Fame Junkies – Volume 11: Having Your Own Celeb BFF

He just makes you feel so very comfortable.

She just brightens your day with her smile.

Do you ever have the uncanny feeling that Tom Hanks or Julia Roberts is an actual friend of yours? This is no coincidence. For years, Hollywood producers have looked for actors that have "best friend" appeal to star in their movies. Consider the case of Tom Cruise.

In my youth, I can remember watching the movie Risky Business and thinking offhandedly that Joel Goodsen, the character played by Tom Cruise, would be a great friend to have. According to the movie’s producer, Steve Tisch, this inspired feeling was no coincidence.

Tisch, a tall man with a strong sailor’s jaw and closely cropped graying hair was about to share some secrets of the trade with me. During his many years in Hollywood, he’s earned a reputation as successful producer of movies such as: Forrest Gump, Snatch, American History X and Risky Business.

Perhaps more than anything else, however, Tisch is known as the producer who ‘discovered’ mega-celeb Tom Cruise.

As Tisch recalls it, he and his partner Jon Avnet had spent months looking for the perfect actor to play the lead in the movie Risky Business. One day Tom Cruise walked into his office--and almost instantly, Tisch knew that he had found his actor. Tisch insists that the secret to Cruise’s magnetic appeal is the fact that, on top of being a heartthrob, he is almost universally ‘likeable.'

"Unlike many other talented actors who have emerged over the last twenty years, Tom Cruise will get the girl in the audience; but he will also get the husband or the boyfriend, because they want to be his pal. The girls love him; but the guys aren’t threatened by him. That’s key. Cruise is cool--but not so cool that he would ignore you. He is endearing, charismatic, warm and funny, without ever being threatening. You would let this guy drive your girlfriend home after school. What it comes down to is that this is a guy who you’d want to bring home and introduce as your new best friend."

What’s really interesting is that the "celebrity best friend effect" may be enhanced or intensified when we--the viewers--are feeling lonely or alienated. Indeed, a recent study by professor Jean Twenge at San Diego State University suggests that we use celebrities as a coping mechanism when we can’t or don’t expect to connect with others.

In Twenge’s study, a group of college students was given a personality test. Unbeknownst to the students, Professor Twenge never actually used the test results to determine ‘what’ student was ‘which’ personality type. Instead, she and her colleagues then randomly divided the college students into two basic groups. The first group, which was called the "Future Belonging" group, was told that their personality tests foretold a future with a strong network of friends and loved ones. The second group, which was called the "Future Alone" group, was essentially told to expect a life of loneliness and isolation.

After receiving this mixed bag of news, all of the student subjects were given a choice: They could either spend the next few minutes filling-out a health questionnaire to then, right afterwards, receive valuable feedback about their physical health--or they could simply read People magazine or Entertainment Weekly. Overall, the members of the "Future Alone" group were more than twice as likely to choose the celebrity magazine option than did the "Future Belonging" group. So, although one would be inclined to think that the "Future Alone" students would be intimidated by the predicted ‘reality’ of being unaided later in life--and would thus choose an option where they’d benefit from knowledge about their physical health, they chose otherwise.


In this and other related experiments, Twenge concluded that our relationship with celebrities, like our relationships with family members, offers us a special coping mechanism to ward off feelings of loneliness and aggression. According to her, this possibility really became clear to her when, in another study, she asked her subjects to write an essay on their favorite celebrities. Time and again she was struck by the warm, personal tone of these essays.

Based on both Twenge’s and Tisch’s information, it became quite clear that celebrities help fill the gap of a much-needed comfort zone, generally provided to us by good friends, who will ‘always be there’--and upon whom we can depend. The celebrity needs to feel as if they’re within our reach.

From the expressive essays Twenge received from her subjects, she ultimately concluded, "It didn’t sound like they were talking about celebrities," she told me. "It sounded like they were talking about their best friends from the third grade."

Twenge’s observation struck me as quite funny because I was actually eight years old when Risky Business debuted. So, in a manner of speaking, I suppose Tom and I have been best friends since the third grade.

This was adapted from the new book, Fame Junkies. Read the hot, page-turning exposé that everyone in Hollywood is talking about! Purchase a copy of FAME JUNKIES for a discounted price on Buy.com right now.