Smile, please, Madge!

After my little moan on Monday about Lindsay Lohan, this little article in today's Times amused me greatly:

"A pensioner who found what he thought was a photograph of Marilyn Monroe posing nude as a hitchhiker – and was told by an expert on the star that it seemed authentic – has learnt that it was an image of the pop singer Madonna."

So Madonna posed for nude photos, pretending to be a hitchiker? Oooookay, the problems of this little nugget of information are too vast to go into properly now.

Why is it these days that to become really famous - and I mean, really famous - there has to be some sort of scandal surrounding an artist? Then the focus isn't on their work any more, but on them. I think that must have been the problem with Marilyn, the studios were too focussed on her, not on her abiltiies as an actress. I guess this problem has been around for a very long time, though possibly interesting to see it had the opposite effect at the time for Fatty Arbuckle.

But look at Amy Winehouse. She has unfortunately become a classic example. She's a brilliant artist, very gifted songwriter, unique and original in a music world largely dominated these days by computors. Yet she didn't get to be really famous until her drug habit came to the front pages. Nothing to do with her music. Same with Britney; though, honestly, her music has pretty much gone down hill. It would also explain why Cheryl Cole is probably the most famous member of Girls Aloud, with the trials and tribulations of being married to Ashley.

The death knell of this, the absolute bottom, would be if people remember Sir Paul McCartney more for the messy divorce he's currently going through, and not for his years and years of brilliant, brilliant music. Then, I say, we're all doomed.

Laters.