Celebrity-In-Chief: How Show Business Took Over the White House

Author: Alan Schroeder
Publisher: Westview Press
Publication Date: 2004-02-01
Features: U.S. PRESIDENTS AND HOLLYWOOD have had a mutual admiration society that extends far back into history. In Celebrity-in-Chief, journalist Alan Schroeder contends that each camp influenced the other—particularly over the past century—creating a president who no longer understands a part upon a remote civic pedestal, isolated from Hollywood and popular culture. Instead, the powerful forces of the American celebrity circus drag him into the tent and ask him to put on a show. The job of president has always been politically demanding, but now there is another requirement: to exude star quality. In the parlance of Hollywood, he must “fill the frame.” Drawing upon a wealth of fascinating anecdotes about some of the most celebrated individuals in American history, Schroeder shows how successive presidents since Woodrow Wilson have put on a show with mixed results. Whether it was Bill Clinton playing sax on TV talk shows or George W. Bush's Top Gun stunt aboard an aircraft carrier, Celebrity-in-Chief entertainingly convinces us that the result is a whole sale and mystification of the office—and that this marriage of pop culture and the presidency will continue to fascinate and endure.