Fame in the 20th Century

Genre

documentary film

Country

United Kingdom

Elsewhere

IMDb

How it feels

A BBC documentary series that surveys how fame evolved over the 20th century, decade by decade. Clive James presents profiles of notable figures and offers witty commentary on the nature of celebrity.

educationalwrythoughtfulreflectiveinformativeobservationalnostalgicanecdotal

What happens

Fame in the 20th Century is a 1993 BBC documentary television series and book by Clive James. The book and series examined the phenomenon of fame and how it expanded to international mass media proportions throughout the 20th century. The series first aired starting in January 1993, with 8 episodes divided in roughly 8 decades, from the 1900s to the 1980s. Each episode highlighted world-famous people during that part of the century. James delivered interesting and amusing comments about the portrayed celebrities and the various ways they became famous. In the United States, the series were broadcast on PBS and in Australia on ABC, though some footage was occasionally cut if the rights to it were too expensive. The series has never been repeated on television since, which James attributes to the fact that "every inch of footage in the gigantic compilation belonged to some agency legally equipped to charge the Earth." He further points out that the book contains "the text almost exactly as I read it out on screen... but I took care even at the time to write it as if it might have to survive on its own." (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

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