Towards an industrial history of celebrity gossip:The National Enquirer, People Magazineand ‘personality journalism’ in the 1970s

Abstract

In ‘Approaching celebrity studies’, published in the inaugural edition of this journal, Graeme Turner underscores the fact that celebrity, apart from being approached as a form of representation, discourse and cultural formation, ‘needs to be understood and studied as an industry’. Working within this paradigm, this article works towards a production history of that industry, examining the development, production and discourse surrounding two essential celebrity-based publications of the 1970s: The National Enquirer and People Magazine. The author argues for The National Enquirer and People Magazine as symptomatic of the 1970s trend towards ‘personality journalism’, while emphasising the specific ways in which the success of both publications may be traced to the reconciliation of two types of publication – the scandal rag and the fan magazine – that had ceased to attract large readerships. With innovations in form, content, mode of production and distribution, People Magazine and The National Enquirer effectively re-framed the foundation upon which the celebrity gossip industry as we recognise it today has been built. The rise of both publications prompted cries bemoaning the demise of the fourth estate, underscoring anxieties concerning the ‘tabloidisation’ and ‘celebrification’ of society that continue to the present day. Ultimately, this paper aims to historicise and contextualise both the success and the anxiety surrounding People Magazine and The National Enquirer, filling in the scholastic blanks in our understandings of celebrity in the 1970s.

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