When Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt negotiated with People and other celebrity magazines this summer for photos of their newborn twins and an interview, the stars were seeking more than the estimated $14 million they received from the deal. They also wanted a hefty slice of journalistic input -- a promise that the winning magazine's coverage would be positive, not merely in that instance but into the future.
According to the deal offered by Ms. Jolie, the winning magazine was obliged to offer coverage that would not reflect negatively on her or her family, according to two people with knowledge of the bidding who were granted anonymity because the talks were confidential. The deal also asked for an "editorial plan" providing a road map of the layout, these people say.The winner was People. The resulting package in its Aug. 18 issue -- the magazine's best-selling in seven years -- was a publicity coup for Ms. Jolie, the Oscar winner and former Hollywood eccentric who wore a necklace ornamented with dried blood and talked about her fondness for knives before transforming herself into a philanthropist, United Nations good-will ambassador and devoted mother of six.
In the People interview, there were questions about her and Mr. Pitt's charity work and no use of the word "Brangelina," the tabloid amalgamation of their names, which irks the couple.
For the record, People denies this, but I'm not sure what else they'd say. Unlike a lot of other celeb mags, People still holds on to a some sense of journalistic ethics. Or maybe not. I think this sort of thing is good in the short term, but bad over the long-term. Frankly, I've stopped reading celeb profiles in all magazines. What are you really going to learn? What really is the point? Why not just send the press release directly to the fans? Someday soon, Hollywood will figure this out and publish its own magazines--if there are any magazines still around.
The Beautiful Struggle: A Father, Two Sons, and an Unlikely Road to Manhood 
People still holds on to a some sense of journalistic ethics. Or maybe not.
I'd think the latter. Then again that's my whole predisposition again most entertainment/tabloid magazines talking. I'm still surprised at National Enquirer being OTM on John Edwards, for all that they have delivered the goods plenty of times the past (and many other times haven't, etc. etc.)
The mutually-reinforcing dynamic between the press and mass media entertainment figures is a near constant ever since celebrity culture as such was first codified in the 19th century. (Consider the story of Jenny Lind, for instance, specifically her American successes, though that link doesn't go into as much detail as I would have liked.) So I admit this just seems like another example of standard practice rather than a sudden shift.
Yeah, I seem to remember reading People and laughing at its fawning celebrity coverage back in my journalism student days.
Everyone's a winner as far as I'm concerned. Especially the baby. Sure, it will probably grow up to be a terrible person, but that's not important. What's important is having a lot of money and being ridiculously good looking. Which this child is sure to be.
"Hollywood will figure this out and publish its own magazines"
Hollywood figured this out years ago. The Hollywood fan mags and gossip rags of yore were organs of the industry.
What Time Inc figured out is that they could they could do the same thing, put the veneer of journalistic integrity over it, and sell ad space to P&G.
The Enquirer pays its unnamed sources, which is obviously sketchy. This step by People seems only a tiny step away from that.
They're both trash, in my opinion. Lots and lots of photos, gossip, junk. A mile wide and a millimeter deep. No thanks.
The Hollywood fan mags and gossip rags of yore were organs of the industry.
And they're amazing documents, especially for what they leave out and/or skate over. (The marketing of Rock Hudson as utterly straight being a classic example.) Stuff like that makes you realize how little the Onion had to do to make Jackie Harvey a continuing feature.
Frankly, I've stopped reading celeb profiles in all magazines.
But, how will you know what they are really like? How will you live?
I have never suffered from the need to stop reading celeb profiles. I never took up the habit. I do not understand the attraction to knowing the details of a strangers personal life. An artists measure is their work and I do not care who is poking whom with what.
Since all celebrity coverage is useless trivia about a subject of less than no importance who cares if every single word of it is false?
I knew I was old when I walked through the checkout line and looked at the covers of the glossy tabloids and thought to myself "I have no idea who those people are."
@Stacy: Twins, a girl and a boy, so even more so.
This isn't clear: If People agreed not to ever print anything negative, no matter what Jolie and Pitt do in the coming years, that seems both naive (on People's part) and unenforceable (on Jolie/Pitt's part). But if People paid millions for the shots, you'd expect that they wouldn't use "Brangelina" (I hate it too), that the coverage would be positive, and that it would talk about their charity work, which is actually pretty impressive.
I've never bought People, but it's my first choice of Doctor's Office Reading, and I'd say their coverage of anyone with whom they have interviews, celebrity or heartwarming neighborhood utility worker or girl with leprosy, is positive. My only reading of other celebrity mags consists of the covers in the supermarket checkout line, and even with that very limited exposure I am sick of the endless round of "brad and angelina breaking up" and "Jen is mad/sad/bad."
The funny thing about 'reality' shows is, even when a few have been found to be largely staged, people still watched. People aren't looking for investigative journalism with these mags, just good stories and pictures. And there's nothing wrong with that.
You didn't just put the words "journalistic ethics" and "celeb magazines" in the same sentence...
Shame on you.
It's entertainment, PR, and drivel for the masses. Why should anyone expect anything in it to be true or held up to some form of ethics? it's entertainment, like the movies they star in.
You want ethics, wait for an article in the news paper or a real magazine.
You want ethics, wait for an article in the news paper or a real magazine.
Correction -- you want ethics, do it yourself. Or maybe go to another planet.
Amd let me guess, huh, you only watch foreign films. And you certainly don't watch TV, because TV is a nickname, nicknames are for friends, and Television is NO friend of yours.
I read this on the way into work this morning. First, I was fascinated at its presence on the front page. The FRONT PAGE of the NYT. Second, I was kinda left with a 'so what?' feeling. Isn't this becoming SOP in Hollywood? I'm not quite sure why this was considered news.
Amd let me guess, huh, you only watch foreign films. And you certainly don't watch TV, because TV is a nickname, nicknames are for friends, and Television is NO friend of yours.
You left out his ownership of a mini-Victrola.
One of their most memorable skits, IMO.
Applying ethics to this is just silly.
Is there any sense in which applying ethics would improve the knowledge of the public? Good, bad, or ugly, any word spent on Brangelina's baby is tripe that is utterly irrelevant to any reader. It's an entertainment product, not journalism. The celeb mags are in the same sort of business as reality TV shows--- enough fact to provide a feeling or realism, enough contrivances to make it dramatic.
I can't believe its profitable to pay 14 million for snapshots of the frigging baby, but whatever.
That celebrities are just like ME!
I bought that issue eagerly. I can't even tell you what the article said. I bought it for the pictures. I bet 90% of the people who bought that issue bought it for the pictures.
People knows that.
Ginger Joe,
"Keep. The Change"(blood trickling out of ear)
Rikyrah
I have a question if you would deign to enlighten me. Why would you pay to see a stranger's baby pictures, when you would cringe inside if an elderly woman produced snapshots of the grand-kids? I am sure there must be some difference that I am unable to appreciate but I cannot fathom what it might be.
After spending several years as an entertainment industry flack and as something of a student of the biz--this is "same old, same old." Sidney Falco and J.J. Hunsecker ("Sweet Smell of Success" ) probably have more integrity that many (but by no means all) of my former colleagues and the "journalists" we worked with.
TNC: I really like your blog, one of only three I have bookmarked.
I don't care how she manipultes her own image but I sure do wish she'd stop pimping out her children to the highest bidder. It's child exploitation if you ask me and really kind of disgusting. Of course the people who ogle pictures of these kids are weird too. The selling of baby photos is the worst thing to happen in Hollywood in a long time.
http://www.236.com/video/2008/get_your_war_on_the_day_traito_10364.php
This is really the only relevant commentary, I think. Selling baby photos is only as reprehensible as ... buying them... or buying people magazine.