Rewriting the stars: Surface tensions and gender troubles in the online media production of digital deepfakes

This article examines a cross-section of viral Deepfake videos that utilise the recognisable physiognomies of Hollywood film stars to exhibit the representative possibilities of Deepfakes as a sophisticated technology of illusion. Created by a number of online video artists, these convincing ‘mash-ups’ playfully rewrite film history by retrofitting canonical cinema with new star performers, from Jim Carrey in The Shining (Stanley Kubrick, 1980) to Tom Cruise in American Psycho (Mary Harron, 2000). The particular remixing of stardom in these videos can – as this article contends – be situated within the technological imaginary of ‘take two’ cinephilia, and the ‘technological performativity of digitally remastered sounds and images’ in an era of ‘the download, the file swap, [and] the sampling’ (Elsaesser 2005: 36–40). However, these ‘take two’ Deepfake cyberstars further aestheticize an entertaining surface tension between coherency and discontinuity, and in their modularity function as ‘puzzling’ cryptograms written increasingly in digital code. Fully representing the star-as-rhetorical digital asset, Deepfakes therefore make strange contemporary Hollywood’s many digitally mediated performances, while the reskinning of (cisgender white male) stars sharpens the ontology of gender as it is understood through discourses of performativity (Butler 1990; 2004). By identifying Deepfakes as a ‘take two’ undoing, this article frames their implications for the cultural politics of identity; Hollywood discourses of hegemonic masculinity; overlaps with non-normative subjectivities, ‘body narratives’ and ‘second skins’ (Prosser 1998); and how star-centred Deepfakes engage gender itself as a socio-techno phenomenon of fakery that is produced – and reproduced – over time.

Identifying Blind Spots in Leadership Development

A plethora of market available 360-degree assessment tools add value to the work of organizational leadership and management professionals. This chapter examines 360-degree assessments in terms of leadership development, training, and coaching. Multi-rater assessment use is reviewed in the context of emotional intelligence competencies. Leadership development is enhanced when benchmarks are established for leaders in the area of emotional intelligence. Organizations can identify keys to leader development by recognizing specific competencies in “star performers” (high performers). Self-report assessment instruments are generally useful in identifying key leadership competencies, but are limited by an individual's self-awareness. 360-degree multi-rater assessments enhance and support the recognition of these specific competencies but more so serve to identify blind spots or gaps in competency areas. Any divergence is often between a leader's self-reporting and observations gleaned from a 360-degree perspective by peers, subordinates, managers, family members, friends, and others.

Performance of Agriculture in Gujarat

There have always been large disparities in India’s agricultural performance at the state level because of varying resource endowments and levels of investment in the creation of rural infrastructure. States like Punjab and Haryana performed well in the 1960s and 1970s, while Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh have been star performers during the post-2000 period.

Clara Schumann and Jenny Lind in 1850

Clara Schumann’s 1850 tour of northern Germany with her husband officially ended with a successful concert in Altona where Jenny Lind made a surprise appearance. Immediately thereafter, one more concert featuring the pianist, singer, and Robert’s music was added at the last minute to take place in Hamburg. This too was a success. But a detail that made it especially memorable was Lind’s position behind the piano lid so that, as Clara recounted in her diary, many audience members could hardly catch a glimpse of her. This paper explores the rationales and implications of this singular and fleeting moment, and teases out aspects of the two star performers’ relationship both on and off the stage. In the process, the paper draws attention to hitherto neglected variables in the performance practice of Lieder and seeks to expand our lines of inquiry with regards to the 19th-century Lied as cultural practice.

A Dive and a Dance with Kabuki Vaudeville: Taishū Engeki Comes Back!

Taishū engeki occupies a niche in Japanese popular theatre between the all-male troupes of state-subsidized Kabuki and the highly commercial, all-female troupes of the Takarazuka Revue. Its origins are disputed: while some scholars trace it back to the thirteenth century, others say it is mostly a post-war phenomenon. Family-based, itinerant troupes comprising both sexes book theatres for a month at a time. They live in the theatre, sleeping onstage or in the house. They perform twice daily for largely working-class audiences. Tickets are cheap, but troupes supplement their box office with merchandise sales and with generous tips which patrons deliver in mid-performance. The form draws heavily on onnagata performance in Kabuki, less heavily on the otokoyaku (women in men’s roles) of the Takarazuka Revue. In taishū engeki, however, actors of both sexes often cross-dress with star performers appearing en homme and en femme in quick succession. Like vaudeville, whose demise was repeatedly announced in the early decades of the last century, taishū engeki has often been pronounced dead. Yet despite its notorious geriatric core audience, there are signs that taishū engeki is coming back. Robert Schneider is an Associate Professor of Theatre and Dance at Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, Illinois. He is also a playwright and translator whose articles and reviews have appeared in the New York Times, American Theatre, and Plays International & Europe. Nathan Schneider is a writer and translator who lives in Tokyo.

Conclusion

The conclusion draws together ideas from the book, suggesting a few key points. First, it draws attention to the cultural agency of ‘exemplars’, or what folklorists have sometimes called ‘star performers’. Singers and storytellers like Henri Vidal, Marie Bouzats, or Catherine Gentes are not just important because they were typical, but because they played leading roles in local cultures. The conclusion argues that such exemplars allow historians to perceive changing cultures of the body which cannot be reduced to the simple advent of a ‘modern’ body. The example of the moorlands of Gascony suggests broader patterns in the history of the body during the period of modernization.