Greetings from the suspiciously balmy Nutmeg State!<\/p>\n
On Christmas, my dad, sister and I were watching The Dark Knight<\/i>. I was playing with my phone during this blessed event, and decided to do some research on who the next Batman movie villain(s) would be. According to various bloggers, Johnny Depp and Eddie Murphy are both being considered for The Riddler, and Philip Seymour Hoffman will be asked to play The Penguin. Someone also mentioned Angelina Jolie as Cat Woman, meow, and one very eager lad is pushing Guy Pierce as The Black Mask<\/a> on account of his – Pierce’s, not B. Mask’s, though who knows – history with director Christopher Nolan. <\/p>\n At what point do these things become self-fulfilling prophecies? That is, in 2008, how powerful is would-be, or potential will-be, audience participation? I’m not going to pretend I know anything about Hollywood beyond what Entourage<\/i> teaches us, but one presumes casting directors, or at least interns in casting departments, read these blogs and are consequently aware of the casting buzz, true or completely false. And if casting teams learn from blog entries, blog comments and online discussion forums that there is an existing fan base for a certain casting choice, does that affect their decisions, even in the slightest? If Guy Pierce is cast in the next Batman movie, producers know x number of people who believe they are responsible for the decision are guaranteed to go see the movie. That’s worth something. Similarly, might a studio “leak” a few casting options and see how the blog-o-sphere reacts before making a final decision? I have no idea, but wouldn’t be surprised if that happened all the time.<\/p>\n There was a ridiculously interesting Jane Meyer New Yorker <\/i>article<\/a> in October about Sarah Palin’s rise to, let’s say “fame”, in which Meyer describes how Adam Brickley<\/a>, a young, “self-described ‘obsessive’ political junkie” started searching for potential female Republican VP candidates:<\/p>\n He was running out of options, he recalled, when Brickley registered
\nhe said to himself, “What about that lady who just got elected in
\nAlaska?” Online research revealed that she had a strong grassroots
\nfollowing; as Brickley put it, “I hate to use the words ‘cult of
\npersonality,’ but she reminded me of Obama.”<\/p>\n
\na Web site–palinforvp.blogspot.com<\/a>–which began getting attention in the
\nconservative blogosphere. In the month before Palin was picked by
\nMcCain, Brickley said, his Web site was receiving about three thousand
\nhits a day. Support for Palin had spread from one right-of-center
\nInternet site to the next. First, the popular conservative blogger
\nInstaPundit mentioned Brickley’s campaign. Then a site called the
\nAmerican Scene said that Palin was “very appealing”; another, Stop the
\nA.C.L.U., described her as “a great choice.” The traditional
\nconservative media soon got in on the act: The American Spectator<\/i> embraced Palin, and Rush Limbaugh, the radio host, praised her as “a babe.”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n