lynch has cited Kenneth Anger as one his main influences, with similar themes of the darker side of humanity running rampant under a beautiful surface being portrayed in works such as ‘Blue Velvet’ and ‘Twin Peaks’.
There are definitely themes from this book I could use to inspire my own piece of work for the portfolio project. The idea of exploring the darker side of fame and Hollywood in particular may be more of a strong idea than the topics I had thought of before; para-social relationships and conspiracy theories – although there may still be ways I can link these themes in. I could potentially use more modern examples for my piece – such as the Harvey Weinstein ‘casting couch scandal’ from a few years ago. In this way I would be sonifying some of the themes presented in ‘Hollywood Babylon’, which would be an interesting exercise.
However, there is also a lot of falsity in ‘Hollywood Babylon’ – certain aspects of stories that Anger either overdramatised or completely made up. For instance, there is the story of Lupe Velez, an actress who committed suicide by overdosing on Seconal tablets. In the book, Anger claims that the tablets did not fully kill Velez as a result of the large amount of alcohol she had consumed earlier that evening, and that she ending up sprawling across her bedroom into the bathroom and accidentally drowned with her head in the toilet. This has been proven as untrue, when a police photograph of Velez’s body, as it was found, was released in 2013 – she had died in her bedroom as a result of the tablets, and did not drown in the toilet. Anger’s story, therefore, either came about as a result of rumour or deliberate mistruth.
Perhaps though, there could be ways of incorporating themes of falsehood and rumour into my piece as well. People are inevitably drawn to gossip and salacious stories – this is why tabloid culture is still so popular amongst us. We want to hear these stories and believe them to be true, and sometimes lies and rumour can be a big part of this – there are tons of examples of this online. Maybe there would be a way of me being able to touch on these topics in the work that I make.
Overall, ‘Hollywood Babylon’ was a very engaging read that I finished in two days and it almost felt addictive to read. This probably speaks to the human condition’s love for dirt – when it comes to gossip, no one is completely infallible.