Welcome to Our Generation USA!
Copyright © 2015 Bert N. Langford (Images may be subject to copyright. Please send feedback)

"Celebrities"
addresses those whose Achievements are unique from other Web Pages,
e.g. Celebrity Chefs,
Game Show Hosts,
audio/video and/or Internet performers,
Models,
​and other Multi-talented Celebrities



Celebrities, including a List of Celebrities
YouTube Video: Tim Allen* in the 1994 Movie "Santa Claus"**
* - Tim Allen; ** - "The Santa Clause" Movie (1994)
Pictured: L-R: Marlon Brando (in The Wild One (1953); and Anthony Hopkins and Jodie Foster (in Silence of the Lambs (1991)

Greatest Movie Directors



Click here for a List of Celebrities.

Celebrity refers to the fame and public attention accorded by the mass media to individuals or groups or, occasionally, animals, but is usually applied to the persons or groups of people (celebrity couples, families, etc.) themselves who receive such a status of fame and attention. Celebrity status is often associated with wealth (commonly referred to as fame and fortune), while fame often provides opportunities to make money.

Although the term "celebrity" is often intended to refer to famous individuals, it is also commonly used to refer to anyone who has had any moderate public attention in media, regardless of how well-known they are beyond their niche.

Successful careers in sports and entertainment are commonly associated with celebrity status; while political leaders often become celebrities. People may also become celebrities due to media attention on their lifestyle, wealth, or controversial actions, or for their connection to a famous person.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about "Celebrities":
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Celebrities who were Former Models
YouTube Video of Katherine Heigl and the Movies she has appeared in
​Pictured: Cameron Diaz & Katherine Heigl Appearing on Seventeen magazine Covers

Celebrities who were former models

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Some of today's top actors and actresses are so "ridiculously good looking " as Zoolander would say  that before they were on screen  they were walking catwalks or posing for major brands in magazines and commercials.


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Teen Idols
YouTube Video of Ricky Nelson Singing to his fans
​Pictured: Ricky Nelson and Brad Pitt

Teen Idols
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A listing by decade, a teen idol is a celebrity with a large teenage fan-base. Teen idols are generally young but not necessarily teenagers. Often teen idols are actors or musicians, but some sports figures also have an appeal to teenagers. Some teen idols began their careers as child actors, like Lindsay Lohan. 
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The 30 most influential people on the Internet
(as reported in the March 5, 2015 issue of Time Magazine)
YouTube Video of PewDiePie
Pictured: Felix Arvid Ulf Kjellberg (a.k.a. PewDiePie) & Taylor Swift

The 30 most influential people on the Internet



An Internet celebrity, blogebrity, cyberstar, online celebrity, or Internet personality is someone who has become famous by means of the Internet. Internet allows people to reach a narrow audience across the world and so become famous within one or more Internet communities Millions of people write online journals or weblogs.

In many cases, they write anonymously or their focus is upon a specialist topic. But if the author has or develops a distinctive personality, their fame may derive from this as much as from the content of their blog. In some cases, people might rise to fame through a single event or video that goes viral.

The Internet allows videos, news articles, and jokes to spread very quickly. Depending on the reach of the spread, the content may become considered an "Internet meme," and thus, any of the people associated may gain exposure. For example, Zach Anner, an Austin, Texas-based comedian gained world-wide attention after submitting a video to Oprah Winfrey's "Search for the Next TV Star" competition.

The concept of web celebrity ties in to Andy Warhol's quip about 15 minutes of fame. A more recent adaptation of Warhol's quip, possibly prompted by the rise of online social networking, blogging, and similar online phenomena, is the claim that "In the future, everyone will be famous to fifteen people" or, in some renditions, "On the Web, everyone will be famous to fifteen people". This quote, though attributed to David Weinberger, was said to have originated with the Scottish artist Momus.







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Reality Show Stars
​YouTube Video of Dancing With the Stars with Rumer Willis, Daughter of Bruce Willis and Demi Moore
Pictured: Dancing With the Stars (ABC: 2005-Present) and Keeping Up With the Kardashians (E! Network: 2007-Present)

Reality Show Stars


Covers TV Stars on Reality TV Shows







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Hollywood's Bad Guy Celebrities
Video of Kanye West Ruining Taylor Swift VMA Award Appearance
​Pictured: Christian Bale and Sean Penn.

Hollywood's Bad Guy Celebrities
These include celebrity men who are known for bad temper, arrests,  and/or other irregular behavior.







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Sex Symbols
YouTube Video of Marilyn Monroe in "The Seven Year Itch"
Pictured: Marilyn Monroe & David Beckham

Sex Symbols
A sex symbol is a celebrity of either sex, typically an actor, musician, supermodel, teen idol, or sports star, noted for being widely regarded as sexually attractive. The term was first used in the mid-1950s in relation to the popularity of certain film stars.







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Celebrities who are "Famous for Being Famous"
YouTube Video of the Kardashian Sisters on Family and Fights
​Pictured: Paris Hilton and Nicole Ritchie (Left) and Kardashian Sisters (Right).
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Celebrities who are
Famous for being famous, or famous for nothing, is a pejorative popular culture term that refers to someone who attains celebrity status for no particular identifiable reason (as opposed to fame based on achievements, skill, and/or talent) and just appears to generate their own fame, or someone who achieves fame through association with an actual celebrity (such as being the spouse, child, etc. of one).

People who have been described as "famous for being famous" include Angelyne, Paris Hilton, Katie Price and the Kardashian family.







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Actors and Actresses including a List
 YouTube Video Top 10 Sandra Bullock Movies by WatchMojo
​Pictured Clockwise from Upper Left: Johnny Depp; Reese Witherspoon; Halle Berry; Morgan Freeman

Click here for a List of Actors/Actresses.

An actor (male) or actress (female) is a person who portrays a character in a performance. The actor performs "in the flesh" in the traditional medium of the theater, or in modern mediums such as film, radio, and television.

The actor's interpretation of their role pertains to the role played, whether based on a real person or fictional character. Interpretation occurs even when the actor is "playing themselves", as in some forms of experimental performance art, or, more commonly; to act, is to create, a character in performance.

Formerly, in some societies, only men could become actors, and women's roles were generally played by men or boys. When used for the stage, women occasionally played the roles of prepubescent boys.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about Actor/Actress:






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Bob Mackie, Fashion and Costume Designer
YouTube Video of Bob Mackie Highlights
Pictured below:  The Design Process: Bob Mackie Mentor Project.
Robert Gordon Mackie (born March 24, 1939), is an American fashion designer and costumer, best known for his dressing of entertainment icons, including:
Mackie was the costume designer for Carol Burnett on The Carol Burnett Show during its entire 11-year run and designed the costumes for its spinoff, Mama's Family, and for the 1993 television adaptation of Gypsy.

For more about Bob Mackie, click here.








Ralph Lauren, Fashion Designer Pictured:
Ralph Lauren (born October 14, 1939) is an American fashion designer, philanthropist, and billionaire businessman, best known for the Ralph Lauren Corporation, a global multibillion-dollar enterprise. He has become well known for his collection of rare automobiles, some of which have been displayed in museum exhibits.

He stepped down as CEO of the company in September 2015 but remains executive chairman and chief creative officer. As of April 2022, his net worth was estimated at US$6.9 billion.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about Ralph Lauren:







Heidi Klum model, television host, producer, and businesswoman​Pictured below: Supermodel Heidi Klum Reflects on Career, Encourages Followers to Chase Their Dreams
Heidi Klum (June 1973) is a German and American model, television host, producer, and businesswoman. She appeared on the cover of the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue in 1998 and was the first German model to become a Victoria's Secret Angel.

Following a successful modeling career, Klum became the host and a judge of Germany's Next Topmodel and the reality show Project Runway, which earned her an Emmy nomination in 2008 and a win in 2013 for Outstanding Host for a Reality or Reality-Competition Program (shared with co-host Tim Gunn).

Klum has been nominated for six Emmy Awards. She has worked as a spokesmodel for Dannon and H&M and has appeared in numerous commercials for McDonald's, Volkswagen and others.

In 2009, Klum became Barbie's official ambassador on Barbie's 50th anniversary. As an occasional actress,
In May 2011, Forbes magazine estimated Klum's total earnings for that year as US$20 million. She was ranked second on Forbes' list of the "World's Top-Earning Models". 

Forbes noted that since ending her 13-year run as a Victoria's Secret Angel, Klum has become more of a businesswoman than a model. In 2008, she became an American citizen while maintaining her native German citizenship.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about Heidi Klum:







Ansel Adams, PhotographerPictured below: Collage Images -- Using the iPod touch cameras, students will create their own versions of these famous Ansel Adams photos. Students are to use the following angles, ants eye view, birds eye view, portrait, close up, and shooting upward. Enjoy!
Ansel Easton Adams (February 20, 1902 – April 22, 1984) was an American landscape photographer and environmentalist known for his black-and-white images of the American West.

He helped found Group f/64, an association of photographers advocating "pure" photography which favored sharp focus and the use of the full tonal range of a photograph.

He and Fred Archer developed a system of image-making called the Zone System, a method of achieving a desired final print through a technical understanding of how the tonal range of an image is the result of choices made in exposure, negative development, and printing.

Adams was a life-long advocate for environmental conservation, and his photographic practice was deeply entwined with this advocacy.

At age 12, he was given his first camera during his first visit to Yosemite National Park. He developed his early photographic work as a member of the Sierra Club. He was later contracted with the United States Department of the Interior to make photographs of national parks.

For his work and his persistent advocacy, which helped expand the National Park system, he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1980.

Adams was a key advisor in the founding and establishment of the photography department at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, an important landmark in securing photography's institutional legitimacy. He helped to stage that department's first photography exhibition, helped found the photography magazine Aperture, and co-founded the Center for Creative Photography at the University of Arizona.


Photographic career:

Example of Adams' work: Mural Project:

In 1941, Adams contracted with the National Park Service to make photographs of National Parks, Indian reservations, and other locations managed by the department, for use as mural-sized prints to decorate the department's new building. 

The contract was for 180 days. Adams set off on a road trip with his friend Cedric and his son Michael, intending to combine work on the "Mural Project" with commissions for the U.S. Potash Company and Standard Oil, with some days reserved for personal work.
​Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about Ansel Adams:







Celebrity Chefs
Guest appearances by Celebrity Chefs on the Late Show with Stephen Colbert: Pictured below:  Clockwise from Upper Left:
​A celebrity chef is a kitchen chef who has become a celebrity. Today, chefs often become celebrities by presenting cookery advice and demonstrations, usually through the media of television and radio, or in printed publications.

While television is ultimately the primary way for a chef to become a celebrity, some have achieved this through success in the kitchen, cook book publications, and achieving awards such as Michelin stars, while others are home cooks who won competitions.

Celebrity chefs can also influence cuisines across countries, with foreign cuisines being introduced in their natural forms for the first time due to the work of the chef to inform their viewers. Sales of certain foodstuffs can also be enhanced, such as when Delia Smith caused the sale of white eggs across the UK to increase by 10% in what has since been termed the "Delia effect". 

Endorsements are also to be expected from a celebrity chef, such as Ken Hom's range of bestselling woks in Europe, but can also lead to criticism over which endorsements are chosen such as when Marco Pierre White teamed up with Bernard Matthews Farms, or when Darren Simpson advised and endorsed fast-food restaurant KFC.

In South Korea, a celebrity chef is referred as a Cheftainer.


History:

Cooks rising to prominence date at least as far back as the Roman Empire. The Roman historian Livy dated the advent of Rome's decline with the cook's "rise above his station". "And it was then," he wrote, "that the cook, who had formerly the status of the lowest kind of slave, first acquired prestige, and what had once been servitude came to be thought of as an art." He was not alone in this belief: Roman sumptuary laws were passed to curb what was seen as a culture of excess.

The earliest chef to be credited with being a celebrity was the 16th century Italian, Bartolomeo Scappi. He was the personal chef to Pope Pius V, and is credited with writing the first cookbook, Opera Dell'arte del Cucinare in 1577.

The 19th-century French chef Marie-Antoine Carême has also since been referred to as a celebrity of his era, due to the complexity of his recipes.

​The first chef to achieve widespread fame and celebrity status was Alexis Soyer. Born in France, Soyer became the most celebrated cook in early Victorian England. In 1837, he became chef de cuisine at the Reform Club in London, where he designed the kitchens with Charles Barry. His exceptional cooking skills were combined with an excellent eye to marketing and self-publicity to ensure that he molded the public's perception of him. His image was even successfully used as a trademark to market a range of bottled sauces produced by Crosse & Blackwell.

Soyer also invented many popular new recipes and foods; he produced and marketed a popular drink made of a variety of fruits mixed with carbonated water, which he called Soyer's Nectar Soda Water. His special dish at the club, Soyer's Lamb Cutlets Reform, is still on the menu today. At the Reform Club, he instituted many innovations, including cooking with gas, refrigerators cooled by cold water, and ovens with adjustable temperatures. His kitchens were so famous that they were opened for conducted tours. When Queen Victoria was crowned on 28 June 1838, he prepared a breakfast for 2,000 people at the club.

He was also well known for his philanthropy. During the Great Irish Famine in April 1847, he implemented a network of soup kitchens to feed the poor. His "famine soup" was served to thousands of the poor for free. Soyer wrote a number of bestselling books about cooking, one of them even selling over a quarter of a million copies. His 1854 book A Shilling Cookery for the People was a recipe book for ordinary people who could not afford elaborate kitchen utensils or large amounts of exotic ingredients. Other works included The Gastronomic Regenerator (1846), The modern Housewife or, Ménagère and Soyer's Culinary Campaign (1857).

Television celebrity chefs:

The earliest television celebrity chef in Britain was Philip Harben.

The earliest television celebrity female chef in the UK was Fanny Cradock. 
  • She appeared on British television for over two decades, from the 1950s through the 1970s.
  • She originally became popular following the publication of her first cookbook in 1949, The Practical Cook, and after gaining a cult following with cookery demonstrations in theatres around the country.
  • Her television career came to an end when she appeared as a judge on reality television show The Big Time in 1976. She appeared to pretend to retch as contestant Gwen Troake described her menu for former Prime Minister Edward Heath.
  • Presenter Esther Rantzen later described the incident as like "Cruella de Vil meets Bambi".

Described as America's first celebrity chef, Julia Child first appeared on American television in 1963 on the Boston-based WGBH-TV. She soon starred in her own show, The French Chef, which was followed by other shows. At the time of her death, she was credited by the media as having "demystified the art of cuisine for the home cook and inspired many of today's celebrity chefs". Such was her impact on American cuisine, her kitchen has been preserved on display at the Smithsonian Museum of American History.

In recent years, gaining a Michelin star has increased chefs' profiles sufficiently for them to be featured on television and become a household name. Marco Pierre White became the youngest chef in the world to achieve three Michelin stars, which went on to make him a household name and have one of his cookbooks, White Heat, described in 2005 as "possibly the most influential recipe book of the last 20 years" by food critic Jay Rayner. 

More typical of Michelin-starred restaurants in recent years, the success of Gordon Ramsay led to the commissioning of a five-part television series, Boiling Point, by the UK's Channel 4, which followed the chef as he opened his first solo restaurant, Restaurant Gordon Ramsay. 

While Joël Robuchon, Alain Ducasse, and Gordon Ramsay all run restaurant empires that each hold more than 10 Michelin stars, Ramsay is arguably the more famous chef due to his number of television shows broadcast internationally in the UK, the United States, and around the world.

Dedicated food-related television channels have also become a medium for chefs to become household names, for example in the United States, the Food Network features shows from celebrity chefs such as Paula Deen and Bobby Flay. 

In the UK, the Good Food Channel has shows with chefs such as Rick Stein and Jamie Oliver. Certain chefs, such as Nigella Lawson, have had shows featuring on channels in more than one country.

MasterClass and YouTube Celebrity Chefs:

MasterClass has a number of celebrity chefs including Thomas Keller, Massimo Bottura, Alice Waters, Roy Choi, and Gordon Ramsey. Youtube has brought other celebrity chefs such as Chef Jean-Pierre and Jamie Oliver to a wider audience.


Influences

Celebrity chefs have changed the styles of food that the general public consume. For example, despite the fact that Asian cuisine had been available in the UK since before the Victorian era, only due to the influence of chefs such as Ken Hom and Madhur Jaffrey in the early 1980s did the public become aware that these anglicised meals were not the authentic article. 

Tying into his first television series in 1984, the book Ken Hom's Chinese Cookery sold 1.2 million copies in the UK alone. Chef Jamie Oliver ran a campaign in the UK in his television show Jamie's School Dinners to introduce supposedly better eating habits in school dinners for schoolchildren. The campaign caused a change in food-standard requirements across the UK, and the show was exported to the United States for the same purpose.


Endorsements:

Endorsements by celebrity chefs have led to increased demands for certain food products.

Both Jamie Oliver and Nigella Lawson caused a surge in sales of goose fat after including it in recipes, and Ken Hom's first television series caused a surge in sales of Peking ducks.

Endorsements by Delia Smith became so well known that the "Delia effect" was added to the British dictionary in 2001. For example, her How to Cook series caused a 10% spike in egg sales alone, and sales of tinned minced beef and Fray Bentos tinned pies went up by around 12% following the publication of How to Cheat at Cooking.

Product range tie-ins on housewares have also becoming a staple part of a celebrity chef's income. More than 4.7 million of Ken Hom-endorsed wok range have been sold in Europe. The writing of cookbooks has also been a regular product of the celebrity chefs, from both those who have gained Michelin stars, and homestyle cooks who have had books produced as a tie-in for television shows.

Certain endorsements by celebrity chefs have led to high levels of criticism from the food industry and the public. In 2011, Australian chef Darren Simpson created a range of burgers for fast-food restaurant Kentucky Fried Chicken, leading to comments being posted on Twitter such as "Darren Simpson you complete and utter sell-out. KFC? Seriously?".

Australian television chef Colin Fassnidge said that the move by Simpson resulted in him becoming a laughing stock, and that while celebrity chefs can make a fortune from such deals, they also risk their credibility. 

In the UK, Marco Pierre White drew criticism after teaming up with Bernard Matthews Farms in March 2010 to create a range of ready meals that were dropped after a year of production.


Healthiness of recipes:

A 2012 paper published in the BMJ found that recipes in top-selling books by television chefs (Nigella Lawson, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, Jamie Oliver, and Lorraine Pascale) were less healthy than supermarket ready meals. Neither ready meals nor the chefs' recipes met national or international recommendations for a balanced diet.

See also:







Game Shows and their HostsPictured below (L-R): Pat Sajak and Vanna White of "Wheel of Fortune", and Alex Trebek of "Jeopardy!" 
[Game Shows are covered below, due to the prevalence of hosts and contestants who achieve celebrity status as a result of their participation!]

A game show is a genre of broadcast viewing entertainment (radio, television, internet, stage or other) where contestants compete for a reward. These programs can either be participatory or demonstrative and are typically directed by a host, sharing the rules of the program as well as commentating and narrating where necessary.

The history of game shows dates back to the invention of television as a medium. On most game shows, contestants either have to answer questions or solve puzzles, typically to win either money or prizes. Game shows often reward players with prizes such as cash, trips and goods and services provided by the show's sponsor.


History:

1930s–1950s:

Game shows began to appear on radio and television in the late 1930s. The first television game show, Spelling Bee, as well as the first radio game show, Information Please, were both broadcast in 1938; the first major success in the game show genre was Dr. I.Q., a radio quiz show that began in 1939. 

Truth or Consequences was the first game show to air on commercially licensed television; the CBS Television Quiz followed shortly thereafter as the first to be regularly scheduled. The first episode of each aired in 1941 as an experimental broadcast.

Over the course of the 1950s, as television began to pervade the popular culture, game shows quickly became a fixture. Daytime game shows would be played for lower stakes to target stay-at-home housewives. Higher-stakes programs would air in prime time. (One particular exception in this era was You Bet Your Life, ostensibly a game show, but the game show concept was largely a framework for a talk show moderated by its host, Groucho Marx.)

During the late 1950s, high-stakes games such as Twenty-One and The $64,000 Question began a rapid rise in popularity. However, the rise of quiz shows proved to be short-lived. In 1959, many of the higher stakes game shows were exposed as being either biased or outright scripted in the 1950s quiz show scandals and ratings declines led to most of the primetime games being canceled.

An early variant of the game show, the panel show, survived the quiz show scandals. On shows like What's My Line?, I've Got A Secret, and To Tell the Truth, panels of celebrities would interview a guest in an effort to determine some fact about them; in others, celebrities would answer questions. Panel games had success in primetime until the late 1960s, when they were collectively dropped from television because of their perceived low budget nature.

Panel games made a comeback in American daytime television (where the lower budgets were tolerated) in the 1970s through comedy-driven shows such as Match Game and Hollywood Squares.

In the UK, commercial demographic pressures were not as prominent, and restrictions on game shows made in the wake of the scandals limited the style of games that could be played and the amount of money that could be awarded.

Panel shows there were kept in primetime and have continued to thrive; they have transformed into showcases for the nation's top stand-up comedians on shows such as:  -- all of which put a heavy emphasis on comedy, leaving the points as mere formalities.

The focus on quick-witted comedians has resulted in strong ratings, which, combined with low costs of production, have only spurred growth in the UK panel show phenomenon.

1950s–1970s:

Game shows remained a fixture of US daytime television through the 1960s after the quiz show scandals. Lower-stakes games made a slight comeback in daytime in the early 1960s; examples include Jeopardy! which began in 1964 and the original version of The Match Game first aired in 1962. Let's Make a Deal began in 1963 and the 1960s also marked the debut of Hollywood Squares, Password, The Dating Game, and The Newlywed Game.

Though CBS gave up on daytime game shows in 1968, the other networks did not follow suit. Color television was introduced to the game show genre in the late 1960s on all three networks. The 1970s saw a renaissance of the game show as new games and massive upgrades to existing games made debuts on the major networks. 

The New Price Is Right, an update of the 1950s-era game show The Price Is Right, debuted in 1972 and marked CBS's return to the game show format in its rural purge. The Match Game became "Big Money" Match Game 73, which proved popular enough to prompt a spin-off, Family Feud, on ABC in 1976. 

The $10,000 Pyramid and its numerous higher-stakes derivatives also debuted in 1973, while the 1970s also saw the return of formerly disgraced producer and game show host Jack Barry, who debuted The Joker's Wild and a clean version of the previously rigged Tic-Tac-Dough in the 1970s. 

Wheel of Fortune debuted on NBC in 1975. The Prime Time Access Rule, which took effect in 1971, barred networks from broadcasting in the 7–8 p.m. time slot immediately preceding prime time, opening up time slots for syndicated programming. Most of the syndicated programs were "nighttime" adaptations of network daytime game shows.

These game shows originally aired once a week, but by the late 1970s and early 1980s most of the games had transitioned to five days a week.

1980s–1990s:

Game shows were the lowest priority of television networks and were rotated out every thirteen weeks if unsuccessful. Most tapes were wiped until the early 1980s. Over the course of the 1980s and early 1990s, as fewer new hits (e.g. Press Your Luck, Sale of the Century, and Card Sharks) were produced, game shows lost their permanent place in the daytime lineup.

ABC transitioned out of the daytime game show format in the mid-1980s (briefly returning to the format for one season in 1990 with a Match Game revival). NBC's game block also lasted until 1991, but the network attempted to bring them back in 1993 before cancelling its game show block again in 1994. CBS phased out most of its game shows, except for The Price Is Right, by 1993.

To the benefit of the genre, the moves of Wheel of Fortune and a modernized revival of Jeopardy! to syndication in 1983 and 1984, respectively, was and remains highly successful; the two are, to this day, fixtures in the prime time "access period".

Cable television also allowed for the debut of game shows such as: 
It also opened up a previously underdeveloped market for game show reruns.

General interest networks such as CBN Cable Network (forerunner to Freeform) and USA Network had popular blocks for game show reruns from the mid-1980s to the mid-'90s before that niche market was overtaken by Game Show Network in 1994.

In the United Kingdom, game shows have had a more steady and permanent place in the television lineup and never lost popularity in the 1990s as they did in the United States, due in part to the fact that game shows were highly regulated by the Independent Broadcasting Authority in the 1980s and that those restrictions were lifted in the 1990s, allowing for higher-stakes games to be played.

After the popularity of game shows hit a nadir in the mid-1990s United States (at which point The Price Is Right was the only game show still on daytime network television and numerous game shows designed for cable television were canceled), the British game show Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? began distribution around the globe. Upon the show's American debut in 1999, it was a hit and became a regular part of ABC's primetime lineup until 2002; that show would eventually air in syndication for seventeen years afterward.

Several shorter-lived high-stakes games were attempted around the time of the millennium, both in the United States and the United Kingdom, such as:  leading to some dubbing this period as "The Million-Dollar Game Show Craze".

The boom quickly went bust, as by July 2000, almost all of the imitator million-dollar shows were canceled (one of those exceptions was Winning Lines, which continued to air in the United Kingdom until 2004 even though it was canceled in the United States in early 2000); these higher stakes contests nevertheless opened the door to reality television contests such as Survivor and Big Brother, in which contestants win large sums of money for outlasting their peers in a given environment. [See "Reality TV" web page for those listings]

Several game shows returned to daytime in syndication during this time as well, such as Family Feud, Hollywood Squares, and Millionaire.

2000s–present:

Wheel of Fortune, Jeopardy! and Family Feud have continued in syndication. To keep pace with the prime-time quiz shows, Jeopardy! doubled its question values in 2001 and lifted its winnings limit in 2003, which one year later allowed Ken Jennings to become the show's first multi-million dollar winner; it has also increased the stakes of its tournaments and put a larger focus on contestants with strong personalities.

The show has since produced four more millionaires: tournament winner Brad Rutter and recent champions James Holzhauer, Matt Amodio, and Amy Schneider. Family Feud revived in popularity with a change in tone under host Steve Harvey to include more ribaldry.

In 2009, actress and comedienne Kim Coles became the first black woman to host a prime time game show, Pay It Off.

The rise of digital television in the United States opened up a large market for rerun programs. Buzzr was established by Fremantle, owners of numerous classic U.S. game shows, as a broadcast outlet for its archived holdings in June 2015.

There was also a rise of live game shows at festivals and public venues, where the general audience could participate in the show, such as the science-inspired Geek Out Game Show or the Yuck Show.

Since the early 2000s, several game shows were conducted in a tournament format; examples included: 
Most game shows conducted in this manner only lasted for one season.

A boom in prime time revivals of classic daytime game shows began to emerge in the mid-2010s. In 2016, ABC packaged the existing Celebrity Family Feud, which had returned in 2015, with new versions of To Tell the Truth, The $100,000 Pyramid, and Match Game in 2016; new versions of Press Your Luck and Card Sharks would follow in 2019. 

TBS launched a cannabis-themed revival of The Joker's Wild, hosted by Snoop Dogg, in October 2017. This is in addition to a number of original game concepts that appeared near the same time, including: 

International issues:

The popularity of game shows in the United States was closely paralleled around the world. Reg Grundy Organisation, for instance, would buy the international rights for American game shows and reproduce them in other countries, especially in Grundy's native Australia.

Dutch producer Endemol (later purchased by American companies Disney and Apollo Global Management, then resold to French company Banijay) has created and released numerous game shows and reality television formats popular around the world. Most game show formats that are popular in one country are franchised to others.

Game shows have had an inconsistent place in television in Canada, with most homegrown game shows there being made for the French-speaking Quebec market and the majority of English-language game shows in the country being rebroadcast from, or made with the express intent of export to, the United States.

There have been exceptions to this (see, for instance, the long-running Definition). Unlike reality television franchises, international game show franchises generally only see Canadian adaptations in a series of specials, based heavily on the American versions but usually with a Canadian host to allow for Canadian content credits (one of those exceptions was Le Banquier, a Quebec French-language version of Deal or No Deal which aired on TVA from 2008 to 2015).

The smaller markets and lower revenue opportunities for Canadian shows in general also affect game shows there, with Canadian games (especially Quebecois ones) often having very low budgets for prizes, unless the series is made for export. Canadian contestants are generally allowed to participate on American game shows, and there have been at least three Canadian game show hosts – Howie Mandel, Monty Hall and Alex Trebek – who have gone on to long careers hosting American series, while Jim Perry, an American host, was prominent as a host of Canadian shows.

American game shows have a tendency to hire stronger contestants than their British or Australian counterparts. Many of the most successful game show contestants in America would likely never be cast in a British or Australian game show for fear of having them dominate the game, according to Mark Labbett, who appeared in all three countries on the game show The Chase.

Japanese game show:
See also: Japanese game show

The Japanese game show is a distinct format, borrowing heavily from variety formats, physical stunts and athletic competitions. The Japanese style has been adapted overseas (and at one point was parodied with an American reality competition, I Survived a Japanese Game Show, which used a fake Japanese game show as its central conceit).


Prizes:

Many of the prizes awarded on game shows are provided through product placement, but in some cases they are provided by private organizations or purchased at either the full price or at a discount by the show. There is the widespread use of "promotional consideration", in which a game show receives a subsidy from an advertiser in return for awarding that manufacturer's product as a prize or consolation prize.

Some products supplied by manufacturers may not be intended to be awarded and are instead just used as part of the gameplay such as the low-priced items used in several The Price is Right pricing games. Although in this show the smaller items (sometimes even in the single digits of dollars) are awarded as well when the price is correctly guessed, even when a contestant loses the major prize they were playing for.

For high-stakes games, a network may purchase prize indemnity insurance to avoid paying the cost of a rare but expensive prize out of pocket. If the said prize is won too often, the insurance company may refuse to insure a show; this was a factor in the discontinuation of The Price Is Right $1,000,000 Spectacular series of prime-time specials.

In April 2008, three of the contestants on The Price Is Right $1,000,000 Spectacular won the top prize in a five-episode span after fifteen episodes without a winner, due in large part to a change in the rules. The insurance companies had made it extremely difficult to get further insurance for the remaining episodes.

A network or syndicator may also opt to distribute large cash prizes in the form of an annuity, spreading the cost of the prize out over several years or decades.

From about 1960 through the rest of the 20th century, American networks placed restrictions on the amount of money that could be given away on a game show, in an effort to avoid a repeat of the scandals of the 1950s. This usually took the form of an earnings cap that forced a player to retire once they had won a certain amount of money or a limit on how many episodes, usually five, on which a player could appear on a show.

The introduction of syndicated games, particularly in the 1980s, eventually allowed for more valuable prizes and extended runs on a particular show. British television was under even stricter regulations on prizes until the 1990s, seriously restricting the value of prizes that could be given and disallowing games of chance to have an influence on the results of the game.

(Thus, the British version of The Price Is Right at first did not include the American version's "Showcase Showdown", in which contestants spun a large wheel to determine who would advance to the Showcase bonus round.)

In Canada, prizes were limited not by bureaucracy but necessity, as the much smaller population limited the audience of shows marketed toward that country. The lifting of these restrictions in the 1990s was a major factor in the explosion of high-stakes game shows in the later part of that decade in both the U.S. and Britain and, subsequently, around the world.


Bonus round:

A bonus round (also known as a bonus game or an end game) usually follows a main game as a bonus to the winner of that game. In the bonus round, the stakes are higher and the game is considered to be tougher.

The game play of a bonus round usually varies from the standard game play of the front game, and there are often borrowed or related elements of the main game in the bonus round to ensure the entire show has a unified premise. Though some end games are referred to as "bonus rounds", many are not specifically referred to as such in games but fit the same general role.

There is no one formula for the format of a bonus round. There are differences in almost every bonus round, though there are many recurring elements from show to show. The bonus round is often played for the show's top prize.

It is almost always played without an opponent; two notable exceptions to this are Jeopardy! and the current version of The Price Is Right. On Jeopardy!, the final round involves all remaining contestants with a positive score wagering strategically to win the game and be invited back the next day; Jeopardy! attempted to replace this round with a traditional solo bonus round in 1978, but this version was not a success and the round was replaced by the original Final Jeopardy! when the show returned in 1984. 

The Price Is Right uses a knockout tournament format, in which the six contestants to make it onstage are narrowed to two in a "Showcase Showdown;" these two winners then move on to the final Showcase round to determine the day's winner.

Until the 1960s, most game shows did not offer a bonus round. In traditional two-player formats, the winner – if a game show's rules provided for this – became the champion and simply played a new challenger either on the next show or after the commercial break.

One of the earliest forms of bonus rounds was the Jackpot Round of the original series Beat the Clock. After two rounds of performing stunts, the wife of the contestant couple would perform at a jackpot board for a prize. The contestant was shown a famous quotation or common phrase, and the words were scrambled.

To win the announced bonus, the contestant had to unscramble the words within 20 seconds. The contestant received a consolation gift worth over $200 if she was unsuccessful.

Another early bonus round ended each episode of You Bet Your Life with the team who won the most money answering one final question for a jackpot which started at $1,000 and increased $500 each week until won.

Another early example was the Lightning Round on the word game Password, starting in 1961. The contestant who won the front game played a quick-fire series of passwords within 60 seconds, netting $50 per correctly guessed word, for a maximum bonus prize of $250.

The bonus round came about after game show producer Mark Goodson was first presented Password, contending that it was not enough to merely guess passwords during the show. "We needed something more, and that's how the Lightning Round was invited," said Howard Felsher, who produced Password and Family Feud. "From that point on every game show had to have an end round. You'd bring a show to a network and they'd say, 'What's the endgame?' as if they had thought of it themselves."

The end game of Match Game, hosted for most of its run by Gene Rayburn, served as the impetus for a completely new game show. The first part of Match Game's "Super-Match" bonus round, called the "Audience Match", asked contestants to guess how a studio audience responded to a question.

In 1975, with then regular panelist Richard Dawson becoming restless and progressively less cooperative, Goodson decided that this line of questioning would make a good game show of its own, and the concept eventually became Family Feud, as whose inaugural host Dawson was hired.


See also: ___________________________________________________________________________​

A game show host is an individual who manages a game show, introduces contestants, and asks quiz questions to test the knowledge of said contestants. They may also have other duties pertinent to production.


History:

In 1938, Freddie Grisewood was the first game show host. He directed Spelling Bee, a fifteen-minute show that was broadcast in the United Kingdom over radio and television.


Characteristics:

Especially in the United States, game show hosts have generally been conservative or libertarian in their political beliefs. Reasons for this include many of the hosts' rural origins (early television personalities were expected to have natural General American English accents, which were most prominent in the Midwest) and the merit-based nature of the game show format.


World records:

In June 2014, Alex Trebek set a new world record for "hosting more episodes of a single television game show than anyone else in TV history". Bob Barker previously held this record.

In 2019, Pat Sajak became the longest-running host of any game show, defeating Barker’s previous record of 35 years hosting The Price Is Right.

See also: ​






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Zendaya, Singer and ActressPicture below: Zendaya Through the Years: From Disney Teen to ‘Euphoria’ Leading Lady
Zendaya Maree Stoermer Coleman (born September 1, 1996) is an American actress and singer. Known mononymously as Zendaya, she has received various accolades, including two Primetime Emmy Awards and a Golden Globe Award. Time magazine named her one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2022.

​Born and raised in Oakland, California, Zendaya began her career as a child model and backup dancer.

She made her television debut as Rocky Blue on the Disney Channel sitcom Shake It Up (2010–2013) and starred as the titular character in the channel's sitcom K.C. Undercover (2015–2018).

Her feature film debut came in 2017 with the superhero film Spider-Man: Homecoming, and she later starred in its sequels.

Zendaya's role as Rue Bennett, a struggling drug-addicted teenager, in the HBO teen drama series Euphoria (2019–present) made her the youngest recipient of the Primetime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series, which she won twice.

Her other film roles include the musical The Greatest Showman (2017), the romantic drama Malcolm & Marie (2021), and the science fiction epic Dune (2021).

In addition to her acting career, Zendaya has ventured into music. In 2011, she released the singles "Swag It Out" and "Watch Me", the latter a collaboration with Bella Thorne. She signed with Hollywood Records in 2012.

Her eponymous debut studio album (2013) was released to moderate success. The album's lead single, "Replay", reached the top 40 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 chart.

Zendaya's biggest commercial success as a musician came with her Zac Efron collaboration, "Rewrite the Stars", from The Greatest Showman soundtrack in 2017. The single reached within the top 20 of several record charts and has received multi-platinum sales certifications globally. Zendaya has also written and performed several songs for Euphoria.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about Zendaya 








​Paris HiltonPictured below: Paris Hilton through the years: The star's life in photos
Paris Whitney Hilton (born February 17, 1981) is an American media personality, businesswoman, socialite, model, actress, singer and DJ.

Born in New York City, and raised there and in Los Angeles, she is a great-granddaughter of Conrad Hilton, the founder of Hilton Hotels.

Hilton first attracted tabloid attention in the late 1990s, when she became a fixture in NYC's social scene, and ventured into modeling at age 19, signing with Donald Trump's agency Trump Model Management.

After David LaChapelle photographed her and sister Nicky for the September 2000 issue of Vanity Fair, Hilton was proclaimed "New York's leading It Girl" in 2001. The reality television series The Simple Life (2003–2007), in which she co-starred with her friend Nicole Richie (see next Celebrity following this one), and a leaked 2003 sex tape with her then-boyfriend Rick Salomon, later released as 1 Night in Paris (2004), catapulted her to global fame.

Hilton published her debut book, Confessions of an Heiress (2004), which became a New York Times Best Seller, landed her first major film role in the horror remake House of Wax (2005), and released her eponymous debut studio album, Paris (2006), which reached number six on the Billboard 200 and respectively produced the successful single "Stars Are Blind".

Her media ventures have included:
A polarizing and ubiquitous public figure, Hilton is said to have influenced the revival of the "famous for being famous" phenomenon throughout the 2000s. Critics indeed suggest that she exemplifies the celebutante —a household name not through talent or work, but through inherited wealth and lavish lifestyle. 

Forbes included her in its Celebrity 100 in 2004, 2005, and 2006, and ranked her as the most "overexposed" celebrity in 2006 and 2008. Hilton has parlayed her media fame into numerous business endeavours.

Under her company, she has produced content for broadcast media, launched a variety of product lines, and opened a chain of self-branded boutiques worldwide, as well as an urban beach club in the Philippines. Her perfume line alone has brought in over US$2.5 billion in revenue to date.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about Paris Hilton:​







Nicole Richie Pictured below: Nicole Richie, Jamie Foxx* and More Celebrities Who Were Adopted
​* -- Jamie Foxx
Nicole Richie

Nicole Camille Richie (née Escovedo; born September 21, 1981) is an American television personality, fashion designer, and actress. She came to prominence after appearing in the reality television series The Simple Life (2003–2007), in which she starred alongside her childhood friend and fellow socialite Paris Hilton (see celebrity above). Richie's personal life attracted media attention during the series' five-year run and thereafter.

Following the conclusion of The Simple Life, Richie continued her career in television, appearing as one of the three judges on the reality competition series Fashion Star (2012–2013). She later starred in the unscripted comedy series Candidly Nicole (2014–2015), which ran for two seasons.

From 2017 to 2018, Richie starred in her first series regular acting role as Portia Scott-Griffith in the sitcom Great News. In 2020, she became a judge on the reality competition series Making the Cut. In fashion, she is the founder of the lifestyle brand House of Harlow. Richie has also published two novels.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about Nicole Richie:







Power Couples Pictured below:
Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck are married*! See photos of the lovebirds (USA Today)
 * -- Perhaps the Ultimate Power Couple? Jennifer and Ben Affleck are also known as "Bennifer":

Bennifer is a name given by the media to the high-profile relationship between American actor and filmmaker Ben Affleck and American entertainer Jennifer Lopez. The pair had a widely publicized 18-month romance from 2002 to 2004, and were engaged to be married.

After their breakup, they maintained a friendship. They rekindled their romantic relationship in early 2021 and got married in July 2022. 

They have starred in two films together, Gigli (2003) and Jersey Girl (2004), and appeared in two music videos together, "Jenny from the Block" (2002) and "Marry Me" (Ballad Version) (2022).

Click here for more about "Bennifer"!
___________________________________________________________________________

Power Couple

​A power couple is a popular and/or wealthy pairing that intrigues and fascinates the public in an intense or obsessive fashion. The term originated in the United States, and it was coined in the early 1980s when intense public interest in fictional soap opera couple Luke Spencer and Laura Webber, from General Hospital, made the pair a popular culture phenomenon.

The term powercouple typically refers to fictional couples from television dramas and film, such as Gone with the Wind's Rhett Butler and Scarlett O'Hara. With regard to real-life pairings, tabloids and the mainstream media have focused on wealthy or popular celebrity couples, and have titled them supercouples or power couples.

Examples are the pairing of Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez (which became known by the portmanteau "Bennifer": (See above); and the former relationship of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie ("Brangelina").


Definitions:

Powercouples are defined as popular or financially wealthy pairings that are widely admired in an intense or obsessive fashion and influence society's expectations of what a great love story or relationship should be; they may or may not be romantic or high-profile, and interest in the pairings may be due to a combination of chemistry, physical attractiveness, or because they seem fated.

The term supercouple first appeared in 1981, with the wedding of General Hospital's Luke and Laura. Thirty million viewers tuned into the event, and the widespread media attention it received from prominent newspapers and magazines set the pairing up as the default model for other soap opera supercouples. 

The model Luke and Laura originally followed consisted of action stories, romance, and obstacles for the couple to overcome. This paradigm subsequently became ideal of fictional soap opera supercouples in America, and extended to other genres.

In Queer TV: Framing Sexualities On US Television, Nancy Martin says, "Actively desiring heterosexual pairs not bent on reproduction became a required advertising device and a narratological mainstay on daytime and primetime." 

In Russian Television Today, David MacFadyen concludes, "Even the busiest, most rambling soap operas are often neatly and conclusively distilled in the public's mind by a 'supercouple' or tiny, central pair of protagonists." Luke and Laura's popularity resulted in fictional supercouples generally being regarded as soulmates. The pairings have typically overcome numerous obstacles or significant strife in order to be together.

Though a successful model, the concept has been criticized for hindering the growth of characters' relationships with other love interests; this has resulted in alternate definitions for the term.

In her essay criticism of the term, The Siren Call of the Super Couple (ed. Suzanne Frentz, 1992), Diana Reep describes the love of a supercouple as "so perfect that they are incapable of having romantic feelings for anyone else under any circumstances. In addition, the two have no personal flaws or idiosyncrasies that could interfere with their perfect love. Only an evil, outside force could disturb their relationship". 

While Days of Our Lives former supervising producer Al Rabin credited the supercouple aspect as the secret to the show's success, his then–executive producer Ken Corday stated, "By definition, supercouple excludes others on the show. Every time they walk into a room, every other character, no matter how important, becomes window dressing, I've never believed in it." Corday added, "Either people are involved in a good story or they're not. They're an interesting couple or they're not."

Celebrity couples may also be regarded as supercouples. Interest in the pairings ranges from media and public obsession to calculation of the couples' combined finances.


Internet and media trends:

Fans often use portmanteau to refer to their favorite couples on online message boards, a significant aspect of the "shipping fandom".

The "shipping fandom" scene, whose name is derived from the word "relationship", is a general term for fans' emotional or intellectual involvement with the ongoing development of romance in a work of fiction.

Though technically applicable to any such involvement, it refers chiefly to various related social dynamics observable on the Internet, and is seldom used outside of that context. "Shipping" can involve virtually any kind of relationship—from the well-known and established, to the ambiguous or those undergoing development, and even to the highly improbable and the blatantly impossible.

People involved in shipping (or shippers) assert that the relationship does exist, will exist, or simply that they would like it to exist.

"Portmanteaux first came about with Lewis Carroll" as a way to blend words, stated Jonathan Gabay, author of the Copywriter's Compendium—a reference guide to the English language. Gabay added that people blend words in this fashion because sometimes there are words an individual wants, but those words do not actually exist. "There's a feeling you are trying to get out", he said. 

For fictional pairings, examples showcase themselves as: 
Some couples are given more complex portmanteaux; on How I Met Your Mother, the pairing of Barney and Robin is referred to as "BROTP", incorporating their initials, their platonic status as "bros", and the popular fandom term OTP ("One True Pairing"). 

Seth Cohen of the show The O.C. parodied name-blending trends when he talked about real couples' overexposure to one another; he wondered whether or not his pairing with Summer Roberts would be called "Summereth" or "Sethummer".

Gabay said portmanteaux "...giv[e] people an essence of who they are within the same name. In double-barrelled names, the hyphen is almost pushing one name away from the other. Meshing says 'I am you and you are me', which is rather romantic". 

Occasionally, even anti-fans come up with names for couples, such as General Hospital's Sonny Corinthos and Emily Quartermaine. The unpopular pairing of the mob boss and his enforcer's sweet younger sister became known as "Soily". Similarly, name-blending exists with celebrities' first names.

Said to be a sign of commitment and togetherness, meshing is also seen by some as an attempt to banish what might be considered a "sexist" tradition of a woman taking her husband's name when she marries.

In other Internet trends, fans often take part in making fan videos (also referred to as fanvids, a compilation of favorite scenes stylishly intercut as music videos or other various forms of entertainment) and writing fanfiction (alternative endings and stories to the original story's outcome) for their favorite pairings. Sites such as YouTube, Archive of our Own, and Fanfiction.net help to facilitate this.


Soap operas:

Origins:
See also: List of supercouples § Soap opera

According to American soap opera writer and romance novelist Leah Laiman, soap operas are best known and most remembered for romance. The romances in daytime dramas are significantly characterized by bringing couples together, splitting them up, and starting the cycle over again to ensure that viewers remain invested in the pairings, if popular.

This is a strategy that often succeeds within the medium. A supercouple storyline is typically detailed by the couple's facing seemingly insurmountable challenges, such as a difference in social class, strong family interference, simple disagreements, marriages to other people, children with other people, etc.

Two characters comprising a supercouple will usually reunite and marry, while the most significant obstacle for the pairing is the soap opera genre itself; as soap operas typically continue for decades, there is no closure for the pairing unless both characters leave the show together or one of them dies.

It is because of this, that after the usual fairytale wedding, if the supercouple remains on the series, writers do not allow the item to live happily ever after as a couple in a fairy tale would but rather subject them to a continual cycle of being separated and reunited. This factor has contributed to two characters of a supercouple normally divorcing and remarrying each other a few or several times. 

Author Diana Reep argues that the supercouple phenomenon creates "serious storyline problems" for producers and writers due to characters' being destined for only one lover:

The problem supercouples create for storytellers is that, as characters, therefore, they are unchanging in a narrative form that emphasizes evolving characters and relationships... and as ideals, supercouples bring closure to a relationship in a world that is based in continuing expectations of change.

Creators within the medium generally focus more on the benefits of supercouples rather than the potential problems the pairings can produce. Former One Life to Live co-head writer Josh Griffith said that the key to a show's success is "passionate, romantic storytelling and pairings, and that's what creates a supercouple". To him, they embody love and passion.

Legends:

Although the term was not coined until the early 1980s, some couples prior to that point have been retrospectively termed supercouples; for example, Jeff Baker and Penny Hughes and Bob and Lisa Hughes, from As the World Turns. Doug Williams and Julie Olson from Days of Our Lives are sometimes considered the first supercouple.

From 1970 until 1976, Doug and Julie's relationship wavers between love and hate. The chemistry the portrayers exhibited became evident offscreen; the real-life couple, Bill Hayes and Susan Seaforth, were married in 1974. This set off a commotion among thousands of fans, who wrote letters to the show asking that the couple also be allowed to marry in the story. Since the actors were already married, they felt this was a valid request. 

NBC worked the tension and lengthened the anticipation of the wedding but eventually caved into the audience's pressure. Doug and Julie are married in October 1976 within the series. They are the first soap opera characters to appear on the cover of Time.

Luke Spencer and Laura Webber, portrayed by Anthony Geary and Genie Francis from General Hospital, are considered the most famous soap opera supercouple.

Their romance enthralled viewers; when they wed on November 16, 1981, American daytime television recorded its highest-ever ratings, with 30 million people tuning in to watch them say "I do". Elizabeth Taylor made a cameo appearance during the wedding, and Princess Diana reportedly sent champagne. 

The couple was featured on the covers of People and Newsweek, and was credited with having brought "legitimacy to daytime serials" and its fans by crossing boundaries and becoming celebrities in the mainstream media. As a result, Luke and Laura have become regarded as daytime television's quintessential and most iconic couple. 

While Guiding Light has the smallest number of supercouples, the series still had prominent pairings, notably Quint and Nola, as well as Josh and Reva, one of the central supercouples from the 1980s onward. In 1982, All My Children's Jesse and Angie became the first black supercouple.

"Dirty" Den and Angie Watts, portrayed by Leslie Grantham and Anita Dobson on the British soap opera EastEnders, generated an audience response similar to Luke and Laura's. Den and Angie are renowned as arguably Britain's most iconic soap opera couple, having broken the record for episode ratings to 30.1 million viewers in 1986 on the episode of their divorce, a record that remains unbeaten by any British soap opera episode today.

Golden Age: 1980s:

The 1980s is known as the "Golden Age" of supercouples. Shows such as All My Children, As the World Turns and along with the aforementioned General Hospital and Days of our Lives were well known for their supercouples. Days of our Lives in particular had a significant number of supercouples — Bo and Hope, Shane and Kimberly, Patch and Kayla, and Jack and Jennifer all going on at roughly the same time. The show soon featured John and Marlena. 

All My Children was represented by: 
As the World Turns had the popular couples: 
Along with Luke and Laura, General Hospital also boasted Alan and Monica and Frisco and Felicia. At the same time, Santa Barbara introduced another supercouple, Cruz and Eden.

The supercouple phenomenon spread to foreign shores, with Scott and Charlene, portrayed by Jason Donovan and Kylie Minogue on the Australian soap opera Neighbours. The success of their romance prompted a fellow Australian daytime drama Home and Away to shelve out their own supercouple, Shane and Angel, and Den and Angie from EastEnders emerged as Britain's most famous soap opera couple.

Sheraton Kalouria, NBC's Vice President of Daytime Programming, said he believes in the "it" factor regarding fictional couples. "It's hard to imagine Bo and Hope as a supercouple and divorce that from the magnetic chemistry of Peter Reckell and Kristian Alfonso", he stated. "Or Cruz and Eden from Santa Barbara days and A Martinez and Marcy Walker. Or McKenzie Westmore as Sheridan and Galen Gering as Luis, if I might be so bold as to dub them a supercouple. Actors bring a huge excitement to [their pairing]."

Decline and remolding: 1990s–2000s:

Popular, traditional, and altered setups:

Popular couplings on soap operas exist today, but there are few termed supercouples by fans or the soap opera media. Usually, the term is reminiscent of the 1970s and 1980s. As such, supercouples that are still on serials today are mostly from the 1980s, or early 1990s.

After the mid-1990s, the supercouple phenomenon slowly faded and the nature of soap operas today allows few couples to define the nature of the show anymore as original supercouples once did.

Days of our Lives executive producer Ken Corday said that while he feels that "love in the afternoon" is still important to the genre, the supercouple title "disappeared from [his] vocabulary when Al Rabin [his supervising producer] left the show". 

All My Children and One Life to Live creator Agnes Nixon argued, "[Supercouples are] still a vital component whenever possible." She stressed the importance of creating "young love [stories], the Romeo and Juliet" of tomorrow.

Shows have attempted to revive the success of supercouples through modern couples. There are instances when a character becomes a part of two popular pairings, where both couples which include the character develop the same or close to the same amount of positive fan reaction from viewers.

This causes a certain rivalry between the two couples, with both vying for the title of supercouple. An example of this was especially evident with the mid-1990s storyline of General Hospital's Sonny Corinthos, Brenda Barrett, and Jasper "Jax" Jacks, often referred to as "the hottest love triangle in soap opera history" by the soap opera media. 

The couple combinations within the love triangle were equally in demand, and which of the two is a true supercouple remains in dispute. Though debated, both couples are referenced and listed as supercouples by the soap opera medium. 

The Sonny character eventually acquired second supercouple status in the pairing of Sonny and Carly, becoming a part of two successful on-screen romances.

In other instances, a character is part of two equally popular couplings, but the storyline does not lend itself to the scenario being referred to as a love triangle. Samantha "Sami" Brady of the soap opera Days of our Lives is romantically desired by the two men, Lucas Roberts and EJ Wells. However, she was not considered to be actively involved in a love triangle, and both couples (Lucas and Sami and EJ and Sami) resonate with fans and appear to be at least equal in comparison and popularity.

In today's soap opera medium, there are couples which come close to gaining supercouple status in terms of popularity. Although these pairings have perceived chemistry and potential, the couple's story is cut short, often due to the actors leaving to pursue jobs outside of soap operas or due to the writers changing direction in a storyline. These couples do not last long enough onscreen to garner the long history of what is often considered a genuine supercouple.

Such couples include: 
Soap opera columnist Carolyn Aspenson stated that the "supercouple formula" should be redefined. She argued that tragic couples such as Leo and Greenlee are a better love story than if they had stayed together with a "boring" everyday life. "A super couple shouldn’t be designed to be a couple that beats the odds and sticks it out no matter what," she said.

"We’re left with nothing on those terms. Instead, try redefining a super couple by the intensity of their love, their loss and their ability to move on without their other half. It leaves us frustrated, heartbroken and yearning for more. To me, that is the definition of a super couple."

Gay and lesbian:

Soap operas traditionally featured only heterosexual romance. For American soap opera, this began to change with characters Bianca Montgomery, Lena Kundera, and Maggie Stone from All My Children. Bianca's unveiling as a lesbian was unique for daytime television.

By being a core character and the daughter of legendary diva Erica Kane, "the show initiated an innovative discourse about the possibility, location, and representation of lesbian and gay characters in a television genre historically predicated on the celebration of heterosexual courtship, romance, and family life".

In 2003, Bianca's relationship with Lena resulted in American daytime's first lesbian kiss. The two became American daytime's first lesbian couple, and received significant press. Though Lena and Bianca's romance was well-received, popular, and the couple became responsible for several historic moments within daytime television, it was Bianca's relationship with close confidante Maggie that thoroughly captivated viewers.

The romance was considered unique and especially significant due to the show's insistence that Maggie was not gay; the show's insistence did not deter viewers from wanting the two romantically paired, and they often wrote in to the network (ABC) demanding that Bianca and Maggie become an official item. 

Eventually, hints that Maggie might not be heterosexual started to appear throughout the series, complicated by Maggie insisting that she is not gay but is rather "into guys" and only guys. Yet fan mail for the Bianca and Maggie pairing was prominent. 

The couple's popularity grew beyond soap opera press, as newspapers and television magazines became fascinated by the love story as well. TV Guide, The Advocate, and Daily News were among the media taking interest.

The pairing eventually became the most popular gay couple in soap opera history, which surprised industry insiders who had not believed that a gay pairing could be as significantly in demand as heterosexual pairings. Though Bianca and Maggie's romance was not made official until both were offscreen, it made clear to writers and executives who had been conflicted about including gay and lesbian love stories that the daytime audience was interested. Bianca and Maggie subsequently became American soap opera's first same-sex supercouple.

Soap opera analyst C. Lee Harrington stated, "While the past decade has witnessed a growing number of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender characters in primetime dramas and situation comedies, daytime soap operas offer unique challenges (and possibilities) regarding the inclusion and 'normalization' of varied sexualities in entertainment television." 

Daytime television has been ahead of primetime for some time in exploring diverse or controversial storylines and characters, with the one glaring exception being homosexuality. Gay and lesbian issues or characters were invisible in 1950s and early 1960s TV. When it came to the mainstream shows, audiences were built up as "replications of the idealized, middle-class nuclear family, defined as monogamous heterosexual couples with children" (Buxton, 1997, p. 1477). Because of this perception of what was ideal, networks geared programming toward it, feeling that viewers were exactly like these images on their television screens.

In contrast to primetime, daytime dramas have different obstacles to developing innovative programming, with their advertising sponsors being more conservative, their audience smaller and "genre restrictions that emphasize continuity and respect for history over innovation". Soap opera tried its first chance at including a gay character back in 1983 on All My Children. Actress Donna Pescow portrayed Dr. Lynn Carson, who "comes out" as a lesbian to patient and confidante Devon Shepherd McFadden (Tricia Pursley).

The two women admit to having romantic feelings for each other, and that is as far as the relationship goes.

A prominent obstacle for gay and lesbian characters on daytime television is interference from television network executives who fear a decline in their ratings. The characters are often denied fulfilling and lasting romances with others of the same sex.

"Before Bianca's gay character was written into All My Children, the purpose of gay characters was to make a point or explain homosexuality for the audience—a task handled within the course of a few episodes," said Zach Hudson of Washington Blade. "The distraught parents or angry bullies who caused the early gay characters so much turmoil would suddenly see the light. Then the story—and the character—would simply vanish."

It was not until Bianca that prominent gay characters and couples seemed possible within American daytime. Since then, American soap operas have tried to replicate the success of the Bianca character with the introduction of their own gay and lesbian characters.

One soap opera in particular, As the World Turns, has been successful in launching the first popular romance between two men on an American daytime drama, Luke Snyder and Noah Mayer.

In late 2007, the two make television history by carrying out the first kiss between two male lovers on an American soap opera. The popularity of the pairing borders on the same fascination level that centered around Bianca and Maggie's lesbian romance. Not even months into the romantic aspect of their relationship, TV Guide named the male duo a top power couple.

Noah Mayer became one of the latest soap opera characters to come out as gay, and joined Bianca and others as visible gay characters in daytime. One year before Luke and Noah, the British soap opera Hollyoaks had already embarked on issuing their own gay male supercouple, between characters John Paul McQueen and Craig Dean; the storyline became one of the show's most successful, gaining "legions" of fans. 

The budding same-sex romance on Guiding Light between Olivia Spencer and Natalia Rivera Aitoro became popular with fans in 2009. 

That same year, One Life to Live introduced its own male gay supercouple with Oliver Fish and Kyle Lewis. 

On international television, the German soap opera Verbotene Liebe gained international popularity, with the storylines involving Carla and Stella, and later with the couple of Christian and Oliver.

Beginning in 2011, Days of our Lives broke new ground when it decided to have the character Will Horton come out as gay. The soap chronicled Will's struggle to accept his sexuality. The show also highlighted many obstacles the LGBT community face, such as bullying, hate crimes and gay slurs. The show cast actor, Freddie Smith in the role of Jackson "Sonny" Kiriakis, the second openly gay contracted character in a daytime soap opera. 

Sonny would eventually become Will's ongoing love interest. To the surprise of the actors and writers, Will and Sonny were greeted with fan support, and were eventually titled a supercouple and "power couple". The show pushed the envelope even further when it decided to air Will's first same-sex sexual encounter on-screen (which would become the first of many). 

Chandler Massey went on to receive the 2012 Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Younger Actor in a Drama Series, becoming the first actor ever to receive a Daytime Emmy Award for playing a gay character. He won his second consecutive Emmy for the role in the same category in 2013. Smith received his first Daytime Emmy nomination for his role in 2013 pitting him against Massey for the same award. In his acceptance speech, Massey thanked Smith. 

The show won the GLAAD Media Award for Outstanding Daily Drama in 2013. In August 2013, it was announced that Massey had filmed his final episode as Will Horton, and that a recast had already been made. Days had initially planned not to recast the role, but changed its mind due to fear of advertiser and fan backlash.

In either aspect, fictional gay and lesbian romances have been argued as making an impact. "These stories have the ability to reach the many different generations of viewers who watch daytime and share with them stories of our lives," stated Damon Romine, media entertainment director for the GLAAD organization. "What viewers are seeing is that more and more of their own neighbors and friends are dealing with these issues, and the soaps are merely reflecting the reality of the world we live in."


​Primetime television:
See also: List of supercouples § Prime time television

A paradigm used for primetime couples is the love-hate relationship plotline. In the television series Dynasty, characters Krystle and Blake (Linda Evans and John Forsythe) are seen fighting for years, through ex-lovers and a host of other interferences. Krystle winds up in a coma and Blake spends years in jail, but their love eventually wins out over their problems. This resulted in the couple subsequently becoming one of television's classic supercouples. 

Other early primetime power couplings include: 
Television shows also produce tragic love stories, such as Buffy and Angel from the series Buffy the Vampire Slayer. The pairing's persistent fight to be together is considered to have cemented their place in supercouple history. Voted #2 on IGN's list of Top 10 Favorite TV Couples, and #5 on AOL's list of Greatest TV Couples of All Time, the sites categorized the pairing as "the ultimate" star-crossed couple. 

The pairing's main predicament—unable to experience sexual intimacy without Angel losing his humanity—has been summarized by IGN:  "After all, when you're a Vampire Slayer, it hardly seems like the appropriate person to fall for would be a Vampire. But fall for Angel Buffy did, setting up one of the most involving and tragic love stories we can remember on TV. After all, it's pretty rare for one half of a great couple to go from gentle and caring to sadistic and murderous in the course of a single night...and spurred on by having sex with the girl he loves no less.:

Creator of the series Joss Whedon said, "'Becoming', Parts 1 and 2 ... really sort of charted the main points of the Buffy–Angel relationship in all its difficulty and romance." 

Buffy's portrayer, Sarah Michelle Gellar, said, "I think deep down Buffy will always love Angel and she will never love anyone the way in which she loves him. I think they found a wonderful supercouple in Buffy and Angel."

Certain shows may not be adequately suited for a tragic-love storyline.

For comedies, the approach of pairing mismatched couples is also often applied, and for dramas, there tends to be a "will-they-won't-they" setup.

Website Cinemablend states that there are two general formulas for a "will-they-wont-they" setup. "The first one is when one person pursues the other, then finally gives up and dates someone else," the site stated, "and the other scenario is when the two characters are so different and often do not get along with one another, they fight and argue constantly, but then one thing or a series of 'things' happen and they are forced to put up with each other." 

Examples of popular couples cited for having displayed this formula are:
There are numerous shows that tend to pair up two unexpected characters with other. For instance, Pacey Witter and Joey Potter from the drama Dawsons Creek. Pacey and Joey did not like each other at all first, and Joey was in love with her soulmate Dawson Leery, but they eventually fell in love and became a supercouple of the show. 

Regularly quoted as TV's first LGBTQ powercouples are (from Glee):
A well-known "will-they-won't-they" setups is the relationship of supercouple Agent Fox Mulder and Agent Dana Scully from the science fiction/thriller series The X-Files. Mulder and Scully, two FBI agents investigating cases that involve the paranormal, are showcased as having a relationship which borders on subtle hints of romance throughout the series without the two being heavily romantically involved.

Though anticipation for Mulder and Scully to romantically commit to each other had existed for years among the show's fanbase, the pairing's romantic intimacy was not written as soon as fans would have hoped for; when the two are finally shown sharing a kiss in 1999 after seven seasons of buildup, some viewers felt the show waited too long to script the event.

Critics state that in such cases, if a series extends sexual tension for "too long" before finally acting on romantic intimacy between the characters, it can result in viewers feeling that the best part of the pairing's buildup was their "will-they-won't-they" status.

With some fictional supercouples from soap opera or primetime, the couple may have started out as an unexpected pairing and with or without a paradigm. Due to viewers becoming excited over the prospect of chemistry between the two, the show's producers and writers later decide to pair them.


Film:
See also: List of supercouples § Film

Given that films inherently have a shorter amount of time to develop characters and carry out storylines, the task of convincing the audience that the film's couple are adequately suited for each other can be challenging. This is especially evident in cases where there is not enough plot focusing on the buildup of the characters' interaction, which can make the love story seem contrived. 

A memorable line or catchphrase spoken between the characters has been suggested as a remedy to this, since it can elevate a pairing's popularity.

Films may resort to the notion that romance is a solution to life's problems or is unchangeable, tapping into a "love conquers all" appeal; for example, in "doomed" romances where the underlying message is that the love the couple shared endured even though their time together was cut short.

A film supercouple can be a couple appearing with the same actors over the course of few or several films, making the actors the supercouples rather than the characters.


Celebrity:
See also: Hollywood marriage
​
​The media often focuses on celebrity pairings. Celebrity couples who are viewed as fascinating or create a power coupling due to finances are singled out as supercouples. 

Since the term was coined, classic Hollywood couples have been regarded as supercouples, including Clark Gable and Carole Lombard. People magazine stated that Gable and Lombard were "more than just Golden Age window dressing. The love they shared for six years was that Hollywood rarity: the real thing."

They were titled "The King of Hollywood and the Queen of Screwball Comedy", respectively, and eloped during a break in production on Gable's Gone with the Wind in 1939. Lombard died three years later in a plane crash on her way home from a war bond rally. 

Desi Arnaz and Lucille Ball were the stars and producers of I Love Lucy, and have since been credited as an onscreen and offscreen supercouple. They divorced in 1960 after 20 years of marriage. 

People described  couples recognized as "the greatest love stories of the century" included:
The supercouple title has been similarly prolific with modern celebrity pairings. In 1997, rapper/actor Will Smith married actress Jada Pinkett. The couple were titled a supercouple due to their combined film star allure and perceived physical attractiveness. 

In 2003 and 2008, People magazine categorized them as a supercouple due to their long marriage and widespread celebrity status. Smith spoke of the power of love as a connective force to Essence magazine: "The truth about life is that we're all alone," he said. "But when somebody loves you, that experience is shared. Love is the only real connective tissue that allows you to not live and die by yourself." 

Additionally, in 1997, Ellen DeGeneres and Anne Heche began dating and were described as "the world's first gay supercouple". Their relationship lasted three years. 

In 1998, Brad Pitt met Friends actress Jennifer Aniston, and married her in a private wedding ceremony in Malibu on July 29, 2000. They were titled a supercouple, regarded as one of the film industry's most powerful, and their marriage was considered a rare Hollywood success. 

In January 2005, Pitt and Aniston announced they decided to formally separate after seven years together. Two months later, Aniston filed for divorce, citing irreconcilable differences. 

In November 2000, Michael Douglas married Welsh actress Catherine Zeta-Jones, and the pairing, 25 years apart in age, were considered a supercouple.

Pairing Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez incited unprecedented media attention for an American modern-day supercouple during their 2002-2004 relationship. The two were referred to as the first superstar couple of the Internet age, and the couple's popularity resulted in their being known by the portmanteau "Bennifer" (for Ben and Jennifer) to the media, as well as to fans using the name combination. 

The term Bennifer itself became popular and started the trend of other celebrity couples being referred to by the combination of each other's first names. The pairing eventually succumbed to overexposure, which caused public interest in their romance to result in less admiration and negatively affected their careers. 

In 2007, Affleck stated: "[The romance] was probably bad for my career. What happens is this sort of bleed-over from the tabloids across your movie work. You go to a movie, you only go once. But the tabloids and Internet are everywhere. You can really subsume the public image of somebody. I ended up in an unfortunate crosshair position where I was in a relationship and [the media] mostly lied and inflated a bunch of salacious stuff for the sake of selling magazines. And I paid a certain price for that. Then, in concert with some movies that didn't work..."

​A celebrity supercouple to emerge after Bennifer was "TomKat" (the coupling of celebrity stars Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes), and other countries had already adopted the supercouple term.

The United Kingdom had: 
Japan had: 
  • Tomonori Jinnai and Norika Fujiwara;
  • Jinnai established himself as a television regular and a "pin-geinin" or solo comedian
  • while Fujiwara, a former Miss Japan, became known as a successful actress and "one of the business's biggest earners with a string of commercial contracts, regular TV and stage roles, and also active in charitable causes".
  • They were titled "one of the 'super couples' of Japanese showbiz" and "held their elaborate traditional wedding on February 17, 2007 at the Ikutajinja shrine in Fujiwara's hometown of Kobe, with hundreds of reporters and thousands of fans craning for a glimpse outside" and "invited 600 guests to the Hotel Okura the following April for a wedding reception that cost over ¥500 million.The event was broadcast live on TV and had a high audience rating of 40% in the Kansai region".

Another American couple regularly titled a supercouple are rapper Jay-Z and R&B singer Beyoncé Knowles. 
  • Their marriage in New York City in early 2008, was reported by People. 
  • Knowles and Jay-Z were listed as the most powerful couple for Time magazine's 100 most influential people of 2006.
  • In January 2009, Forbes ranked them as Hollywood's top-earning couple, with a combined total of $162 million. 
  • They also made it to the top of the list the following year, with a combined total of $122 million between June 2008 and June 2009.

The spotlight and attention given to American celebrity supercouples reached its height in 2006, when the celebrity phenomenon dubbed "Brangelina" triggered media obsession surrounding screen stars Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie. 

The two emerged as a prominent supercouple, and the mania that followed was described as having "reached the point of insanity, far overshadowing the hoopla that attended such couples as 'Bennifer' and 'TomKat'". 

The obsessive media attention surrounding Pitt and Jolie's union was initially the result of rumors regarding Pitt's involvement with Jolie during the shooting of their 2005 film Mr. & Mrs. Smith. Speculation that Pitt had been romantically involved with Jolie while still married to Jennifer Aniston was daily gossip and thought to be the reason for Pitt and Aniston's divorce. 

Jolie, however, stated that there was no romance between her and Pitt during filming and that she would never be intimate with a married man.

An official item soon following Pitt's divorce from Aniston, Pitt and Jolie became more of a media fascination for their social activism and ever-growing family, with the couple adopting from foreign countries. The anticipated birth of Pitt and Jolie's first biological child together, Shiloh Nouvel Jolie-Pitt, was cited as the most influential celebrity baby, as the public pondered what the combined physical features of two people commonly cited as the world's most beautiful celebrities would produce in a child. 

The first baby pictures for Shiloh set a world record. People paid more than $4.1 million for the North American rights, while British magazine Hello! obtained the international rights for roughly $3.5 million; the total rights sale earned up to $10 million worldwide, and was the most expensive celebrity image of all time. 

All profits were donated to an undisclosed charity by Jolie and Pitt. On July 26, 2006, Madame Tussauds in New York unveiled a wax figure of two-month-old Shiloh; it was the first infant re-created in wax by Madame Tussauds. 

In 2008, the Shiloh Hello! image was eventually "topped" by images of her siblings, twins Knox Léon Jolie-Pitt (a boy) and Vivienne Marcheline Jolie-Pitt (a girl). The rights for the first images of Knox and Vivienne were jointly sold to People and Hello! for $14 million, making the images the most expensive celebrity pictures ever taken.

The money went to the Jolie/Pitt Foundation.

Robert Thompson, director of the Centre for the Study of Popular Television, said the coupling of A-list stars like Pitt and Jolie, or in years gone by Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton, was "a paparazzi's dream come true". He added that "as silly as it sounds, this new tendency to make up single names for two people, like 'Bennifer' (Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez) and 'TomKat' (Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes), is an insightful idea'. 'Brangelina' has more cultural equity than their two star parts."

In India, cricketer Virat Kohli and Bollywood actress Anushka Sharma started dating in 2013, and tied the knot in December 2017, forming one of contemporary India's most famous and talked-about supercouple. They have been referred to as 'Virushka', in line with Hollywood pairings such as 'Brangelina'. 

Similarly, actors John Abraham and Bipasha Basu are a former supercouple. 

Other Indian power couples, usually associated with the Hindi film industry, include: 
Polly Vernon of the British newspaper The Guardian summed up her analysis of what makes a celebrity supercouple in her May 25, 2000 article: "The basic appeal of the accomplished supercouple can be reduced to this: by hooking up with another, carefully selected celeb, you can eliminate your bad points, compensate for your own shortcomings, and hint at a softer, more vulnerable side.

Attach yourself to someone smarter, prettier, more fashionable, hipper, funnier than you are, and you will automatically acquire these missing qualities by osmosis. They, equally, will benefit from your particular brand of star quality. Your public perception will become more complete, more exciting. Together, you are quite literally, the ultimate individual."

Click here for more about Power Couples.








Celebrity Gossip Magazines, Tabloid Journalism and their Paparazzi Pictured below: The Case Against Celebrity Gossip
[Your Webhost: Three related topics are presented together to cover sensationalist journalism]

Gossip Magazines:​

A gossip magazine, also referred to as a tabloid magazine, is a magazine that features scandalous stories about the personal lives of celebrities and other well-known individuals.

In North America, this genre of magazine flourished in the 1950s and early 1960s. The title Confidential, founded in 1952, boasted a monthly circulation in excess of ten million, and it had many competitors, with names such as Whisper, Dare, Suppressed, The Lowdown, Hush-Hush, and Uncensored. These magazines included more lurid and explicit content than did the popular newspaper gossip columns of the time, including tales of celebrity infidelity, arrests, and drug use.


History

The publication generally credited as America's first national weekly gossip tabloid is Broadway Brevities and Society Gossip, which was launched in New York in 1916 and edited by a Canadian named Stephen G. Clow. 

Brevities started out covering high society and the A-list of the New York theater world, but by the 1920s focused on society scandal and the destruction of reputations culminating in its editor, Stephen Clow, and two of his associates being charged with using the mails to defraud due to allegations that the magazine was a blackmail racket threatening to publish material injurious to the reputations of businesses and individuals unless they purchased advertising.

The tabloid was consequently shut down in 1925 after Clow and his associates were convicted with Clow sentenced to six years in prison (serving two).

Clow revived the tabloid in 1930 and the new incarnation covered more general vice and ran splashy, highly sensationalized features on sex, drugs, gang violence and crime. This was possibly the first time a gossip magazine had made real efforts to attract readers who weren't members of the elite classes; it didn't presume its readers had a close familiarity with any given social or professional world.

In 1932, New York City banned newsstands from selling the racy tabloid, and it appears to have folded sometime around 1933. A third incarnation of the tabloid was printed in Toronto from 1937, with Clow as editor initially, until around 1948.


Modern:

The large-circulation gossip magazines eventually gave way to supermarket tabloids, such as the National Enquirer, and to less scandal-oriented celebrity coverage in magazines such as People and Us, though small-circulation publications that harken back to the 1950s approach have continued to be published.

The history of gossip magazines also includes a few eccentric titles that flouted the usual rules of acceptable taste, such as the sexually explicit Hollywood Star of the 1970s. There are nearly 400 magazines related to gossip in the news stands.

Notable gossip magazines around the world include: 
The gossip genre has crossed over onto television and the internet with sites such as TMZ.com and its television counterpart TMZ on TV as well as Perez Hilton, The Drudge Report, and The Smoking Gun breaking many of the stories that were formerly the domain of gossip magazines and tabloids.

See also: ___________________________________________________________________________

Tabloid Journalism:

​Tabloid journalism is a popular style of largely sensationalist journalism which takes its name from the tabloid newspaper format: a small-sized newspaper also known as half broadsheet. 

The size became associated with sensationalism, and tabloid journalism replaced the earlier label of yellow journalism and scandal sheets. Not all newspapers associated with tabloid journalism are tabloid size, and not all tabloid-size newspapers engage in tabloid journalism; in particular, since around the year 2000 many broadsheet newspapers converted to the more compact tabloid format.

In some cases, celebrities have successfully sued for libel, demonstrating that tabloid stories have defamed them. Publications engaging in tabloid journalism are known as rag newspapers or simply rags. Tabloid journalism has changed over the last decade to more online platforms that seek to target and engage youth consumers with celebrity news and entertainment.

Scandal sheets:

Scandal sheets were the precursors to tabloid journalism. Around 1770, scandal sheets appeared in London, and in the United States as early as the 1840s. Reverend Henry Bate Dudley was the editor of one of the earliest scandal sheets, The Morning Post, which specialized in printing malicious society gossip, selling positive mentions in its pages, and collecting suppression fees to keep stories unpublished.
​
Other Georgian era scandal sheets were Theodore Hook's John Bull, Charles Molloy Westmacott's The Age, and Barnard Gregory's The Satirist: William d'Alton Mann, owner of the scandal sheet Town Topics, explained his purpose: "My ambition is to reform the Four Hundred by making them too deeply disgusted with themselves to continue their silly, empty way of life."  

Many scandal sheets in the U.S. were short-lived attempts at blackmail. One of the most popular in the U.S. was the National Police Gazette.

Scandal sheets in the early 20th century were usually 4- or 8-page cheap papers specializing in the lurid and profane, sometimes used to grind political, ideological, or personal axes, sometimes to make money (because "scandal sells"), and sometimes for extortion.

A Duluth, Minnesota example was the Rip-saw, written by a puritanical journalist named John L. Morrison who was outraged by the vice and corruption he observed in that 1920s mining town. Rip-saw regularly published accusations of drunkenness, debauchery, and corruption against prominent citizens and public officials.

Morrison was convicted of criminal libel in one instance, but his scandal sheet may have contributed to several politicians losing their elections. After Morrison published an issue claiming that State Senator Mike Boylan had threatened to kill him, Boylan responded by helping to pass the Public Nuisance Bill of 1925.

It allowed a single judge, without jury, to stop a newspaper or magazine from publishing, forever. Morrison died before the new law could be used to shut down Rip-saw. 

The Saturday Press was another Minnesota scandal sheet. When the Public Nuisance Bill of 1925 was used to shut down The Saturday Press, the case made its way to the United States Supreme Court which found the gag law to be unconstitutional.


Supermarket tabloids:

In the United States and Canada, "supermarket tabloids" are large, national versions of these tabloids, usually published weekly. They are named for their prominent placement along the supermarket checkout lines.

In the 1960s, the National Enquirer began selling magazines in supermarkets as an alternative to newsstands. To help with their rapport with supermarkets and continue their franchise within them, they had offered to buy back unsold issues so newer, more up to date ones could be displayed.

These tabloids—such as the Globe and the National Enquirer—often use aggressive and usually mean-spirited tactics to sell their issues. Unlike regular tabloid-format newspapers, supermarket tabloids are distributed through the magazine distribution channel like other weekly magazines and mass-market paperback books.

Leading examples include the National Enquirer, Star, Weekly World News (later reinvented as a parody of the style), and the Sun. Most major supermarket tabloids in the U.S. are published by American Media, Inc., including the National Enquirer, Star, Globe, and National Examiner.

A major event in the history of U.S. supermarket tabloids was the successful libel lawsuit by Carol Burnett against the National Enquirer (Carol Burnett v. National Enquirer, Inc.), arising out of a false 1976 report in the National Enquirer, implying she was drunk and boisterous in a public encounter with U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger.

Though its impact is widely debated, it is generally seen as a significant turning point in the relations between celebrities and tabloid journalism, increasing the willingness of celebrities to sue for libel in the U.S., and somewhat dampening the recklessness of U.S. tabloids.

Other celebrities have attempted to sue tabloid magazines for libel and slander including Phil McGraw in 2016 and Richard Simmons in 2017.

Tabloids may pay for stories. Besides scoops meant to be headline stories, this can be used to censor stories damaging to the paper's allies. Known as "catch and kill", tabloid newspapers may pay someone for the exclusive rights to a story, then choose not to run it. 

Publisher American Media has been accused of burying stories embarrassing to Arnold Schwarzenegger, Donald Trump, and Harvey Weinstein.


Red tops:

The term "red tops" refers to British tabloids with red mastheads, such as The Sun, the Daily Star, the Daily Mirror, and the Daily Record.


Modern tabloid journalism:
​
In the early 21st century, much of tabloid journalism and news production changed mediums to online formats. This change is to keep up with the era of digital media and allow for increased accessibility of readers.

With a steady decline in paid newspapers, the gap has been filled by expected free daily articles, mostly in the tabloid format. Tabloid readers are often youths, and studies show that consumers of tabloids are on average less educated. It can often depict inaccurate news and misrepresent individuals and situations.

See also: ___________________________________________________________________________

The Paparazzi:

Paparazzi  are independent photographers who take pictures of high-profile people; such as actors, musicians, athletes, politicians, and other celebrities, typically while subjects go about their usual life routines. Paparazzi tend to make a living by selling their photographs to media outlets that focus on tabloid journalism and sensationalism (such as gossip magazines).


Description:

Paparazzi tend to be independent contractors, unaffiliated with mainstream media organizations, who track high-profile people and take pictures of them once they get the chance to do so. 

Some experts have described the behavior of paparazzi as synonymous with stalking, and anti-stalking laws in many countries address the issue by seeking to reduce harassment of public figures and celebrities, especially when they are with their children. 

Some public figures and celebrities have expressed concern at the extent to which paparazzi go to invade their personal space. The filing and receiving of judicial support for restraining orders against paparazzi has increased, as have lawsuits with judgments against them.


Famous paparazzi:

Walter Santesso portrays Paparazzo in the 1960 film La Dolce Vita, marking the character as the eponym of the word paparazzi.

Ron Galella is well known for his obsessive stalking of several celebrities, most notably Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis. Galella has been defined as "the Godfather of the U.S. paparazzi culture".

Rino Barillari is an Italian paparazzo known as the "King of the Paparazzi" in Italy. He was awarded the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic in 1998.


Celebrity paparazzi:

Paparazzi are often a problem for celebrities, as the latter have become increasingly objectified and worshipped by fans (see: Celebrity worship syndrome), especially through social and mass media. 

This happens because constant exposure to and coverage of these figures leads people to treat celebrities like they are their social intimates, who they admire, gossip about, or copy habits from. 

A 2009 study which anonymously interviewed a number of celebrities showed that it was a common sentiment that being pursued by paparazzi causes a loss of personal life, lack of anonymity, and a feeling of constantly being watched. This causes them to compensate by forming separate identities, one an image offered to the public, and one reserved for moments of privacy and intimacy.


Etymology:

A news photographer named Paparazzo (played by Walter Santesso in the 1960 film La Dolce Vita directed by Federico Fellini) is the eponym of the word paparazzi. 

In his book The Facts on File Encyclopedia of Word and Phrase Origins, Robert Hendrickson writes that Fellini named the "hyperactive photographer ... after Italian slang for 'mosquito.'" As Fellini said in his interview to Time magazine, "Paparazzo ... suggests to me a buzzing insect, hovering, darting, stinging." Those versions of the word's origin are sometimes contested.

For example, in the Abruzzo dialect spoken by Ennio Flaiano, co-scriptwriter of La Dolce Vita, the term paparazzo refers to the local clam, Venerupis decussata, and is also used as a metaphor for the shutter of a camera lens.

Further, in an interview with Fellini's screenwriter Flaiano, he said the name came from the book Sulla riva dello Jonio (1957), a translation by Italian poet Margherita Guidacci of By the Ionian Sea, a 1901 travel narrative in southern Italy by Victorian writer George Gissing.

He further states that either Fellini or Flaiano opened the book at random, saw the name of a restaurant owner, Coriolano Paparazzo, and decided to use it for the photographer. This story is further documented by a variety of Gissing scholars and in the book A Sweet and Glorious Land. Revisiting the Ionian Sea. 

By the late 1960s, the word, usually in the Italian plural form paparazzi, had entered English as a generic term for intrusive photographers. A person who has been photographed by the paparazzi is said to have been "papped".


Legality:

Due to the reputation of paparazzi as a nuisance, several countries and states restrict their activities by passing laws and curfews, and by staging events in which paparazzi are specifically not allowed to take photographs. 

In the United States, celebrity news organizations are protected by the First Amendment. 

However, to protect the children of celebrities, California passed Senate Bill No. 606 in September 2013. The purpose of the bill is to stop paparazzi from taking pictures of children or wards in a harassing manner because of their parent's occupation. This law increased the penalty for harassment of children. California Civil Code sections 1708.7 and 1708.8 explicitly address stalking and invasion of physical privacy.

Injunctions:
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​In 1972, paparazzo photographer Ron Galella sued Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis after the former First Lady ordered her Secret Service agents to destroy Galella's camera and film following an encounter in New York City's Central Park. Kennedy counter-sued claiming harassment.

The trial lasted three weeks and became a groundbreaking case regarding photojournalism and the role of paparazzi. In Galella v. Onassis, Kennedy obtained a restraining order to keep Galella 150 feet (46 m) away from her and her children. The restriction was later reduced to 25 feet (7.6 m). The trial is a focal point in Smash His Camera, a 2010 documentary film by director Leon Gast.

In 1997, Diana, Princess of Wales and partner Dodi Fayed were killed in a limousine crash as their driver was speeding, trying to escape paparazzi. Another person, Trevor Jones survived.

An inquest jury investigated the role of paparazzi in the incident, but no one was convicted. The official inquests into the accident attributed the causes to the speed and manner of driving of the Mercedes, as well as the following vehicles, and the impairment of the judgment of the Mercedes driver, Henri Paul, through alcohol.

In 1999, the Oriental Daily News of Hong Kong was found guilty of "scandalizing the court", an extremely rare charge where the judiciary find that the newspaper's conduct undermines confidence in the administration of justice. The charge was brought after the newspaper had published abusive articles challenging the judiciary's integrity and accusing it of bias in a lawsuit the paper had instigated over a photo of a pregnant Faye Wong.

The paper had also arranged for a "dog team" (slang for paparazzi in the Chinese language) to track a judge for 72 hours, to provide the judge with first-hand experience of what paparazzi do.

Time magazine's Style & Design special issue in 2005 ran a story entitled "Shooting Star", in which Mel Bouzad, one of the top paparazzi in Los Angeles at the time, claimed to have made US$150,000 for a picture of Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez in Georgia after their breakup. "If I get a picture of Britney and her baby," Bouzad claimed, "I'll be able to buy a house in those hills (above Sunset Boulevard)." Paparazzi author Peter Howe told Time that "celebrities need a higher level of exposure than the rest of us so it is a two-way street. The celebrities manipulate."

In 2006, Daniella Cicarelli went through a scandal when a paparazzo caught video footage of her having sex with her boyfriend on a beach in Spain, which was posted on YouTube. 
After fighting in the court, it was decided in her favor, causing YouTube to be blocked in Brazil. This caused major havoc among Brazilians, including threatening a boycott against MTV Brasil, where Cicarelli worked, unless she was fired.

The block only lasted a few days, and Cicarelli was not dismissed. The legal action backfired as the court decided she had no expectation of privacy by having sex in a public location.

The E! network program Celebrities Uncensored used often-confrontational footage of celebrities made by paparazzi.

Following the publication of photographs showing Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge sunbathing whilst topless at the French holiday home of her husband's cousin Viscount Linley, it was announced on September 14, 2012, that the royal couple were to launch legal action against the French edition of Closer magazine.

It was the first time that a senior British royal has sued in a court outside the UK. The reason cited for the legal action is that the Duchess had a right of privacy whilst at the home—the magazine responded that the pictures had been taken from the public highway. The injunction was granted on September 18, 2012, and the publishers of the magazine were ordered not to publish the photographs in France and not to sell the images.

The publishers were also ordered to hand over the original material of the published pictures under threat of a €10,000 fine for every day of delay in doing so. The magazine also had to pay some money.

In the United Kingdom, Sienna Miller, Amy Winehouse, and Lily Allen have won injunctions that prevent the paparazzi from following them and gathering outside their houses. Miller was awarded £53,000.

In 2013, rapper Kanye West faced assault charges after attacking a photojournalist. He stated that he would fight to get the law changed, so celebrities can profit from paparazzi's work.

Other measures:

In addition to legal action, celebrities have taken other measures to avoid paparazzi. When Daniel Radcliffe was performing in the play Equus in London, he wore the same hat and jacket every day for six months, to make the photos look old and therefore "unpublishable"








Celebrity Mega Mansions Worth Millions
​Updated: Jul 24, 2023 By Kate Prince--Business  @ https://za.investing.com/magazine/
Being rich and famous has its downsides, like a severe lack of privacy and public scandals that can derail an entire career. However, it also has its upsides too. A personal fortune means being able to buy some of the biggest homes in the United States and beyond. 

The biggest celebrities have huge property portfolios, with some of them flipping houses as a second career. From Disney stars to reality TV moguls, these estates have everything an A-lister could possibly want, such as gyms, libraries, cigar rooms, and even underground parking garages. 

Below, we offer 10 celebrity homes, out of 251 total celebrity homes covered in this article. 

To see all homes, click here.
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Sally Field

Pictured below: ​Sally Field’s Former Malibu Abode
Price: $7.9 million
Location: Malibu, California 

We’ve seen actress Sally Field onscreen for decades, and the starlet remains a Hollywood icon. Like many actresses, with Field’s net worth, Sally has lived in quite a few expensive properties over the years, including this $7.9 million Malibu abode.

The three-acre property has a 6,000-square-foot, four-bedroom main house. The highlight of this beautiful home is its horse-riding facilities and stalls, which are perfect for any equestrian. Another feature you can’t miss is the twenty-foot-tall teepee in the front yard, which has a capacity to hold up to fifteen people.
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Oprah Winfrey
Price: $88 million
Location: Montecito, CA

Oprah is the perfect example of what can be done when you set your mind to it. Winfrey didn’t have the greatest start in life, but she managed to create one of the biggest media empires in the world. Now worth over $1 billion, Oprah has spent a large portion of that on her sprawling Montecito home, named “Promised Land.” 

Sitting on 42 acres near Santa Barbara, the idyllic home was actually snapped up by Winfrey after she attended a party there in 2001. Initially, the owners didn’t want to sell, but they soon changed their minds once the TV personality pulled out her checkbook and offered them a reported  $52 million. 
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Taylor Swift
Price: $30 million
Location: Beverly Hills, CA

When it comes to celebrity property portfolios, Taylor Swift has an almost unrivaled collection. From an instant in Nashville to penthouse apartments in NYC, Swift has it all. A few years ago, she even bought a Beverly Hills mansion that formerly belonged to one of Hollywood’s founding fathers, Samuel Goldwyn. 

The $30-million-dollar property was first built in 1934. Boasting just under 11,000-square-foot of space, the Georgian Revival home has everything the former Sony artist could need, including a gym, a pool, and even a library as well as two private guest suites. What more could you want? ​
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John Travolta

Price: $10 million
Location: Ocala, Florida 

Hollywood superstar John Travolta has enjoyed a career spanning across the decades. As you might expect from a star so well established, Travolta has plenty of money in the kitty to purchase lavish properties. His main home is situated in Ocala, Florida – and isn’t exactly run-of-the-mill. 

​The sprawling mansion sits in an exclusive gated community. It has all the usual luxuries that you might expect, but it also has on-site parking for several planes. The runway leads right up to the house, so when John wants to take a plane for a spin, he doesn’t have to go far.

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​(Gymnast) Simone Biles

Price: $1 million
Location: Houston, Texas

At just 24 years old, Simon Biles has proved time and time again that she’s the world’s best gymnast. Thanks to her growing career and multiple endorsement deals, Biles already has an impressive property under her belt. Although it might not be the most expensive celeb home, it’s incredible considering how old she is. 

Biles lives in a 4,00-square-foot home in Texas that boasts a huge swimming pool, stylishly designed indoor and outdoor space, and more. This is just the start for Biles, so it wouldn’t be a surprise if she traded up in the next few years.
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Tiger Woods

Price: $54.5 million
Location: Jupiter Island, FL

Tiger Woods rose up through the ranks to become not just a world-class golfer, but a celebrity. Few from the golfing world can say the same. Woods has many homes, but one of his favorite residences is his Jupiter Island, FL estate. 

Made up of six bunkers, the sprawling set up has 3,300-square-feet of living space, accompanied by another 6,400-square-foot building that can be used for all manner of things. Woods even has his very own oxygen therapy room for when he’s not feeling well. We just wish there was a tour we could watch on YouTube.
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​Matt Damon

Price: $21 million
Location: Pacific Palisades, CA

Matt Damon has managed to do very well for himself over the years, so it’s only natural that his property collection reflects that. The actor put one of his homes, a stunning Pacific Palisades mansion, on sale in early 2021 for $21 million. 

As you might expect, the home is immaculately decked out with a neutral chic color scheme and plenty of floor-to-ceiling windows to let in natural light. The property also has an expensive garden, games room, and plenty of guest accommodation for parties that go on late into the night. 
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​Beyonce and Jay-Z

Price: $88 million
Location: Bel Air, CA

What do you do when you’re one of the most talked-about couples in the world, with a combined worth of over $1 billion? Splash out on a Bel Air compound worth over $88 million, of course. Jay-Z and Beyonce have worked hard to earn a fortune, so their expansive property portfolio is well-deserved. 

Their main LA home is a sight to behold. Modern and contemporary, the house has a 15-car garage, an entire section of the home for staff, and over 30,000-square-foot of living space. Amazingly, Bey and Jay were able to get a real deal for this estate, talking the seller down from $120 million and paying just $88 million. ​
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​Prince Harry & Meghan Markle

Price: $14.65 million
Location: Los Angeles, CA

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle inked a deal in 2020 to purchase this stunning mansion in Los Angeles, California. Realtor reported that this mansion was the first home that either of the couple had ever owned, and they wanted to “put down their roots.” Harry and Meghan wanted their son, Archie, to have a “normal” life.
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Whoopi Goldberg

Price: $3.81 million 
Location: West Orange, New Jersey 

Whoopi Goldberg, one of Hollywood’s most beloved stars, lives in a massive New Jersey mansion in one of the most exclusive gated communities that the state has to offer. She first bought the colonial, Georgian mansion in 2009. The home itself was constructed nearly a century earlier in 1927.

It stretches nearly 9,500 square feet, and it features amenities like a patio, pool, indoor gym, ad extravagant kitchen. Goldberg, who describes her style as “eclectic” has outfitted the mansion with mahogany furniture and a ton of artwork. The Sister Act star said she chose New Jersey because it was far more private than New York City, where “fifty people would hang out” with her when she tried to “sit outside.”
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