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Arts
Wednesday, November 11, 2015 — 5A
TV NOTEBOOK
Jon Stewart to HBO,
‘Star Trek’ to CBS
By ALEX INTNER
Daily Arts Writer
Last week, two deals were
announced within 24 hours that
each can shift the online stream-
ing landscape. The first involves
a new “Star Trek” series that
will air on CBS’s streaming ser-
vice, CBS All Access. The second
announced that Jon Stewart will
bring his breaking news com-
mentary to HBO Go and HBO
Now. If these deals reach their
maximum potential, they will
allow each service to establish
itself as an original content pro-
vider, though each will face stiff
challenges in the process.
CBS is trying to send the mes-
sage that it’s ready to stand with
the likes of Netflix, Amazon
Prime and Hulu Plus with its
“Star Trek” deal. The series will
be executive produced by Alex
Kurtzman, who co-wrote the last
two movies of the franchise, and
will premiere in January 2017
on CBS All Access after airing
a “special preview episode” on
CBS. The “Star Trek” franchise
is one of the largest in the CBS
library, with six television series
and a gigantic fanbase. So it’s a
logical place for CBS to go to try
to push viewers to its stream-
ing service. Also, this isn’t the
first time that a Star Trek series
kicked off a new platform. Back
in 1995 when Paramount was
looking for something to support
the new network UPN, they cre-
ated “Star Trek: Voyager,” which
aided the fledgling network by
earning a high viewership during
its first season.
The Trek deal is the largest
splash for a streaming content
provider since the initial two-
season, $100 million pickup of
“House of Cards” by Netflix in
2011. But Netflix had more to
build on than CBS All Access.
Les Moonves, the head of CBS,
has refused to say how many are
currently subscribing to the $5.99
per month site, only suggesting
that the number is greater than
the 100,000 that currently sub-
scribe to Dish Network’s Sling
service. At the time of the “Cards”
announcement, Netflix had 20
million subscribers. CBS is likely
working from a smaller base than
Netflix, so it will be more difficult
to make the Trek show a success.
However, CBS will be using
their linear audience, which is
still the highest of any of the
broadcast
networks.
It
will
include a season’s worth of NFL
promotions to try to push view-
ers to their preview showing. The
key will be making a high-quality
episode of television with a cliff-
hanger that will help the shove.
As for Jon Stewart’s HBO
deal, the details are slim. But we
do know Stewart signed a four-
year deal with HBO that covers
new short-form digital content
for HBO Now and Go, as well
as a first-look deal for any film
or television projects Stewart
might produce during this time
span. Stewart, who left “The
Daily Show” earlier this year,
has the opportunity to make
new content multiple times per
day, all of which will be upload-
ed as they’re ready.
In his former role, Stewart was
one of the preeminent names in
news, doing 22 minutes of com-
mentary and comedy four times
a week. This appears to be a part
of a larger push by HBO to enter
the news commentary arena,
which started with “Last Week
Tonight” and will continue with
an upcoming nightly newscast
from VICE. The key difference
between HBO’s prior news proj-
ects and Stewart’s videos are
that Stewart’s will be exclusively
online, on the subscriber-only
streaming sites. Given the suc-
cess that Oliver has enjoyed in
his time at HBO, it’s only natu-
ral that his mentor, Stewart, will
have a similar level of triumph
creatively. Still, the big question
is whether Stewart is enough of
a name to guide people to HBO’s
online presence. HBO is probably
shelling out a great deal of money
to Stewart for this deal, and they
need the viewership to make it
worthwhile.
Ultimately,
the
subscriber
numbers will decide whether or
not these deals will be valuable
to the networks. HBO has a sub-
scriber base that will make it eas-
ier for them than CBS, but CBS
has the NFL as a launching pad,
which is larger than anything
HBO has. However, if both deals
bring the ideal number of view-
ers, they will open up both CBS
All Access and HBO Now and Go
as original programmers in the
online space.
COMEDY CENTRAL
MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN.
Social media
celebrity stuns fans
with departure
By HAILEY MIDDLEBROOK
Daily Arts Writer
First, a picture: Tall and blond,
tan skin framed in a backless white
dress, hands scrunching perfect
beach hair. She’s laughing — her
profile crinkling — while her toes,
curled on the edge of a dock, point
out to the shimmery water.
We, the Instagram stalkers,
soak it in, and try to replicate
it. We change out of sweats and
into season-appropriate casu-
al wear (i.e. what we weren’t
casually wearing before), find
an inspiring (yet still natural)
backdrop for our spontaneous
adventure. We copy the angle of
the camera, capturing our own
curved silhouettes and side-
grins; we hook a finger strategi-
cally behind our ear, taming an
imaginary lock of hair. We wait
until dusk for the perfect light
and the “prime time” to post on
Instagram (roughly 7 to 9 p.m.,
according to my 18-year-old sis-
ter). We laugh 100 times. We get
super annoyed that we still don’t
look candid enough.
And we wish our lives were as
cool as Essena O’Neill’s.
Over the past four years,
O’Neill, a 19-year-old from the
Sunshine Coast of Australia, has
become a social media celebrity
— followed by half a million on
Instagram, nearly 250,000 on her
YouTube channel. On her IMG
modeling profile, O’Neill claims
to be “committed to inspiring
young women to love their bodies
and to make good lifestyle choic-
es.” Her Instagram feed proves it:
she laughs on the beach, makes
açai breakfast bowls, unwinds
with yoga. On YouTube, she
reveals beauty tips and vegan
recipes, giving followers insight
to her perfectly zen, perfectly
candid life in the sun.
So when O’Neill changed her
Instagram name to “Social Media
Is Not Real Life” last week, the
Internet blew up. Without warn-
ing, she re-captioned her photos
— the ones hundreds of thou-
sands of us had pinned as “goals”
— to tell the real story behind
them. For the photo of her in the
backless white dress, she wrote:
“NOT REAL LIFE — I didn’t
pay for the dress, took countless
photos trying to look hot for Ins-
tagram, the formal made me feel
incredibly alone.” She revealed
the
advertising
deals
made
covertly, writing on another,
“Was paid $400 to post a dress.”
She said that with her number of
followers, online brands now pay
up to $2,000 per Instagram.
Promotional
photos
aside,
the real shock was the inten-
tion behind O’Neill’s personal
pictures. Because when there
wasn’t a brand — just a natural,
laughing picture of O’Neill — we
felt connected, like we were in
on her secret. But what social
media users don’t see (or choose
to ignore) is what’s really being
sold: not a brand, but the Insta-
grammer (or blogger, YouTuber,
etc.) herself.
O’Neill
uncovered
pictures
of herself on the beach, writing,
“Nothing is candid.” On anoth-
er: “A 15-year-old that calorie
restricts and excessively exercis-
es is not goals” — a message that’s
dangerously ignored by masses of
“fitspiration” boards and blogs.
Consumed by numbers —
views, likes, followers — O’Neill
deleted her Instagram and You-
Tube, calling it quits on her
“perfect life” as we knew it. She
opened a Vimeo account, where
she recently posted a 12-min-
ute video on “Why I think social
media sucks,” in which she
demands of future social media:
“Would someone please make
something that isn’t based on
views, likes and followers?”
She continues on the video,
“If I had no likes or follows, I
thought I meant nothing.” But (as
we all know) feeling validation
from likes or views isn’t anything
new; O’Neill firmly states that she
doesn’t blame social media itself
for her unhappiness, but rather
her own addiction to it. Her aim
for Vimeo is to post three videos
a week, sharing her thoughts on
social media, body image and
what it means to live a (real)
healthy lifestyle, free from com-
ments or approval from YouTube.
Since
the
fallout,
O’Neill
has posted three more videos
to her site. Despite her youth,
despite how trivial the topic of
social media seems, they watch
strangely like a documentary:
a behind-the-scenes look at a
fallen celebrity. O’Neill is giddy
and aspirational, inviting us all
to be “game changers” by talk-
ing about ideas instead of Ins-
tagrams, reading books instead
of counting likes. She promotes
a movement for authenticity:
“Go outside, go to a park, go to a
beach, go somewhere there are
people around you.”
She ends solemnly, “You don’t
have to appreciate what I’m
doing, but I hope it feels some-
what real ... What I’m doing here
is a statement that real life isn’t
through screens.”
It’s a sweet sentiment, but
there’s something not quite right
about it. Though her makeup is
gone, her hair stuffed in a bun,
O’Neill is still blinking up from
a screen. An unsettling question
remains: Didn’t her Instagram
feel somewhat real to us as well?
NEW MEDIA NOTEBOOK
Essena O’Neill
drops Instagram
James Bond and the
endless franchise
By MADELEINE GAUDIN
Daily Arts Writer
I remember dressing up with a
cape and a wand to see the mid-
night premiere of “Harry Potter
and the Order of the Phoenix.”
I bought my ticket weeks in
advance, waited in line with 100
other wizards for spooky-themed
snacks. Most importantly, I got to
the theater early to pick the best
seat (right behind the railing so I
could put my feet up).
I was excited to see the movie
because I’d read all the books. The
evening oozed anticipation more
than surprise. I, along with every-
one else in the theater, already
knew what would happen, and
that’s exactly why we were there.
That’s the case for fans of any book
series-turned-film franchise. I’m
sure (though I don’t have any first-
hand experience) that the “Twi-
light” movies brought out just as
passionate a crowd.
However, James Bond is dif-
ferent. No one dresses up in
white tuxes and sips martinis in
the movie theater to celebrate
the next 007 addition. Although
that would be pretty suave,
James Bond is a different kind
of series, if you can even call it
that. “Harry Potter” and “The
Hunger Games” have a begin-
ning and an end. Everybody (and
I mean everybody) cries at the
end of “Harry Potter and the
Deathly Hallows” because they
know it’s over. I’m assuming no
one cried at the end of “Spectre,”
the latest episode in the adven-
tures of James Bond, even if they
thought it was the finale of 007.
An air of possibility hangs over
the ending of a Bond movie —
the possibility of another film or
another Bond somewhere in the
not-so-distant future.
This begs the question: Will
James Bond ever be over? I
don’t think so, or at least not in
my lifetime. As long as a Dan-
iel Craig look-alike (though it’s
about time for some diversity)
can throw on a tux and shoot a
gun, there will be more movies.
And that’s interesting, seeing
as James Bond was originally
a book series. It would, there-
fore, make sense to have a set
beginning and end. But the sto-
ryline has spiraled off from the
novels completely, drawing on
elements from all the books in
each film rather than following
their plots exactly.
Bond is a bit like Sherlock
Holmes in the way the stories,
both stemming from books,
are malleable — actors, time
periods
and
plotlines
can
be adjusted to fit popular
demand. In the past 10 years,
both Robert Downey Jr. and
Benedict
Cumberbatch
have
played Sherlock, the former in
a ho-hum film adaptation and
the latter in a brilliant BBC TV
series. Bond has been played by
seven men, ranging from the
mediocre Pierce Brosnan to the
classic Sean Connery. Anyone
can play Bond or Sherlock, in a
way that doesn’t exist in other
series. Only Daniel Radcliffe
can play Harry Potter (and
that’s a fact). But, like Sherlock,
Bond can embody different
representations; many different
actors (who all look eerily
similar) can take on the role.
Maybe Bond films are just
too profitable to give up on.
The 2012 installment “Skyfall”
made
over
$1,000,000,000.
That’s not too surprising, con-
sidering these films are full of
everything the public loves:
sex, guns and unnecessary
explosions. Bond lives adjacent
to Marvel Comics’ superheroes
(another series of sorts that will
never die) and down the street
from more sophisticated spy
thrillers, making the franchise
a unique blend of artistry and
mass market appeal.
Maybe one day our hero will
meet his fateful end, but perhaps
the allure of sex, guns and fast
cars is just too good to pass up.
20TH CENTURY FOX
Where are the shirtless Instagram pics?
FILM NOTEBOOK