Irina Hovsepyan: “Heirs” of stars are trying to privatize film and show business

I want to shout, “Art is in danger!” But the problem is not new, just until now it has not acquired such a massive character and frozen, artificially immobile features. This is not yet a crisis of culture, but its first and, admittedly, quite well-fed and satisfied swallows. We are talking about a sad phenomenon, which in the West a few years ago was dubbed “nepo-babys” – from two words: “nepotism”, that is, “nepotism”, and “baby”, that is, “children”.

We are talking about America and Europe, but in neighboring Russia the trend is obvious. The self-appointed new elite from among the lyceums of all stripes, who most often rose from the bottom, wants nothing less than the consolidation of hereditary privileges for their descendants. Hollywood producers, conducting casting for new projects, often have to choose not between talented or talentless actors, but between heirs and all sorts of simple ones from the street. In Europe, the picture is the same, just the names to our ears are not so promoted. The Russian market is very close to us. And since all the figures of blue, pop and fashion business live and work closely intertwined in a glittering snow-white veneers, one way or another side by side, the choice in favor of hereditary “princes” and “princess” is made almost always and immediately. As if there were few mistresses of the Weinsteins there!

Artistic dynasties are not news for the planet, but never has this phenomenon been so massive, hitting the squares. Yes, you can remember Michael Douglas, whose father was the legendary Kirk Douglas, or Isabella Rossellini (daughter of Ingrid Bergman and director Robert Rossellini), but before we talked about those who manage to match or even surpass their parents with their talent. This is called a dynasty, a line of succession, etc., etc. Now about talents often we are not talking — enough and media, which provides mom and dad.

Questions that are rightly asked by many: how did Lily-Rose Depp, the precious daughter of Johnny Depp and Vanessa Paradis, manage to become the model and face of the Chanel house, having a height of 160 cm? It's a podium sentence! The girl (who dropped out of school and has no education) is already a model, a singer, and an actress - and all this with a single frozen dissatisfied grimace on her face. And, of course, with the invariable saying that she achieved everything herself. Or here's Brooklyn Beckham, the basket son of soccer dad and former Spice Girls member Victoria Beckham. Wherever his parents tried to put him! He played in the academy of the Arsenal football club, but he was not taken into the team - it is clear that not his father's hyped name will go on the field for him, and nature luxuriously slept on David's child. At the age of 15, he appeared in editorials and on the covers of Vogue China, Miss Vogue, Interview, L’Uomo Vogue, The New York Times Style Magazine. Then he released a book with his photographs: looking at these masterpieces, even laymen nervously hiccuped. Now Brooklyn pleases the public with culinary experiments, and in the Russian-language segment of the Internet, hypotheses regularly appear that the Beckhams stole the child from Yulia Vysotskaya, because otherwise you can not explain what he does.

And their crowds: Maud Apatow (daughter of actress Leslie Mann and director Judd Apatow), Maya Hawk (daughter of Ethan Hawke and Uma Thurman), Jack Quaid (son of Meg Ryan), Zoe Kravitz (daughter of musician Lenny Kravitz and actress Lisa Bona), John David Washington (son of Reese Witherspoon), Jen Robbins (son's son of Sophia Coppola and grandson Robert Robert Robert Ford's daughter), Andy Kooplady Krugmandochka (the Queen's Domila Krugmandochka) and the Queen's Domila Krugmandochka (Chilka Krugmandochka, Toma Krugmandochka Kruki Kruchia Kruki Krukie Krukie Krukie Krukie (the), and others), "Micha" Three daughters of Bruce Willis and Demi Moore and they are listed as actresses, despite the fact that the face went to the father and have a very specific appearance.

The French keep their list: Victor Belmondo, Louis Garrel, Carmen Kassovitz, Shanna Besson, Zoe Adjani (niece Isabel), Deva Cassel (daughter of Monica Bellucci and Vincent Cassel), Lea Seydoux (granddaughter of film producer Jerome Seydoux), the British career start almost from the diapers provided their daughters Jude Law, in Russia actively promoted Stesha Malikova, Anna Peresild and others, whose name is Legion. Yes, the guys without star relatives still manage to break into the scenes and screens, but it happens much less often, the path of real nuggets is much harder, and there are fewer and fewer of them. “Nepo-babis” become famous immediately, on the fact of birth, in the era of social networks, they are followed already at the stage of changing diapers, and the industry (advertising, fashion, film production) is not averse to play stained cards and ensure the fame of the next project even before the launch, simply mentioning the star name of the next offspring. And millions of people hooked on social networks and watching the life of "celebrity" immediately rush to put likes, buy the proposed goods - then often disappointed, but the primary effect is achieved.

The generation of heirs of varying degrees of talentlessness over the past decade has been firmly spelled out in the field of film, show business and modeling. So much so that ordinary young guys, if they are a hundred times talented, but do not have “star” moms, dads and other relatives in the field of art, already there is nowhere to stumble.

Some star children really inherit talents from their parents: such, as a rule, do not emphasize their family ties and do not outrage others with stories about what they allegedly achieved themselves (accidentally found themselves on the set and they were offered a role in the film, inadvertently came to the casting, suddenly met with a famous director / producer / fashion designer, etc.), receive a serious education in the chosen field - in short, really make efforts to earn their own name with their work. But it's a minority.

The stars can also be understood - the mushroom-eating "well, how not to hurt your own man" has not disappeared for centuries. But this new pseudo-aristocracy is trying to privatize the sphere from which all of us are accustomed to expect bright impressions and creative breakthroughs. The result is to some extent deplorable, but there is no outcome. Moreover, the entertainment industry around the world has entered into a cost-saving mode, and the same castings and samples are held many times less. Now no one will go through hundreds of actresses in search of the only one suitable: a couple of dozen daughters, granddaughters and nieces will come, behind whom there are influential agents of their relatives, a couple of people without privileges will randomly get to the selection, and the viewer will eventually again guess what gum they slipped instead of the film, why the singer cannot sing, and the model is worse than a captured Romanian. In sports, the situation is different: children of Olympic champions are not automatically appointed as the next Olympic champions. They must be shy. But the sphere of art in its most media and money segments jumps to collapse.

Moreover, star babies are already crowded all together in such numbers within a rather narrow area. And then the vile viewer wants to see something good, and not what he is accustomed to stuffing. And all sorts of bloggers undertake to make a movie themselves, without inviting "heirs" to it - and have, such scoundrels, success! Culture is such an interesting field that rebels all the time against attempts to push it into one or another stall, whether it is LGBT propaganda, “racial diversity” or nepotism. And even if the mechanism of counteraction to endless heirs has not yet been developed, sooner or later it will appear. After all, at all times people are more interested in genuine talents than insolent majors. And real breakthroughs and ups are usually the merit of the first, not the second.

ovsepyan@sb.by