Celebrity Magazines On A First Name Basis

I feel like writing something completely inconsequential on this holiday evening (in other words, I can hear many of you thinking, just like every other non-holiday evening), so here are some thoughts on celebrity magazines. By celebrity magazines, I mean “People” and its now-countless spawn crowding the newsstand display just feet away from where I buy my daily glass of iced tea in our building lobby. I don’t know all the other titles—there’s “Us,” right? And something called “In Style,” plus a couple of others. I don’t read any of them, not even in doctors’ offices. We live in such a celebrity-saturated culture, I’ve always felt you don’t have to actually “buy” or “read” these magazines to find out what the stories are; the information just sort of seeps into the air all around you, and enters your brain whether you want it to or not, like electromagnetic radiation, or Coldplay.

But apparently this system no longer works, because the headlines I see plastered all over these rags now are utterly mystifying to me. I truly don’t know who the stories are about, because the celebrities are only identified USING THEIR FIRST NAMES! The past few weeks, it’s been all Jon and Kate; Jon said this, Kate did that. On another magazine cover, it’s Kate said this, Jon did that. I have just one question: who in the hell are Jon and Kate?? And while we’re at it, I’m not quite sure who Trista and Ryan are, and there’s a young actor named Robert who seems to be on every cover. Robert? I’m not down on the whole first name thing, but you’ve got to give me more to work with than that. “Cher” I’m familiar with. Likewise, “Oprah.” But Robert? That’s my dad’s name. That’s a million people’s name.

Part of the problem is, I don’t watch any reality shows, not even in doctors’ offices, and that’s where a lot of these single-named celebs come from. I actually have done a small amount of looking into the Jon and Kate situation. Apparently they’re the parents of eight children, including sextuplets, and there’s a reality show about their family. What doesn’t make any sense is that the magazine stories, at least from the headlines on the cover, seem to be about Jon and Kate reportedly having affairs. That’s impossible. You just told me they have eight kids.

I’m vaguely aware of a Trista and Ryan who were on a reality show a few years ago, The Bachelor, or The Bachelorette. If this is the same Trista and Ryan, they’ve really stretched out their 15-minutes of fame. Usually these reality show folks show up later in the news only after they’re arrested. Reading the magazine blurbs about T & R, I haven’t seen any reference to law breaking. So hats off to them.

I’m not trying to be willfully stupid. I could find out more about these people with only one name if I wanted to, I suppose. But as Peggy Noonan said on a different topic, it’s nice having a little mystery in life. I’m sure I’ll eventually find out who Robert is. After that, I want to find out how a husband and wife with eight kids are able to have time for affairs. Maybe Jon and Kate will explain it to Oprah.