Blog 14: Draft of Eng 103 Research Paper

Michelle Tapia

Professor Luke Vasileou

ENG 103

18 November 2010

Fame 1980: Its Outlook of Reality

A dream is a vision, an image; the most cherished desire any individual can contain. Numerous people have this inspirational dream, and with a certain degree of ambition, they seek to achieve it no matter what it takes throughout their journey. Such yearning goals and purposes are rigorously based on the person’s most insightful and passionate aspirations in life. For instance, teens that are fervent and avid about artistic aspects might contain that certain admiration and complete devotedness to reach their most inner passion such as in performing arts, dance, theater, drama, and music. That’s how the American musical film Fame (1980) directed by Alan Parker marvelously fits in with this arty ideal; a group of youngsters seek to follow their dreams and audition in the New York City High School of Performing Arts hoping to get accepted. The movie’s setting, New York City, also known as the city that never sleeps, is fantastic due to the many lights, the magical Broadway theaters, delightful surroundings; but mostly because of its fervent appreciation of art. Thus, the stance Fame sought to portray toward life in the city during 1980, involving the social and economical aspect of it, is conclusively more realistic rather than unrealistic.

The film’s plot is about how students with artistic aspirations get specialized training at the New York City High School of Performing Arts which often leads them to success as actors, performers, singers, etc. Fame follows the main characters: Montgomery, Doris, Bruno, Lisa, Coco, Leroy and Ralph from the time when they audition in order to get accepted into school through graduation. It reflects each principal student’s pinpoint issues and how they struggle when attempting to accomplish their dreams. For instance, Montgomery struggles with his homosexuality causing him to feel excluded; shy Doris feels frustrated claiming that she is too ordinary in comparison with the others’ lively personalities; Bruno is reluctant to expose his music publicly and by this argues with his father; Lisa is constantly called by the teacher claiming she wasn’t trying hard enough in her dancing resulting in the teacher dropping her out of dance class; Coco gets fooled by a guy that claims to be a director; Leroy is illiterate but is ashamed to admit it and finally Ralph succumbs into fame excessively.

In the 1980’s New York City went toward a full economic recovery from its near bankruptcy in 1975. On November 23, city authoritarians announced that the city was nearly certain to have an estimated budget surplus from $100 million to $300 million for the monetary year that began on July 1. The city’s overall average salary was about $15,757 and had a minimum wage of $3.10 as seen on Figure 1. The minimum wage had increased from $2.90 to $3.10 on January 1, 1980; thus, the city’s economic status was practically stable.

On Figure 2 the minimum wage is represented as percentage of the average wage and the dropdown of the minimum wage percentage from 45.0% in 1975 to 42.0% in 1977 is clearly seen; but in 1980 the slope gets stabilized again to 45.0% at a short period however, dropping early from 1981. With an estimated population of 7,071,639 in the city according to the Census Data, there was a majority in the number of the unrelated persons with income between $15,000 and $24,999 being 212,130 in comparison to the number of unrelated persons with income between $2,000 and $2,999 being 77,094 for instance. In other words, according to the chart below there is a surpassing difference between the amounts of people that attained more quantity of income rather than a low range; thus, by this it’s inferred that the citizens were stable in terms of economic status.  

Correspondingly, although Fame doesn’t necessarily portray the economical aspect of the city to a deep extent, New York City’s stable financial system is inferred by a single scene. The scene involved Doris wearing a costume of a kind of like blind homeless, holding a blind-stick and money cup next to Montgomery strolling by the city and having a conversation. All of a sudden, a random person puts a coin in the money cup and Doris exclaims that where did that come from surprised and then saying that they can buy coffee with just that coin. Consequently, this brief scene explains how, assuming it was 50 cents was sufficient in order to purchase two cups of coffee defining the city’s economic steadiness in 1980. Additionally, even though the economy was practically balanced by that time, there were still few people that didn’t contain the sufficient funds in order to pay for important purposes or even to subsist. This situation in other words engrosses: high, middle and low class which is the monetary status in which people were divided. Similarly, the film perfectly depicts poverty realistically by showing the characters’ background such as Leroy, for example, as it’s observed how he doesn’t have a place to live and his lack of education as he is illiterate.   

Not only was the stabilized monetary aspect of New York City developing, but certain social trends and a phenomenon as well as growing up in New York City during 1980 was essentially radical. This time involved a significant change in people’s philosophy and way of life; it was the beginning of development on youngsters’ practically defiant attitude towards life and even against their regular custom. In other words, 1980 was the initiation of a phase and era of teen rebellion involving sex extravaganza, drugs, alcohol and many other factors. Another important feature linked to teen rebellion was definitely music as it was a way of youthful societal libertinage and wild philosophy. Not only did music mean a lot to society during that time, but art in general was deeply appreciated. The replication of Broadway theaters and institutions all around New York City represent the growth of art value and admiration evolving throughout society during that time.

Another interesting social affinity was the intricate theme of homosexuality. Gay youth had a really tough time figuring out how to be able to deal with this issue. It was complex for them to identify themselves as homosexual due to social disparities and in that year gay wasn’t a particularly socially accepted matter. For that reason, the homosexual had an unwanted dilemma they had to confront and so, waited a long time until they were able to come out of the closet. It is certainly out of the question to mention the fashion revolving during 1980; the frizzy hair, colorful tights, slouchy socks or leg warmers, power suits, and many other fashion trends. Since communication and media was already developed during that time in the city, fame and prominence was significantly vital to the artistic aspiring people. People sought for numerous forms of exposure and the media certainly made it a lot easier in that sense through newspapers, radio and television. Individuals searched for fame however possible, and when it was about to be reached it somehow succumbed them to a modified lifestyle and uncontrollable aspect of it.    

Likewise, the stance Fame took towards the social aspect of New York City during 1980 is undeniably realistic exposing factual circumstances throughout the main characters’ actions and events. Teen revolt is perceived through all the film’s plot by the main characters’ actions and occurrences. As mentioned already above, the use of drugs is one aspect of youth rebellion portrayed in the movie. This is seen when Ralph and Doris attend The Rocky Horror Picture Show in

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playhouse. The event’s surroundings involved numerous teenagers dressed in accordance to the film’s theme, having a great time and smoking marijuana. In accordance to art appreciation and music, Fame’s insight towards these social trends is unquestionable as it shows the passion and immense desire the students at the New York City High School of Performing Arts have to achieve their fervent artistic dreams. The passion is perceived when the student body, apart from encompassing an energetic lunch hour by dancing and playing music, by hearing the music from Bruno’s father taxicab the streets were filled with them dancing and singing jamming the traffic all around. The way fame was sought during 1980 was significantly portrayed by Coco Hernandez as she was fooled by a guy that claimed that he was a director and that she should go to a screen test for him; which turned out to be a totally unexpected outcome for her, as she was forced to take her top off in front of the camera instead. Also the uncontrollable aspects of fame were seen when Ralph was in a phase of fame which was transforming his lifestyle and apart from the constant drug consumption his ambition turned into urge falling completely out of his hands, thus ruining the comedy show. The struggle of homosexuality described above is another social factor realistically portrayed by Montgomery as he feels uncertain by his sexuality and feels isolated later when Doris and Ralph get together.  

Fame chose a realistic stance to specifically portray the lives of teenagers seeking to attain their most aspired dream in life and convince the audience to understand the variety of issues linked to art-oriented teens. In other words, it clearly reflected different teenagers’ lives and outcomes with one same passion: performing arts. The film also captures the raw emotions of teens that are grappling with strong issues and so portrays this by the students in an astounding clarity. The director Alan Parker opted this realistic approach to connect to the most important theme which is fame, showing the real effects that it can cause and how the teenagers basically dealt with it. By this, he wanted to persuade the viewers how life was during that time in the city as well as how teens strived among numerous troubles linked to fame.   

Works Cited

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Croop, Kari. "Fame." Common Sense Media. Common Sense Media Inc., Web. 23 Nov 2010.

"Fame Lives Forever." MTI Musical Theatre International. iTheatrics, 24 Sep 2009. Web. 21 Nov 2010.

"Fame (1980)." On the set of New York. On the set of New York, Web. 23 Nov 2010.

Johnston, David. "Income Gap is Widening, Data Shows." New York Times (2007): Web. 20 Nov 2010.

"Nominal and Real Minimum Wages, 1950-2005." Irregular Times. Web. 18 Nov 2010.

Parrott, James. "Raising the Minimum Wage In New York: Helping Working Families and Improving the State's Economy." Fiscal Policy Institute. Fiscal Policy Institute, Jan 2004. Web. 23 Nov 2010.

Popik, Barry. "Entry from November 27, 2004: "Fame" (1980)." The Big Apple. Double-Tongued Word Wester Dictionary, 27 Nov 2004. Web. 23 Nov 2010.

Rosenthal, David. "'Chorus Line' Goes to High School." New York Magazine 1980: 56-59. Web. 18 Nov 2010.

Tucker, Reed. "Claim to 'Fame'." New York Post (2009): Web. 23 Nov 2010.