:00:00. > :00:00.She meets John Niven, author of the music business satire
:00:00. > :00:00.Kill Your Friends, and the rapper 50 Cent - and this episode does contain
:00:00. > :00:14.some strong language. In my job I regularly meet people whose lives
:00:15. > :00:20.are splashed all over the Internet and newspapers. One day you are
:00:21. > :00:26.heart and the next, well... Fame is a bizarre and fascinating thing. For
:00:27. > :00:30.my edition of Artsnight I will get behind the machine of celebrity and
:00:31. > :00:36.find out why people won fame and how to get famous and most importantly
:00:37. > :00:40.how to stay famous. The fame game is a multi-million pound industry and
:00:41. > :00:46.it is not just faces that change from month to month and year to year
:00:47. > :00:56.but the game itself. Welcome to my Artsnight.
:00:57. > :01:06.# I don't know what you heard about me... One guy who knows what it is
:01:07. > :01:12.to have everyone know his name is 50 cents or Fiddy. He is still one of
:01:13. > :01:19.the bestselling wrappers of all time. -- is 50 Cent. The fame game
:01:20. > :01:23.was not always easy for Fiddy, he is in the UK for a series of gigs and
:01:24. > :01:32.he is staying just over the road from Radio 1. I will pop over to
:01:33. > :01:37.have a chat with him. The facts of his life could not be more dramatic.
:01:38. > :01:41.Born Curtis Jackson in Queens, New York, he was bought up by his
:01:42. > :01:46.grandmother after his mother was killed. By the time he was 12 he was
:01:47. > :01:53.already dealing drugs. In 2000 he nearly died after being shot nine
:01:54. > :01:58.times at close range. Three years later he released his debut album
:01:59. > :02:02.Get Rich or Die Tryin' which was also the title of his 2005
:02:03. > :02:12.semi-biographical film in which he starred as himself. The difference
:02:13. > :02:14.between 50 Cent and Curtis Jackson, is there much of one?
:02:15. > :02:16.You know, I have grown up with both of them.
:02:17. > :02:21.The 50 cent piece is what it would take to get by in
:02:22. > :02:27.I didn't swear in the house, I didn't say anything that would
:02:28. > :02:31.indicate any of my activities that were going on outside.
:02:32. > :02:34.My grandmother, every time they said I did something, she was like...
:02:35. > :02:41.Curtis in the house and 50 on the street.
:02:42. > :02:47.# I was innocent then, I didn't do no wrong... #.
:02:48. > :02:52.You know, your life has changed drastically from your beginnings,
:02:53. > :02:56.did you always know that you were going to do something to get out of
:02:57. > :03:02.your situation? I have addictive behaviours and I know that getting
:03:03. > :03:09.high is not the thing for me. I will get really high. In the house I grew
:03:10. > :03:13.up in, the alcohol abuse was always present. I grew up bright in the
:03:14. > :03:21.middle of that and I was like, kind of dodging that. You are quite
:03:22. > :03:25.secure in the fact you have not changed since becoming successful or
:03:26. > :03:28.would you say you have changed? You become exposed to different things
:03:29. > :03:36.with travelling and seeing different people. It makes you a broader
:03:37. > :03:44.person. I kind of look at people who have it, like guys from my early
:03:45. > :03:49.life, they just came home from jail and it's amazing because they are
:03:50. > :03:54.exactly who they were before they went away, they did not grow up.
:03:55. > :04:09.They stayed exactly the same, maybe ten years. You have held onto your
:04:10. > :04:16.original crew from where you grew up but obviously with success, suddenly
:04:17. > :04:21.I think other people would like to hang out with you. Did you find out
:04:22. > :04:27.about actresses wanting to date you or athletes hanging out with you at
:04:28. > :04:35.a party, how did you approach that? At first you keep your distance from
:04:36. > :04:39.everybody else. But you need to have people around you with their own
:04:40. > :04:43.success and have similar problems. You are a world famous name, so how
:04:44. > :04:48.does that affect your day-to-day life like going to the gym running
:04:49. > :04:54.to get a coffee? What a shot interaction with the public alike?
:04:55. > :05:01.-- what is your interaction like? You try to keep away from the
:05:02. > :05:12.general public because when you are successful, you become a target.
:05:13. > :05:20.# It's your birthday, we are going to party like it's your
:05:21. > :05:25.birthday,... # Would the young Curtis be more
:05:26. > :05:29.hesitant to enter the industry now? You find that a lot of young
:05:30. > :05:34.artists, whether they are musical artists or painters or whatever, do
:05:35. > :05:37.you find that young people now pay more attention to the celebrity
:05:38. > :05:47.aspect of success as opposed to the work? Well, celebrities don't have
:05:48. > :05:53.do have talent to be a celebrity. An attractive woman taking pictures for
:05:54. > :05:59.Instagram can get a million followers, and she does not have
:06:00. > :06:08.talent outside her genetics or maybe she has a great Doctor! Has there
:06:09. > :06:14.ever been a point when you go, I actually don't feel like being 50
:06:15. > :06:21.Cent today. 50 Cent is the superstar. He is the portion that
:06:22. > :06:25.the world embraced. What's interesting is that when you first
:06:26. > :06:30.come into music culture, you become your idea. So if you did not write
:06:31. > :06:38.things that really relate to your upbringing or who you are, then you
:06:39. > :06:41.will kind of be stuck there. You have an extremely public facing job
:06:42. > :06:46.and people assuming that they know you. How do you not care what people
:06:47. > :06:53.think? Well, you know that they will hate you whatever you do. If you go
:06:54. > :06:58.left, there will be people saying, why did you not go right? It is just
:06:59. > :07:03.because it is their perception of who you are and what you could do.
:07:04. > :07:07.People feel like they are in a great space and they could do anything. I
:07:08. > :07:12.have people becoming angry with me because they feel I could have just
:07:13. > :07:21.made them a star. Can I call you Curtis? Whatever you like. It was
:07:22. > :07:29.lovely to meet the man behind 50. I appreciate your time. Never before
:07:30. > :07:32.has the world been so saturated in images of fame and celebrity.
:07:33. > :07:40.Everywhere we look we are assaulted visually by photographs of pouting
:07:41. > :07:44.or perhaps perfect figures. Brand-new magazines every day and
:07:45. > :07:48.new gossip every day and new columns and with that demand comes at a need
:07:49. > :07:54.for a lot of photos and I mean a lot. I wonder exactly what lengths a
:07:55. > :07:59.photographer will go to to get the perfect celebrity shot. To find out
:08:00. > :08:04.more I'm going to the Getty images gallery to meet Dave Bennett, I like
:08:05. > :08:09.to call him the mobile Mario test Eno. He is a master of photography
:08:10. > :08:13.and if anyone understands the changing face of fame it is him.
:08:14. > :08:20.It's nice to see you. Without a camera! That makes a change. Just
:08:21. > :08:26.surrounded by photos instead. These are incredible photos, moments in
:08:27. > :08:31.pop culture that no one can forget. Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman where
:08:32. > :08:35.the power couple. This was taken in London coming out of a restaurant in
:08:36. > :08:42.Mayfair. This is basically Tom Cruise telling the world that he had
:08:43. > :08:47.left Mimi Rodgers and was now dating Nicole Kidman. It has been used now
:08:48. > :08:51.ever since then all the time and everybody does it. They just go out
:08:52. > :08:58.and take the new girl to a popular haunt. And that will be that. I'm
:08:59. > :09:03.sure you can tell and you must know when you see people pretending that
:09:04. > :09:09.they don't know they are being photographed, have you managed to
:09:10. > :09:14.get a bit of an indicator? Anyone who is anywhere near us, they know
:09:15. > :09:19.that we know that they know. We have been on the red carpet. Liz Hurley
:09:20. > :09:23.was photographed by 40 photographers all evening. Then we came to the
:09:24. > :09:30.party, and I knew that there was something missing, something that
:09:31. > :09:38.she wanted to give. At the in and out club I got there ahead of her. I
:09:39. > :09:45.just went, Liz, and Hugh does not even know the photo is being taken.
:09:46. > :09:50.She was totally ready. Would you say you did not need any particular
:09:51. > :09:57.tricks to get people to let their guard down? We were not long lens
:09:58. > :10:04.guys, we were not in bushes. It was quieter then. The paparazzi would
:10:05. > :10:11.have been ten guys, normally only three or four. The availability of
:10:12. > :10:14.Camrys and digital -- cameras increased the amount of
:10:15. > :10:19.photographers. 30 or 40 guys might be outside a party. There is no way
:10:20. > :10:27.you can get a good picture. It is going to be a ruck. From the moment
:10:28. > :10:31.that the star comes out the door. The face of fame has changed a lot
:10:32. > :10:36.since Dave began his career and what it means to be a celebrity has
:10:37. > :10:40.transformed beyond belief. The interest in celebrity has become a
:10:41. > :10:43.professional activity involving thousands of pounds, millions of
:10:44. > :10:48.pounds. Like all professional activities involving people you have
:10:49. > :10:53.to keep turning the wheel and bringing in new episodes to try to
:10:54. > :10:57.gain audience attraction. You have various celebrity stunts being
:10:58. > :11:02.performed in order to get us interested. Part of the celebrities
:11:03. > :11:07.don't issue is that the paparazzi create situations where stunts can
:11:08. > :11:10.occur and they organise scandalous situations, situations which may
:11:11. > :11:16.lead to a breakdown in ordinary interaction in order to generate
:11:17. > :11:20.news. It is not just talented actors or royals that are the subject of
:11:21. > :11:25.relentless paparazzi attention today, we increasingly see the lives
:11:26. > :11:29.of previously ordinary people gaining more scrutiny from one
:11:30. > :11:33.lenses. I'm about to have a conversation with Rob Cooper who is
:11:34. > :11:38.a celebrity manager and he is known for making sure that his clients get
:11:39. > :11:41.in the paper. Some of his clients are a bit vulnerable and I'm
:11:42. > :11:46.apprehensive about that which is why I want him to see what his methods
:11:47. > :11:54.are and what lengths he will go to to sure that his name is get kept in
:11:55. > :12:02.the paper. -- to make sure. You need to tweet. We should put in a
:12:03. > :12:10.spelling mistake because people might take the piss out of you. In
:12:11. > :12:13.this unnerving documentary we see Rob working with Josie Cunningham
:12:14. > :12:18.who has been in the headlines but the wrong reasons. Rob got in touch
:12:19. > :12:23.when she first came to prominence after a story about her NHS funded
:12:24. > :12:28.breast enlargement. People like to feel better about their own life,
:12:29. > :12:32.they like to read about her life and then say... Did you read this? They
:12:33. > :12:45.want to think they are above this person. We are picking up the
:12:46. > :12:49.Czechs, that's fine. -- cheques. All of these are tactics to maximise
:12:50. > :13:00.interest in her story. When it comes to your job do you ever your ethics?
:13:01. > :13:05.I might feel a little bit guilty. If I met someone and tried to put them
:13:06. > :13:10.out there without insight, I might feel guilty. But if I'm telling them
:13:11. > :13:17.what might happen, there is only so much I can do and I should not how
:13:18. > :13:22.to take responsibility, if they are switched on, that is their choice.
:13:23. > :13:26.Every day when we walk to work and we are going about our daily
:13:27. > :13:29.business, we are assaulted with thousands if not hundreds of
:13:30. > :13:36.thousands of images of people from the public eye whether it is on
:13:37. > :13:41.blogs or magazines or TV, it is everywhere and you can't escape it.
:13:42. > :13:47.What do you do to make sure you get your clients out there?
:13:48. > :13:53.If there are too many photos of someone out there, we will change
:13:54. > :13:56.their hair or something like that. You might have somebody wearing the
:13:57. > :14:01.same track suit every when they do the school run, because no paparazzi
:14:02. > :14:05.is going to turn up outside your house every day to get the same
:14:06. > :14:11.shot. You do that and the paparazzi do not hound you too much. We will
:14:12. > :14:14.only do it on a certain situation, with a badge or a hat, so that
:14:15. > :14:19.picture is pretty much just for one story and can't be used again after.
:14:20. > :14:25.When it comes to your clients, would you say that any of them are decent
:14:26. > :14:30.role models. Let's take a look at Josie for example, would you say she
:14:31. > :14:34.is a role model? I'm not going to lie, it is a Perin's responsibility
:14:35. > :14:39.to raid their children and teach them right from wrong. You don't
:14:40. > :14:47.pass the buck to someone in the limelight, do your job as a parent
:14:48. > :14:48.and your children will be fine. Josie Cunningham ten years ago,
:14:49. > :14:52.would she have been as notorious as she is now? I would say ten years
:14:53. > :14:55.ago she probably would not have been famous and in ten years time she
:14:56. > :15:00.wouldn't be famous. It's purely about the time of the transition
:15:01. > :15:03.from print to online. It's all how much she wants it. At the moment I
:15:04. > :15:11.would say she is happy with what she's done. Meeting Rob was
:15:12. > :15:17.certainly an education. Even though I work in this industry and I'm
:15:18. > :15:21.quite aware of media manipulation, I was enlightened by Rob. I didn't
:15:22. > :15:25.realise just how much goes into those tiny little pictures you might
:15:26. > :15:29.see in the corner of a blog or a magazine, a lot goes into them and I
:15:30. > :15:32.think it's safe to say that with people like Rob around, the industry
:15:33. > :15:35.of celebrity isn't going bust any time soon.
:15:36. > :15:47.Camden Town. In the 90s, this was the spiritual home of Britpop, a
:15:48. > :15:54.music scene that gave rise to a scandalous book about the industry.
:15:55. > :16:00.Kill Your Friends was written by disenchanted PR man Jonathan. This
:16:01. > :16:05.is what I do, I listen to music, singers and songwriters, is decide
:16:06. > :16:14.which ones stand a good chance of commercial success. Sound easy? Get
:16:15. > :16:19.fucked. You wouldn't last ten minutes.
:16:20. > :16:31.I met John... Do your member your first job in the music industry? I
:16:32. > :16:36.have this image of you wide-eyed, OK music industry, I'm ready for you. I
:16:37. > :16:43.would like to think there was a time when I was wide-eyed and innocent,
:16:44. > :16:48.but I felt a bit like the vegetarian working in the slaughterhouse.
:16:49. > :16:58.Beneath your feet you can see sharks circling. These are your colleagues,
:16:59. > :17:11.your friends. Welcome to the music industry. Kill Your Friends is now a
:17:12. > :17:17.film as the sociopathic star... I wrote the book from the point of
:17:18. > :17:22.view of the young naive guy who gets seduced and then disgusted by this
:17:23. > :17:29.system. When I came back to it I wrote it from the point of view of
:17:30. > :17:34.the guy who is in the belly of the beast but absolutely loved it and
:17:35. > :17:42.was completely is unapologetic about his desires. How do you want to play
:17:43. > :17:46.this? You be the enthusiastic music lover and bang on about the guitar
:17:47. > :17:52.solos and I will tell them about the label. Why do people like him so
:17:53. > :18:04.much? His character is pretty awful, he is a terrible human being, but
:18:05. > :18:05.people seem to really like him. I think what happens
:18:06. > :18:10.is that he will see some really outrageous things but now and again
:18:11. > :18:17.he says something that is really right on the money about the nature
:18:18. > :18:20.of fame and the ego of musicians. We enter into an uncomfortable
:18:21. > :18:27.collusion with him because we think, I agree with that. As you know, we
:18:28. > :18:34.will manufacture your records and get them in the shops, and that's
:18:35. > :18:41.about it. We will interfere in every conceivable step of the artistic
:18:42. > :18:46.process. We will force you to appear an degrading kids television
:18:47. > :18:58.programmes when you are hung over in the morning. We will under account
:18:59. > :19:07.you and charge you for everything up to the stables used to knock your
:19:08. > :19:18.horrendous contracts together. Was there a fear about translating the
:19:19. > :19:21.story from print to scream? It was always strange seeing something you
:19:22. > :19:24.have written realised as a movie, a very odd experience.
:19:25. > :19:26.You've seen the evolution of the industry since the 90s.
:19:27. > :19:28.Would you say that that much has changed, really,
:19:29. > :19:31.when it comes to people's attitudes towards what they want out
:19:32. > :19:37.Maybe something that has changed in the past 20 years,
:19:38. > :19:41.and it's a by-product of all of these reality shows, possibly...
:19:42. > :19:48.If you want to be a writer, a musician, an artist,
:19:49. > :19:51.then ideally you want to do the work all this stuff
:19:52. > :19:54.like the red carpets and premieres, that is the effluent, the by-product
:19:55. > :19:59.You then have to do that sort of stuff.
:20:00. > :20:02.Whereas I do think that there is a subculture now
:20:03. > :20:07.of kids who think that the red carpet stuff and getting
:20:08. > :20:09.your photograph taken and doing interviews and pouting in front of
:20:10. > :20:16.Anybody who does this will tell you that that is the worst aspect of it.
:20:17. > :20:23.It's an interesting thing, that a lot of people genuinely seem
:20:24. > :20:29.to want the waste products of fame without any of the good stuff.
:20:30. > :20:36.Thank you very much, John Niven. I thoroughly enjoyed your commentary.
:20:37. > :20:43.Now, if there is one thing that this entire self obsessive moneymaking
:20:44. > :20:47.fame machine can't do without, it's the fans. Fans are at the heart of
:20:48. > :20:51.the industry. After all it is their money that keeps the whole celebrity
:20:52. > :20:55.shebang on the road. I am absolutely fascinated by the relationship
:20:56. > :20:57.between the super famous and their fans and definitely how their
:20:58. > :21:05.relationship has shifted over the years. Before, when it came to our
:21:06. > :21:08.favourites, there was an element of mystery. But now we know everything
:21:09. > :21:12.from their last dentist appointment to even what they had for breakfast.
:21:13. > :21:30.And all change is due to one woman. -- come to the Madonna fan party.
:21:31. > :21:35.Since 2003 the parties have provided an opportunity for fans to meet each
:21:36. > :21:41.other face-to-face and pay homage to the Queen of pop. She was sexy and
:21:42. > :21:48.fun. Because her music has crossed so many genres, it feels like she
:21:49. > :21:54.has soundtrack our lives. I always think when I'm doing things, what
:21:55. > :22:01.would Madonna do? If you think about what Madonna was doing in the late
:22:02. > :22:07.80s and early 90s when she released In Bed With Madonna, the film, she
:22:08. > :22:11.was attempting to portray herself in a slightly different light as how
:22:12. > :22:16.she was seen on TV. Stripping us back to who she really was and what
:22:17. > :22:20.she was really like, warts and all, that was kind of how she sold that
:22:21. > :22:23.film. From that day, celebrities are now very happy to let us into their
:22:24. > :22:27.homes, their bodies, let us see everything that goes on and it's no
:22:28. > :22:34.longer scandalous in the way that it was then. But despite giving fans
:22:35. > :22:37.unprecedented access to her world, Madonna really has remained fiercely
:22:38. > :22:43.protective of her position as a cultural icon. She is still a bit of
:22:44. > :22:49.an enigma, which I like. Do you feel like you know Madonna? No, I feel
:22:50. > :22:55.like I know her as an artist but not as a person, which is how it should
:22:56. > :22:56.be. But in the new world of social media, the staff and relationship
:22:57. > 2:28:35has entered a dramatic