Is Miley Cyrus the Next Britney
Spears?
By Martha Brockenbrough
MSN Cinemama
Barbara Walters, what
were you thinking?
Have you actually seen "Hannah Montana"? I
didn't think so. There is otherwise no explanation for
including its title character in your annual Oscars
special, which gets distinctly less "special" when you feature an
actress whose crowning achievement is putting on a blond wig and
playing a slightly disguised version of herself on the Disney
Channel.
Yes, I get that this show is wildly popular with tweens. I also
get that her 3-D movie made $29 million in its
opening weekend. That doesn't mean it's good.
Miley Cyrus herself is
perfectly adequate. She's cute and personable, and she has a pretty
good singing voice, which you'd expect from the daughter of Billy Ray Cyrus, who appears to have
traded in an achy-breaky heart and mullet for a shag, an earring and
a weekend acting seminar at his local mall. But fascinating? Only
insofar as she is the next most likely teen star to go Britney Spears on us. The
15-year-old has even ripped a page from Britney's handbook, publicly
proclaiming her virginity while dressing for a hooker convention. At
Sunday's Grammy Awards, she wore so much makeup that even the
uber-trashy gossip site of Perez Hilton said she
looked like a porn star. You don't have to be a church lady to find
this a little yucky.
Even worse than the clothes, though, is all the public talk of
virginity. It's like that dream of going to school without pants, in
real life -- totally embarrassing. Miley reportedly went to a
"purity ball" with her dad. Girls who attend these events pledge
their virginity to their fathers, which seems deeply creepy, but
maybe that's just because I read "Oedipus Rex" when I was in high
school.
The virginity shtick, which is overrated, is also pretty
insincere. Either that or it's as confused as a hot dog with
frosting. There is one point to dressing sexy: to attract sex
partners. Anyone who says otherwise is in a losing argument with
Mother Nature.
Still, Miley is certainly not the first preteen idol to have
seized the attention of young girls by using shiny objects. That
doesn't make her rise to superstardom any less discouraging, though.
Let's face it: Teen idols more often than not pay a huge price for
their young fame. Spears and Lindsay Lohan are hardly
the first to crash and burn. With the notable exception of Donny Osmond, almost every
teen idol from my youth ended up in serious trouble. Could those
purple socks have possessed magical protective powers? Quick,
someone send a pair to Miley.
I was clicking around an online auction site a few days ago when
I came across a vintage Teen magazine that would be funny if it
weren't so sad. On its cover are Andy Gibb, Leif Garrett, Kristy McNichol and Scott Baio. How did they
fare? Gibb is dead, Garrett has a criminal record, McNichol has
struggled with mental illness, and Baio, well, he dated Pamela Anderson. (Only
his turn as Bob Loblaw on "Arrested Development"
redeems him. It takes quite an actor to say "Bob Loblaw's law
blog.")
So, when we know the glitzy teens our children idolize are likely
to end up in jail, in rehab or in the grave, why on earth do we go
to such lengths to make sure they get to watch their "Hannah
Montana"? Several newspapers quoted parents who actually let their
kids skip school to watch the movie. Other parents have filed a
class-action lawsuit alleging that Miley's fan club didn't give them
the extra access they needed to get their kids concert tickets.
Parents: Here's a news flash. Your kids should not skip school to
see the "Hannah Montana" movie, unless it is one of your goals to
teach your kids that they can blow off an important obligation to
indulge a petty whim. It might be OK to skip school to see a truly
world-class artist perform, or to see a movie that somehow relates
to something going on in the classroom, bringing learning to life.
Miley Cyrus is neither. She might be someday, but today she is a
chicken nugget of a performer. If you ever want your kids to develop
taste, you won't let them gorge themselves on nuggets -- even if all
the other kids are doing it and your kids swear they'll never eat
again if you don't give them what they want.
These teen idols, besides charging $30 for fan-club membership,
are doing one thing: They're making our teens and preteens idle.
Instead of watching quality movies, reading good books and learning
to sing and play instruments on their own, our kids are indulging in
the fantasy that their idols are sitting just across the family
room. Really, these young stars are sitting on huge piles of money
that would be better invested in college savings funds, and
squandering irreplaceable time that could be better spent on
something smart or, at the very least, on quality entertainment.
It's a safe bet that as long as masses of young kids tune in to
mediocre shows like "Hannah Montana," media companies will continue
to make them. So it's up to us parents to turn off the TV and give
our kids something better.
There might even be a side benefit for all those would-be teen
idols: time away from the spotlight until they have the maturity to
handle its pressures. Because the only thing sadder than seeing
a teenager all sexed up is seeing that same girl 10 years later, all
washed up -- sitting in front of Walters weeping about how it all
went wrong.
---
Martha Brockenbrough is author of "It Could Happen to You:
Diary of a Pregnancy and Beyond." She's also founder of SPOGG, the
Society for the Promotion of Good Grammar. She writes a
fun-with-kids column for Cranium.com, as well as an educational
humor column for Encarta. Check out her Web site.
Sound off: Is Miley the next Britney?
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