She sings, acts and does the catwalk. She's a starlet
She sings, acts and does the catwalk. She's a starlet
By Dini S. Djalal
JAKARTA (JP): It's a typical slackers' day: 6 p.m. and you're sitting in front of the telly fixated by one of the many generic music video shows. A svelte and pretty songstress is on-screen, crooning lovelorn lyrics and pretending that the gorgeous hunk she's winking at is her boyfriend.
At first, your mind ponders crucial trivia, like whether in real life the starlet would actually wear the orange lycra catsuit with the sequined turban. Then you think, "Wait a minute, isn't this the orthopedic sandals ad model, and the actress on that boring TV series last night?"
The answer is a frightening affirmative. In the United States and Europe, a fashion model is often derided, critically and commercially, for becoming an actress or a pop singer.
In Indonesia, a starlet is not a starlet until she has plastered her face on a movie poster, a music cassette, and countless product advertisements and fashion spreads.
Judging by the precious number of faces appearing again and again in assorted media, you would never think that Indonesia is the fourth most populated country in the world. Canada has more diverse talent, and you could fit the population of five Canadas into tiny Java.
Then again, you can't compare Indonesia to Canada (the food is better here, for one). But I do wonder why Indonesian popular culture allows starlets to hold a multiplicity of roles, and with a weak grasp on them all.
Most starlets are mediocre actresses with studio-enhanced singing voices. Their most prominent common denominator is a fondness to pose scintillatingly in front of a camera, which, ultimately, is what counts to Indonesian audiences.
After all, it is the camera which catapulted them into stardom. Parents and teenagers, take note: the best investment an aspiring starlet can have is participation in one of the nation's many beauty pageants. Not necessarily the swimsuit-parade Miss Teenage Bogor variety -- a finalist in teenage magazine Mode's annual "Cover Girl" contests will do. Or in teenage magazine Gadis' annual "Cover Girl" contest. Or in women's magazine Femina's annual "Cover Girl" contest. Or ... you get the picture.
Once recognized by tabloid photographers and fashion editors as a potential photogenic wunderkind, there is nothing stopping the starlet from becoming a household word -- certainly not lack of talent. First the cover-girl prize, then the deluge of commercial offers, then the phone-call from a movie producer, then the arrival of the recording contract, or at least a Karaoke project.
These events are usually punctuated by much fanfare and publicity, including the now-tired revelatory interview: "My first love was singing and acting. The singing and acting is just a side job." Along the way the pile of cash gets taller, for the producers, promoters, publicists and, of course, the starlet.
Wondering who these starlets are? Let's not name names, but celebrity magazine Jakarta-Jakarta often features them on their covers, accompanied with the revelatory interview. Of course Jakarta-Jakarta also features starlets with less diverse occupations, such as plain-old fashion models or, err, plain-old fashion models. Occasionally the magazine spotlights intellectual celebrities, such as newscasters. Sometimes the celebrity gracing the cover is "famous by association", for example the ex-fiancee of an accused murderer or the daughter or grand-daughter of a political figure. Without fail, however, these cover-models are young, pretty and female.
I'm not demeaning Jakarta-Jakarta -- more power to them for recognizing the material value of pretty faces. Sex sells, and sex, at least in this country, remains epitomized by a scantily- clad beautiful starlet. It is the eagerly-buying public which is to blame, feasting on superficial glamour and gossip columns. On that note, more power to the starlet who knows a money-making machine when she sees one. "Who cares if my out-of-tune voice on that record is being drowned by heavy synthesizers," the starlet thinks to herself, "I just want my royalties."
With all that cash, a starlet can save enough to send herself to Public Relations School, the last bastion of respectability for all aging starlets.