White Dwarf Starlet: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

 

 

 

 

 

Compare with [[Former Child Star]]. See also [[I Was Quite a Looker]]. Has absolutely nothing to do with the magazine published by Games Workshop; the name is a reference to stars — the kind in the sky — that have ceased to burn and are now glowing only with residual heat from their younger days. (Of course, the magazine used to be the world's premier gaming magazine and is now just an overpriced catalogue for Games Workshop miniatures, so maybe there's a connection after all...)

{{examples}}

== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==

* In a major twist, the [[Man Behind the Man|true villain]] in Satoshi Kon's ''[[Perfect Blue]]'' turns out to be {{spoiler|Mima's overweight, middle-aged female manager Rumi, who was a former pop idol who didn't last and now thinks she's the real Mima.}} The climax of the film where {{spoiler|Rumi chases Mima in the illusory form of Mima's giggling, pop-idol alter-ego while trying to kill her}} is genuinely disturbing.

* In the anime anthology ''[[Memories]]'', the first short, ''Magnetic Rose'' ([[Creator Thumbprint|also directed by Satoshi Kon]],) has key to its story a once-great opera singer [Eva] who isolated herself in a satellite in the wake of a scandal. It is filled with reminders of her success and uses holograms to simulate a lavish mansion. Her consciousness still haunts the decaying satellite long after her death.

* [[Hates the Job, Loves the Limelight|Akira Kogami]] qualifies for this at age ''14'', having worked as an [[Idol Singer]] since she was 3 years old and now relegated to a three-minute [[Greek Chorus]] [[Show Within a Show|show]] at the end of each ''[[Lucky Star]]'' episode. And boy, [[Yandere|is she bitter about it]].

* It's [[All There in the Manual]]. Ever wonder why {{spoiler|B.T., the manipulative [[Distaff Counterpart]] to Bear}} behaves so peevishly in ''[[.hack|.hack//SIGN]]''? According a hidden message in the OVAs, {{spoiler|she's actually a model who was recently told she's too old to keep in the business.}} Undoubtedly, [[Show Within a Show|The Game Within The Show]], ''The World'', is a vent for her.

* Averted in ''[[Glass Mask]]'', where Tsukikage was horribly disfigured in a stage accident but she remains extremely popular and famous, and she hasn't even lost her acting skills. Now she's more into teaching and finding a "heiress", and the biggest candidates are Ayumi and Maya.

* {{spoiler|Shiho's mother Sayuri Nagasawa}}, in ''[[Private Actress]]''. {{spoiler|While she ''was'' genuinely talented, being scarred ruined her career. }} At the same time, {{spoiler|Sayuri}}'s old rival Ruriko Daichi deeply fears to become this.

** Beautifully lampshaded by Shiho:

 

== [[Comic Books]] ==

* Another male example: Buddy Young Jr. in ''Mr Saturday Night''.

* Vitriolic producer Les Grossman uses these exact words to describe Tugg Speedman if ''[[Tropic Thunder]]'' (the [[Show Within a Show|movie-within-the-movie]]) fails.

* [[Bela Lugosi]] in ''[[Ed Wood (film)|Ed Wood]]'', which makes him perfect for a starring role in [[Show Within a Show|one of the worst movies ever]].

* Velma Von Tussle in ''[[Hairspray]]'', especially in the later versions. Her song "The Legend of Miss Baltimore Crabs" details her beauty queen past.

 

 

* ''[[The Twilight Zone]]'' episode "The Sixteen-Millimeter Shrine" was about a White Dwarf Starlet, Barbara Jean Trenton, who becomes so obsessed with her old movies she literally gets pulled into one.

* Faith from ''Hope And Faith''.

* Parodied in ''[[3rd Rock from the Sun]]'' when Sally began to act like one when her "15 minutes of fame" ran out.

* Jenna Maroney of ''[[30 Rock|Thirty Rock]]'' lives in perpetual fear of becoming one. Of course, she can't really become a has-been since she wasn't really that famous to start with. Instead, she'd be more of a never-was.

* ''[[All My Children]]'''s Erica Kane may count as either a White Dwarf Starlet or as a [[Gender Flip|gender flipped]] Hugh Hefner (i.e., an increasingly desperate and creepy has-been who insists on acting like she's still just as relevant {and vital} as she was decades ago).

* The ''[[Columbo]]'' episode "Forgotten Lady" casts fading Hollywood star Janet Leigh as a White Dwarf Starlet driven to murder in order to facilitate her comeback.

* Seedra from [[1000 Ways to Die]]'s episode "Inject-icide". She's an elderly former beauty queen who injected her face with corn oil as a cheap substitute for Botox (as she couldn't afford the actual treatments). Some of that got into her bloodstream, and then it started leaking out of her face...

* Raquel in ''[[The L.A. Complex]]'' had some fame 10 years or so ago, but now she's pushing 30 and still auditioning to [[Dawson Casting|play teenagers]]. She makes a point of not wanting the "mom roles".

 

== [[Music]] ==

* Nina Simone's ''Stars''

* Dog Fashion Disco wrote a rather creepy song, "Plastic Surgeons", that is a plastic surgeon's serenade to his white dwarf starlet clients.

''A plastic surgeon to the stars of old'' }}

** Prefab Sprouts "The King of Rock And Roll" is about a one-hit wonder who becomes one of these. It was their only hit.

*** ...In the US.

* Faith Hill's "When The Lights Go Down", dedicates a verse to this phenomenon.

without a sound, when the lights go down. }}

* "Mr. Richland's Favorite Song" by Harry Nilsson, about a (male) teen idol who goes from the heights of fame to being "a fallen star who works in a bar where yesterday is king."

== [[Theater]] ==

* The Stephen Sondheim musical ''Follies'' is full of elderly showgirls. Though most of the songs are period pastiches, "I'm Still Here," an anthem to ex-stardom, practically sums up this trope. Some poignant lyrics include:

And I'm here." }}

* Grizabella the Glamour Cat from ''[[Cats]]''.

** Although she {{spoiler|returns to the stage in the epilogue}}.

* A rare male example- Gary Golden from ''[[Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines]].'' Having lost both his career and his good looks when the local Nosferatu Embraced him, much of his spare time is spent dressed up in a tuxedo, conducting "wrap parties" with the corpses of long-dead actors, and occasionally trying to remind visitors that he was once a Hollywood star. Aside from that, though, he's pretty happy with his position.

* Evelyn Morrison, B-movie actress turned motel owner, from ''[[Sam and Max]] Hit the Road''.

* [[Meaningful Name|Gloria Swansong]] from [[Sierra]]'s ''[[Laura Bow|The Colonel's Bequest]]''.

* Naoko Mihama from the first ''[[Siren (video game)|Siren]]'' game is a former model and actress reduced to B-list status. She ends up going crazy due to the horrifying situation she finds herself in, and, combined with her vanity, she {{spoiler|willingly allows herself to become a shibito in a misguided attempt to stay eternally young and beautiful. Following her transformation, she is first seen as a regular shibito, before eventually mutating into a dog shibito.}}

 

== [[Western Animation]] ==

* Slappy Squirrel from ''[[Animaniacs]]'' is an aversion of this. The gag behind Slappy isn't really that she's a fallen starlet seeking to regain her fame — it's that she's a retired slapstick comedy star whose old antagonists don't seem to have let go as well as she has, only now, she's not only smarter than her opponents, she's old, grumpy, sarcastic and arthritic (think of an aged, vindictive [[Bugs Bunny/Characters|Bugs Bunny]]), so not only is great harm befalling her geriatric rivals, it's gotten easier with practice and she enjoys it more.

* A number of [[Adam West]] parodies, [[Adam Westing|most of them voiced by West himself]], tend to fall under this trope. Most notable is "Timothy North," who used to star as "The Fearless Ferret", a ''[[Kim Possible]]'' universe analog of Batman that ran during the same era, and in his old age has come to think he ''is'' the hero. He spent a considerable amount of his fortune having his home redesigned into a replica of the Ferretcave and his alter ego's mansion so accurate that everything actually worked. An actor who played a skunk-themed one-shot villain fell into the same delusion. When they finally work out and/or accept the truth, at a Fearless Ferret convention, they cheerfully greet each other:

'''Whitestripe:''' Same, same. }}

** And played dead serious for drama in ''[[Batman: The Animated Series]]'' as the Grey Ghost, ''[[Batman]]'''s hero. The actor who played the Ghost in the [[Show Within a Show]] Bruce Wayne watched as a kid winds up broke in a run-down one-room apartment hoarding memorabilia from his one starring role, until events make him a real hero, and get him back in the spotlight to boot. (It's worth noting that the real Adam West lives in a mansion and gets plenty of work.)

*** It also helps that the actor has the last copies of the old show {{spoiler|allowing the show to go to video, giving him some income from the royalties}}.

*** It should be added that, in a bit of a [[Inverted Trope|inversion]], the character he voiced in ''[[Batman: The Animated Series]]'' is not hoarding the memorabilia from his one starring role because he ''misses'' anything about it, except perhaps the paycheck it'd brought; he's rather bitter about having gotten typecast as the Grey Ghost to the point of nobody wanting to give him a role as, well, anything else.

** And, at least going by a critic's reaction to her old films being shown, she apparently wasn't a very good actress in her heyday.

* ''[[SpongeBob SquarePants]]'' features Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy, Bikini Bottom analogues of Batman and Robin (and actual superheroes within the Spongebob universe, albeit far past their prime) who (via the intervention of Spongebob) frequently end up attempting to relive their past days of glory.

* Big Food from [[Chowder]] is a perfect example of this trope, even using the line "I am a big star, it's the roles that got small!" with her name and fridge replacing "a big star" and "roles" respectively.

* In the [[Futurama]] episode "That's Lobstertainment!", Dr. Zoidberg's uncle [[Harold Lloyd|Harold Zoid]] is a silent film star who now lives in obscurity in a retirement home. While not as delusional as Norma Desmond, Harold still believes he's one film away from getting back into the business, and tries to use his nephew's money to make that film. At other times, he seems resigned to his fate as a has-been.

'''Harold Zoid:''' I'm a seat-filler, Joan's head. My only marketable skill is to occupy space. }}

* Piella Bakewell from ''[[Wallace and Gromit]]: A Matter of Loaf and Death''. Wallace recognizes her as the spokeswoman for Bake-O-Lite Bread, but she was fired as the "Bake-O-Lite Girl" when she became too heavy to fly the balloon they used in advertising. She's more broken-up about this than she lets on, as Wallace and Gromit learn when she {{spoiler|turns out to be the "cereal killer" who's been offing bakers all across town.}}