Abstract
In all the prolific literature on celebrities, few writers have moved beyond the stock image of the paparazzi as marauding, invasive and unscrupulous. In their excesses, they may readily deserve these adjectives, but reliance upon them may lead to an evasion of critical scrutiny, so causing us to fail in identifying the distinguishing features of paparazzi photography or the interdependent relations between celebrity culture, journalism and media corporations. Kim McNamara offers not only critical scrutiny of the paparazzi industry but also provides a much-needed study based on participant observation, archival research and 30 semi-structured interviews with paparazzi agency owners, photographers, photo editors and entertainment journalists in Los Angeles, London and Sydney. Her book traces the origins and development of paparazzi photography, describes the operating conditions, techniques and skill base of paparazzi photographers and highlights their daily routines. It attends to the structure and organization of the industry and to the manner in which paparazzi images fit into news media agendas. In one chapter, there is a fascinating account of how certain celebrities become especially newsworthy through the construction of ‘story arcs’ based around paparazzi images, some of which run on and on for weeks on end. McNamara’s final two chapters look at connections between historical ‘fine art’ imagery and paparazzi photography and at key regulatory and ethical questions concerning paparazzi conduct, particularly in relation to issues of privacy. In addition to all this, the book considers how image production and image markets have been reconfigured by the shift from analogue to digital platforms. McNamara’s study is very much recommended.