The Curse of Celebrity: Sod off but take my picture first

When I was a young fish, there was a shop on every corner; one little shop closed down but became a local place of worship. In the window, on the shelf, lay a mouse. It had died (mythically after the last piece of cheddar was sold) and began to decompose. Every day, on the way to school, we would visit this shrine to observe the biological process, until weeks later it had, through some mousy metamorphosis, transformed into skeletal form. It did not aspire to greatness: it had no discernible talent but, for a time, it became the focus of our world as it slowly and publicly disintegrated.

I was reminded of this whilst discussing the prevalence of our celebrity culture. The recent events in the car crash lifestyle of Kerry Katona is a case in point. She has, apparently, been voted celebrity ‘mum of the year’. I do not recall swimming to the polling station for this election, pondering whether to place an ‘X’ next to such luminaries as Jordan (a former winner), Rose West, Britney ‘Who needs a child seat?’ Spears, Jade ‘my IQ hurts’ Goody, or Kate McCann. If this seems harsh, consider this: if celebs lived on a council estate, how long would it take Social Services to intervene?

Kerry Katona was apparently, a member of Atomic Kitten (managed, incidentally by Andy McCluskey of OMD, writer of yesterday’s chosen song, Enola Gay: who says there is no coherence to these posts?). I’m not sure if she had a nickname like the Spice Girls had: Common Kitten?

She is the face of Iceland Frozen Foods, although Bjork’s face of Iceland would be less frightening: Scary Kitten, perhaps?

She actually won the award twice! This mother, with a slight cocaine addiction, and hectic social life. A mother that had no contact with her children, following a recent burglary at her home. The celebs’ first action in such traumatic times is to contact Max Clifford and book into rehab clinic, The Priory. I think all celebs should have to go a real priory, where they have to take and maintain an oath of silence.

Katona did the same again this week when she seemed to have split from her husband after he allegedly preferred his chicken less frozen. Again, the man to go to for a shoulder to cry on and negotiate a magazine deal is Clifford. He’s obviously superb at his job, but why does he pop up on TV whenever someone has a story to sell or tell?

Surely, this has nothing to do with:
Kate Moss ending her relationship with Pete Doherty (yet again).
Jordan having a baby and writing another novel (yeh, right).
US celebs spending time in jail and reaping further lucrative publicity.
The impending custody battle with ex husband, Brian McFadden.


Today’s burning issue: If Roly Mo from The Fimbles has his own show, should Rocket The Frog change his agent to Max Clifford?

UPDATE

After I wrote the above, some newspapers were reporting that KK had reconciled with whatever-his-name-is. No word on Rocket yet though.