Taking Care of Masculinity

From the November Zeitgeist…

If the absurd film 300 is anything to go by, men have been shaving their chests and enjoyed taking part in vaguely homoerotic activities for some time. They also seem to have spoken loudly, decisively and dramatically about all manner of things, no matter their import. How different is the man of today? Does he still shave his chest and communicate with declarative statements to no one in particular? Does he need to be reassured by campaign’s such as Ogilvy’s recent entry for Dove that debuted at the SuperBowl?

In the US, Unilever is currently trying to convince men to use a body lotion. After a quick 15-minute workout in which former NFL player Michael Strahan demonstrates working out in a hotel room before smothering Vaseline body lotion over himself; “It takes just 15 seconds for stronger, more resilient skin.” The point is not to convey effeminate qualities in what until now, has clearly been a female-driven domain, but rather to show that a cream can be related to high performance for demanding men. Vaseline research showed that 17% of men “used body lotion at least once a week”, which is more than might have been guessed.

So, while one marketing tone of voice tells us to take care of ourselves in increasingly unexpected ways, another, Maxim, pushes us toward a different direction; “Using too many products makes you a girl”, the magazine dictates. It remains to be seen how playing on tenets of performance and durability will affect sales of products of these kinds in the long-term. The New York Times article on the subject also mentions that Niveaʼs idea of putting their body lotion in the menʼs aisle was not a successful one.

There seems to be no apparent cachet for such a placement. Is this because women do the shop for men and donʼt venture to the menʼs aisle, or is it because men feel comfortable borrowing the products of their partner confident that it works just as well on his skin as hers? Or maybe men donʼt think or want to think about such beauty products in the retail environment. In Paris and Rome, it would be hard for a man to escape a kiss from a male colleague when greeted. For most men in the UK, however, the act ranks somewhere alongside the activities of Caligula.

Reuters however recently reported on an increasingly prevalent inclination in UK men in their teens and early 20s to end texts to each other with a kiss. 75% “regularly [end] texts with a kiss and 48% admitting the practice had become commonplace amongst their group of friends”. Is the prudish, self-aware man becoming more emotive? Ironically it is only in a non-verbal way, for the moment. If a man can be more open with his feelings, he might be more willing to confess his use of cosmetic products, removing any notion of taboo about the subject. If people feel more comfortable discussing such things in the virtual world, social networks would appear to be a convenient place for network effects to take hold…

Making the Oscars more relevant

Are the Oscars as outdated as wearing your hat to work?

Last month, AMPAS celebrated a year of achievements in film, for the 87th time. In a recent article, the Financial Times lambasted the film industry for its overwhelming focus on high-risk, high-reward blockbusters and the death of middle-budget studio films, the likes of which were often lauded by the Academy. Viewing figures for the show in 2015 were the lowest in six years (though, let’s keep things in perspective, it was never watched by a billion people). In a guest post, M.K. Leibman looks at what’s going wrong with a format that has often been criticised as outmoded, if not inappropriate. M.K. is a native New Yorker with experience in film production. She hosts a popular blog where she often critiques film industry practice.

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It’s been a couple of weeks since The Academy Awards. Everyone’s think pieces have already been written, the internet has had its say and Hollywood has already returned to work on this years slate of new releases. It’s back to business as usual. Disappointed with the 18% decline in ratings, the industry assures us that “next year will be better”.

Others like Variety remain less convinced that will be the case.

In it’s incredibly popular piece, Variety stepped up the tone warning that things are unlikely to improve with the Oscars unless several changes are implemented. In its article, Variety noted six changes which should be implemented, notably the inclusion of more popular films as nominees, not televising technical awards, and reducing the run-time of the broadcast.

However, I argue that they don’t go far enough, or actually get to the core of what’s wrong with The Academy Awards. Looking at over 150 comments underneath the article, you could get a feel for what people actually thought was wrong with the ceremony, and it wasn’t giving stage time to the sound editor. The general consensus is: The Oscars just aren’t relevant any more to the average American.

Of course the Academy isn’t just going to throw up their hands and close up shop at this revelation. There needs to be massive changes implemented at all levels of the broadcast in order to sustain its future.

The first decision The Academy should make is to not re-hire show producers Craig Zadan and Neil Merron. They’ve had a run of three years and the show has failed to see a big boost in ratings. It’s not to say these two gentlemen aren’t very talented producers. However, to effectively implement change means to start those changes at the top in order to bring the show in a new direction.

Under the tutelage of Merron and Zadan, the Oscars have struggled to define their tone. In their first year as producers, they made a bold move and picked comedian Seth McFarlane to host the show. His performance drew ire from the older Academy voters and Hollywood for unorthodox jokes, while thoroughly pleasing the younger demographic. The next year they decided to change course drastically to compensate for offending many, hiring the lovable comic Ellen DeGeneres. After McFarlane’s raunchy style, Ellen just felt too clean and safe. While the broadcast was widely watched, the biggest moment felt like a corporate gimmick: a Samsung-sponsored selfie became the most re-tweeted image on Twitter of all time. Neil Patrick Harris was the producing duos most recent choice. He too was a very safe choice, and failed to leave his mark on the show – even feeling awkward at times with the written material he was given to present, such as the joke mocking the broadcasts lack of diversity.

The one common tone these hosts and their shows all share is that the modern Oscars also feel more like a Broadway musical than a celebration of film.

While some may like this Vaudevillian style, most people on social media and in the Variety comments section seemed tired of these long drawn out musical numbers. Several recent hosts have made the musical a centerpiece of their show, including McFarlane with the asinine “show me your boobs.” The Oscars isn’t a Broadway musical, it is a show that ought to celebrate film – not dance around to silly songs, or theme songs from movies made 50 years ago. Or worst of all, in the case of the 85th Academy Awards, to Merron’s own film Chicago in a rather transparent attempt at self promotion.

When asked about their strategy for taking over the Oscars three year ago, Neil Merron and Craig Zadan told Entertainment Weekly that they needed to both shorten the show while increasing the number of performances; an arguably impossible task. They decided to reduce the stage time for technical awards, seating them closer in order to reduce the walk-time to the stage for acceptance of awards (a total of 40 seconds). They reason this frees up more time for musicals and other in-between performances which in turn allegedly attracts more talent to want to attend the broadcast live. Unfortunately, this has failed to decrease the run time and this year’s ceremony nearly approached the four hour mark.

They need to cut out more of the musicals and, like the BAFTAs, eliminate the televised acceptance of technical awards. They need to do this no matter how loudly those technical trades collectively complain about it. By eliminating technical awards, the BAFTAs run on average an hour shorter than the Oscars. This may be a hard pill to swallow for some, but people just don’t have 3.5 hours to devote to an awards broadcast on a Sunday night.

Once we cut out all of the musical numbers and technical awards, what could they be replaced with?

For starters, hosts that can actually captivate an audience without song and dance and poorly-scripted spectacle. None of these hosts were the sort of folks that could get a family to want to sit in front to the TV together to watch. When you think of some of the more successful Oscars hosts throughout history, they were comedians who could naturally work a room, loved by many generations. The current Oscars feel victim to a teleprompter mentality, a hyper-scripted event that fails to feel authentic. In trying to achieve the right tone, the Oscars could benefit from handing the hosting job to a duo like Amy Poeler and Tina Fey, whose Golden Globes hosting gig remains one of the more talked about award shows in recent memory. Some have even suggested their former SNL co-star Jimmy Fallon, but even he feels too safe a choice and slightly over-exposed given his Tonight Show gig. The host needs to be a natural comedian or comedic duo, with more choice over the written material and someone who is not overexposed that plays well with multiple key demographics.

The other part of the tone that needs to change is its pretentiousness. There is no faster way to assure irrelevancy than if you make the Oscars into a club of pretentious film buffs. There needs to be more time devoted to financially successful films that captivated general audiences during the year, and less time making fun of them. You don’t need to give an award to the superhero films, but to mock – or worse, just ignore – their existence isn’t going to improve your ratings either. Perhaps add a segment which praises some of the more financially successful films of the year, or include a performance related to those popular films.

This years ceremony felt almost like the Independent Spirit Awards, the award show that nominates the best of independent cinema. In fact several of this years big winners were also indie films honored at the Spirit Awards. Apart from the film buff niche, the American public isn’t going to see films like Birdman or The Grand Budapest Hotel. That doesn’t mean, as Variety suggests, you need to honor tentpoles with Best Picture nominations, but it’s not like the studios didn’t put out good films people enjoyed which were also award-worthy; Gone Girl was but one notable snub in that arena. People care about the Oscars more when films they care about are nominated or win. The most successful year of all time was when megahit Titanic was nominated in 1998, that year saw 55.5 million viewers versus this years 34 million.

Did the mainstream cachet of David Fincher’s Gone Girl hinder its chances at further Academy recognition?

 

The other 800 pound gorilla in the room is diversity. While not discussed in the Variety article, a highly visible Oscars boycott took social media by storm under the hashtag #OscarsSoWhite and #BoycottOscars. The tweets were in the millions, suggesting the boycott was substantial according to the number of tweets supporting it. Upset by the lack of nominations for Selma and no people of color nominated for acting awards, many decided not to watch. Even Al Sharpton called off a protest of the red carpet, hours before the show was to begin at the request of Selma director Ava DuVernay.

Before one chalks this up to being just another case of social justice sentiment on social media, there are serious long-term financial ramifications. If viewers don’t see themselves represented on screen, or at the Oscars, they’re not going to watch. As America grows more diverse, with people of color expected to become the population majority by 2050, the Oscars need to do more to include illustrate this diversity in their broadcast. Granted, a chef is only as good as his ingredients, the show’s lack of diversity isn’t helped by the product released, which this year had a paucity of strong roles for women. As Variety commented at the time,

“It’s always easier to identify a worrisome trend than to figure out its cause, much less to suggest a workable solution. We can point to the limitations of genre in the case of “American Sniper,” “The Imitation Game” and “Unbroken,” given that most biographical war movies are about the exploits, adventures and sufferings of men. Still, whatever these films’ particular shortcomings or virtues, I suspect that awards voters are too often inclined to accept them on their own grand, self-important terms, which not so subtly conflate significance with masculinity: Watch Chris Kyle and Louis Zamperini march off to war! See Alan Turing change the face of history!”

The Oscars need to find a way to appeal to young people, and people of color alike. The future of this show is not white people over 34, but the critical 18-34 demographic and minorities. This needs to be reflected not only in the broadcast’s format and demeanour, but also in the makeup of the Academy itself; 94% white, 76% men, 63 years old on average.

In order to remain relevant, the Oscars need to find a tone that can compete with people’s attention in a highly-distracting digital age. The Oscars are starting to feel too self-congratulatory, too Hollywood, despite the irony. Americans don’t feel represented by the choices the Academy makes. The musical nature of the show leaves many men out of the equation and the lack of diversity is off-putting to entire races. Yet I doubt most of these considerations will be on the table for next year’s show. I suspect another safe choice for host with a near four hour run time chock full of endless musicals, lack of diversity and self-congratulatory scripted satire which is bound to generate uncomfortable laughs – and in today’s day in age I just don’t know how much longer that format can last. When Americans don’t feel like they’re invested in the show, there are just too many other entertainment options in the present day than to have to tune in for what they know will be in the news tomorrow or on social media in seconds.

Check us out

As we celebrate our first anniversary and approach our 150th post, please join us in celebrating our 30,000th hit.

Over the past year, we’ve written on a variety of subjects. Some articles have commented on whole industries or cultural movements, some on incidents of spectacular successes or dismal failures.

We’ve written on the changing face of masculinity, and how men shop in the second decade of the 21st century. We examined why England lost it’s World Cup bid, and what the World Cup meant for the world as a whole, and the businesses that aim to profit from it.

We talked about the future of content; what it means to own something that only exists as a file on a computer, but you still have to pay for, as bookshops and videostores fade to dust and intellectual property rights evolve along an uncertain path.

How social media is used for good, for ill, for Gatorade and for Conan O’Brien.

We’ve ruminated on leadership, on how luxury justifies itself post-recession, and how antique brands like Louis Vuitton attempt to keep themselves fresh, as well as ultra-premium.

We’ve talked about how movie studios win by marketing their product, and how auction houses lost out to the pitfalls of behavioural economics.

We’ve debriefed you on our visit to the UK’s Google HQ, while waxing lyrical on Nintendo as it moves from taking on Sega to taking on Apple.  We’ve asked what it means for the future of TV when everyone has Sky+ and a broadband connection. And we’ve looked at several examples of superb brand activation.

Lastly, we’ve tried in vain to present the glory of Roger Federer.

Stick around and have a browse, we’re not going anywhere.

“If you can dream, and not make dreams your master…”

From the November Zeitgeist…

When we think of the depiction of a typical man, our mind tends to drift toward a suit, a dinner jacket, or something similarly familiar, stable and unchanging. In truth, menʼs fashion – moreover our interpretation of masculinity – is very fluid and varies wildly according to time and culture.

At the V&A museum in London currently, an exhibition on the Maharaja is a good example of just how open to interpretation are the symbols of masculinity and power. In this case, “teardrops of diamonds dangling from succulent pearls” represent the pinnacle of masculinity. The bygone days of a world that celebrated “the effervescent elegance of a male world” serve to illustrate that the definition of what makes a man manly is inherently arbitrary, and therefore malleable. In this case, power and divinity were symbolised by an extraordinary amount of jewellery that even MC Zeitgeist would have been jealous of. The New York Times review says that with the independence of India so ended an era “when the male peacock finally folded its wings”.

Did it though? Pages of editorial are still detailing the rise of the metrosexual, seemingly one of the slowest ʻrisesʼ of anything ever. While one might be inclined to think that a womanʼs ideal man as sporting some kind of ill-fitting firemanʼs ensemble, with over-developed muscles straining underneath, in truth women in the UK apparently find willingness to do housework a most attractive asset. Perhaps increasingly then, it is responsibility that takes precedence over a more base hunter-gatherer, physical appeal.

In Japan, news of Toyotaʼs withdrawal from Formula 1 and itʼs first earnings loss in fifty years caused Tadashi Yamashina to break down in tears at a public press conference, specifically apologising for the F1 teamʼs failure to win a single race in nine years. Business failure in Japan equates to personal shame for the heads of organisations, and such a display of emotion is presumably intended to illustrate a full mea culpa and to show they are affected by the decisions they make for their employees, rather than appearing stone-faced and passive. This latter description is something of a stereotype for men – oblivious to the more sensitive side of their personality – and in this case shows the public that they truly care about the institution they preside over. As The Mirror comments “if the bullet train is delayed, you will see the CEO on TV bowing as low as he can. It’s about honour and showing sincerity”. Thus, while crying may not be seen by some as sign of manliness, in this context it is a conduit for showing you are a man of principles and respect, both tenets traditionally associated with masculinity.

Perhaps in another hundred years, when the current V&A is underwater, a future exhibition will remind us that brute force and intimidation, even from beyond the grave, once represented manhood. In Russia, the tombstones of erstwhile Mafiosi stand proud and very tall; several are life size depictions of the eternal residents, gazing menacingly outwards. These grotesque images are reminders that not all markets approach the concept of masculinity in the same way.

Of Mad Men and Spider-Men

From the November Zeitgeist…

What do fictional characters and celebrity ambassadors say about the state of masculinity today? The last twenty years have arguably seen a dramatic shift in terms of representation in these fields, from a black president to a different type of action hero.

Indeed, we have gone from a period of filmic portrayals with Arnie and Stallone to a complete absence of testosterone-fuelled role models; Christian Bale toplines the Batman and Terminator franchises, Robert Downey Jr. is Iron Man and Tobey Maguire is Spider-Man*.

Does metrosexuality, a word that Microsoft Word refuses to accept as real, now rule? The term suggests a love of the arts, of music and the theatre; it also seems to suggest a narcissistic obsession with personal appearance and general aesthetic. Russell Brand would seem to epitomize the more questionable side of this relatively new sexuality. Does he epitomise the direction manhood is heading?

Mad Men has become something of a cult hit in the UK, as well as Stateside where it has a bushel full of Emmy and Golden Globe awards. The show oozes style, cool and a love of the finer things in life. It also reminds the viewer of a time when men were [seemingly] far more in control; unquestioned, dictatorial, bitter, frustrated, introverted, promiscuous, manipulative.

Women were confined to the home, save for the most perfunctory work roles. Rather than illustrate a desire for males to return to this period of dominant bliss, what this show and its niche popularity really demonstrates is a wry enjoyment of seeing this tongue-in-cheek depiction of a world that once was, or might have been. Of indulging vicariously in a world without wars in the Middle East, without energy, water and food scarcity, without climate shocks and without gaping budget deficits.

The programmeʼs tone has undeniably bled into popular culture; the rounded collars and square pockerchiefs favoured by Zeitgeist have now become very au courant, as everything from clothing to luggage to scotch glasses becomes imbued with a touch of refined minimalist – but robustly masculine – elegance. The fictional lead, Don Draper, was recently voted the most influential man of the year by AskMen, ahead of such luminaries as Obama, Clooney and even the great Roger Federer.

Cultural depictions of men have clearly evolved over the last two decades to a less overtly aggressive portrayal. Are men more comfortable without these fantastical images? Perhaps a new pragmatism has arrived, one where men are willing to accept that moisturising may be as important as teeth brushing, and one where a superhero is not a ripped Arnold Schwarzenegger but rather a weedy, more accessible Tobey Maguire.

*UPDATE: Even Maguire is deemed too much of a man now, as Sony has scrapped plans for Spider-Man 4, instead returning the series to Peter Parker’s high-school days.