Talk shows: A thematic exploration deciphering commodification,branding and links to capitalism in the media sphere

Abstract

Celebrity talk shows are perceptive illustrations of how they are rooted in profusion of flattery for the bourgeois class, and applaud class consciousness to the extent of normalizing it. This paper encapsulates the trends and patterns in the media sphere through the talk show, Simi Selects India’s Most Desirable and how it flourished as a celebrity’s brand augmenting platform. The study reads into commodification of content, links it to capitalism and also how it is a celebrity branding or rebranding platform. Using the talk show as an apparatus, this work integrates the political economy of communication approach with Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA).

Keywords

Celebrity branding class consciousness commodification critical discourse analysis political economy of communication Simi Garewal talk show television

Talk shows customarily illustrate a pattern of communication with the audience and guests on the show. There are clear-cut segments, with each focussing on a particular aspect usually beginning with an ice-breaker conversation and gradually progressing to segments such as probing the guests’ personal life through conversation or games, interaction with the audience, and rapid-fire question and answer sessions. The codified ritual of talk shows has often been inherited from settings that have nurtured conversations or arguments in the social realm. ‘Codified procedures’ are part of ‘debates, panel discussions, courtroom proceedings and public inquiry hearings’, including segments in which ‘guests or witnesses’ talk (Henstra, 2008: 64). The narrative is rich in heuristic value, directing researchers to often be conscious of textual content and narrative explorations.

The precarious cartel of a particular ‘class’ in media is evident and is to be recognized as a key construct in analysing media texts produced through appeasement of the privileged. To be conscious of class is a critical entry point to analysing media texts and to critique the attempts to normalize class notions.

The 1990s saw an unprecedented growth in the broadcast sphere. Oprah Winfrey’s chat show was a huge hit in the Western media sphere, and it popularized the concept of celebrity chat shows. In India, Phool Khile Hain Gulshan Gulshan (PKHGG), hosted by actress Tabassum, was presumably the first talk show aired on the state-owned Doordarshan. Tabassum predominantly interviewed popular film stars and television celebrities. However, dance and music were primary components of the show and interviews were aired for 10 minutes (Awaasthi, 2016). PKHGG was aired for 21 years from 1972 to 1993. Star World’s talk show, Rendezvous with Simi Garewal got a head start in the elite Indian mediasphere in 1997 and subsequently witnessed a wild mushrooming of chat shows with celebrity hosts such as Karan Johar and Pooja Bhatt. Garewal’s show led to a new-found popular culture that brought together celebrity and gossip with a sophisticated grace that was elitist, desirable and commercially viable too. While literature on celebrity studies talks peripherally about Simi Garewal and her first talk show, Rendezvous with Simi Garewal, her second talk show, Simi Selects India’s Most Desirable (SSIMD) hardly finds a mention. SSIMD packaged celebrities as highly desirable and eligible for marriage, so only those who were young and unmarried were featured on the show. This type of commodification is worth exploring and documenting through a full-fledged study on the series.

This study hence presents the trends and concepts that emerge through Garewal’s talk show, Simi Selects India’s Most Desirable, and attempts to envisage what form of assimilation it could lead to.

Even though these episodes were aired 9 years ago from June 2011 to November 2011, they still strongly resonate in the Indian mediascape. The resonance and recall of the talk show make it an experiential turf to explore. An interesting and perhaps the only academic reference to highlight at this point would be that of Singh who drew on the talk show content to build on film director and producer Karan Johar’s ‘queer performances’ in media appearances, including an episode in which the director was featured (Singh, 2015). It is also essential to register that SSIMD found renewed life in social media. The talk show being presented by the seasoned host, Simi Garewal, on Star World, was another key consideration in the selection of SSIMD for this analysis.

Background

This background is presented as an overview to deepen the understanding about the talk show and how the show makes a good narrative turf to bring out significant concepts. SSIMD was aired every Sunday on Star World from 9 pm to 10 pm, June to November 2011. Garewal’s brand value as host is quite distinctive and she is considered a seasoned host who set the trend for her contemporaries to follow with her earlier talk show, Rendezvous with Simi Garewal, which aired 140 episodes and found place in the Limca Book of Records:

The Limca book of records reports that ‘Longest-running celebrity talk show Simi Garewal’s Rendezvous with Simi Garewal on Star World, which started in 1997 with Ratan Tata as its first guest, completed l00 episodes in June 2004 with Rekha as the celebrity guest. . .. (Bisleri Beverages Ltd, 2006: 140)

The reach and impact of the show was impressive; what was further notable from a researcher’s vantage point was the richness of the narrative and abundance in reflexivity that this platform offered to study critical concepts and present them as lenses that can be used to study shows that are aired in similar genres:

In 2006, Rendezvous with Simi Garewal, who is a Hindi movie star, was the highest rated English entertainment show. It even pushed the global success, The Oprah Winfrey Show, from its time slot both developed uniquely for the Indian market, and based on international formats (Rohn, 2009).

Moving away from tested or adapted formats, SSIMD banked on relational dynamics. Though Garewal’s earlier series was based on the Oprah Winfrey show’s concept, SSIMD frolicked with highlighting emotions such as celebrity awe and romance, and the relational dynamics in operation also served as a brand platform for both the host and the guests. The description of the talk show on the Star World website revealed its unique selling proposition, presenting it as a ‘never before’ format:

This show will feature a young, live audience, and young, vibrant guests. Simi will interact with both through fun games and free-wheeling conversation. You’ll see stars dance, sing, play musical instruments, bake, and talk like they have NEVER BEFORE (Simi Selects India’s Most Desirable, 2011).

The show’s popularity and reach made it interesting to study the significant patterns that emerged from it by paying attention to the narrative. The myriad layers of the show are explored here to identify these patterns.

Approach

This exploratory study uses a twofold methodology integrating the political economy of communication and critical approach.

It is essential to make explicit the search for patterns as my foremost intent when the study began and placing ‘semantic networks’ as a peripheral notion. This dichotomy, placed in tandem with the political economy of communication and critical approach, is fundamental to this work’s development. Recognizing the importance of reading, analysing and documenting the ‘interaction between two or more people’, ‘tracing conceptual distinctions and continuities’, thereby leading to ‘an examination of central terms and concepts, as introduced and redeveloped by respondents (in this case the narrative) and the researcher’, is termed as ‘semantic networks’ in qualitative research (Jensen, 2002: 251).

The discourse in the talk show was predominantly dominated by two individuals, the host, Simi Garewal, and the celebrity guest for the evening. The course taken was to consider the talk show as a base and understand the manifestation of meanings, concepts and complexities that materialized. These are presented as conceptual constructs that create a semantic lens, elucidating an approach to studying texts in the field of media and communication research. Directions from the political economy of communication approach and critical discourse analysis guide this research. The concepts identified in this paper are asserted as entry points that could be used for other studies of a similar nature.

Political economy of communication approach

Moscow’s (1996) framework for rethinking and renewing the political economy of communication is an analytical tool organized around three specific entry points or processes: commodification, spatialization and structuration. Moscow positions these entry points as critical tools. He places them ‘somewhere between Heidegger’s suggestion that concepts are weapons and Wittgenstein’s view that they are simply tools’ (Moscow, 1996: 10). This study of SSIMD, as stated by Moscow (1996), aims to ‘enter and frame a political economy of communication with these substantive concepts, using them as a choice on what to emphasize’. Hence the study’s metrics have been devised as a derivative framework of Moscow’s, using commodification as one of the broad frameworks. Commodification of content and personal information as commodity is explored with an emphasis on media economics, particularly the commercial viability of the process of commodification of content and its manifestation. This is a pertinent angle to explore, considering the advent of recent research trends of viewing news as a commodity. News or talk shows can be viewed as critical segments diffused through television. Thussu (2015), in the context of television news, presents a view of how the ‘popularization of celebrity-driven and sensationalist news’ could make it ‘a more marketable commodity’. Talk shows follow a similar trajectory: celebrity-driven content gets commodified through such platforms too, their discursiveness gives it an enhanced life and the potential to be picked up as content for celebrity-driven news. The structuration and commodification framework has been integrated with critical theory to study the dominant class.

The critical approach

The study combines the political economy of communication approach with critical discourse analysis (CDA) with an aim to ‘interpret’ and ‘explain’ the talk show’s discourse and explore the link between ‘text and society’ (Dijk, 2003). The critical approach will help in understanding the emerging concepts and trends. Dijk (2003), in his book, The Handbook of Discourse Analysis, explains the main tenets of CDA according to Fairclough and Wodak (p. 353) and these have utilized in this study as well:

These include, ‘CDA addressing social problems, power relations being discursive, discourse constituting society and culture, with discourse being ideological and historical, the mediated link between text and society, discourse analysis being interpretive and explanatory and finally discourse as a form of social action. (Dijk, 2003: 353)

Fairclough talks about how CDA ‘oscillates between a focus on structures. . .and a focus on strategies of social agents. . .’, and further points out how a CDA analysis cuts across conventional boundaries between disciplines, and he calls it an interdisciplinary or a transdisciplinary form (Fairclough, 2010). The directions from critical discourse analysis help in making the researcher conscious of power, power relations, dominance, control and their reproduction. It helps in providing the theoretical lens in the exploration of concepts and complexities that emerge from the discourse. As Dijk (1993) suggests, this paper is not directed at labelling ‘. . .elites as the villains in a simplistic story of social inequality, but rather to focus on the unique access of these elites to public discourse, and hence on their role in the discursive management of the public’ (Dijk, 1993: 280). All the episodes of SSIMD have been taken into consideration for the analysis.

Analysis and thematic discussion

This paper is structured on six critical constructs. Initially, the domination and adoration of the bourgeois realm is emphasized to establish the glitzy tenor and high-class ambience that dominated SSIMD. Subsequently, significant concepts that emerge from the narrative are discussed, starting with intertextuality, contamination of memory and reality. Commodification of content explores archetype being sold as a commodity and how capital is the key link between archetype and commodity. The subsequent section presents an overview of how media economics works, explaining the commodification of content yielding results (monetarily), the dynamics of distribution and sponsorship. The concluding sections outline the process of signification and the prolonged engagement with the content; it also maps the convergences to a particularly interesting trend of aping a vulture culture. The use of inductive logic in this paper is evident and in a way stitches together the seemingly disjoint content to present a framework. The concepts identified are presented as operative frameworks and each concept is proposed as a critical tool to study such platforms. Unless the ideologue, setting and purpose of talk shows vary, these tools can be used as a lens to study talk shows in similar genres and style across the globe. The concepts identified are best understood as ‘thematic categories’ and there is value in positing them as ‘analytic units’ (Riessman, 2008).

The domination and adoration of the bourgeois realm

Talk shows continue to ‘simulate celebrity cultures’, posing the pertinent question of how ‘creative labour’ is exploited to generate content solely focussed on celebrating a celebrity, thereby leading to a vicious circle of ‘falsities associated with star transformation narratives, which underscore as well as proliferate reality TV formats and branded entertainment in global markets’ (Baltruschat, 2010: xiv). The domination and the adoration of the bourgeois realm is not something unique to the talk show examined in this paper, but to an array of productions in this genre:

The identification of the public of ‘property owners’ with that of ‘common human beings’ could be accomplished all the more easily, as the social status of bourgeois private persons in any event usually combined the characteristic attributes of ownership and education. (Habermas and Habermas, 1991: 56)

Garewal and the celebrity guests in the talk show are the privileged class and enjoy power, status as opinion leaders, and also a degree of social dominance. The content one would consume from such talk shows is typically generated by a particular class of people from the Mumbai film industry, popularly known as Bollywood. The manifestation of the hegemonic ascendency of Bollywood is a critical trend one has to document. Bollywood celebrities and their hegemony in the sphere of talk shows are positioned as consumable and desirable content. Even if the producer or host wants to move away from showcasing them for a while, the bourgeois realm expansively feeds back into the discursive content and texts emerging from talk shows.

Table 1 and Figure 1 explicate how the bourgeois class completely dominates the SSIMD sphere. However, this is not paradoxical, as SSIMD is a celebrity talk show. The dominant class within the dominant class is established through two illustrations. The first illustration highlights the dominance of the film fraternity. The comparison is generated using another talk show on Star World, Koffee with Karan,¹ which was also hosted by a celebrity, Bollywood director, producer and socialite, Karan Johar. It is evident how other sectors and industries such as sports, business, real estate, academia and health care, get marginalized, and in some cases, the representation is essentially non-existent, although there may be popular and rich personalities in these sectors.

Table 1.

A comparison of guest lists in talk shows aired at 9 pm every Star World (2011 data).

Episode	Guests on Koffee with Karan season 3	Bourgeois realm	Guests on Simi Selects India’s Most Desirable	Bourgeois realm
1	Abhishek Bachchan & Aishwarya Rai Bachchan	Film fraternity	Ranbir Kapoor	Film fraternity
2	Ranbir Kapoor & Imran Khan	Film fraternity	Deepika Padukone	Film fraternity
3	Deepika Padukone & Sonam Kapoor	Film fraternity	Siddharth Mallya	Business fraternity
4	Farah Khan, Rajkumar Hirani & Imtiaz Ali	Film fraternity	Sonakshi Sinha	Film fraternity
5	Kareena Kapoor & Saif Ali Khan	Film fraternity	John Abraham	Film fraternity
6	Anil Kapoor, Sanjay Dutt & Kangana Ranaut	Film fraternity	Sonam Kapoor	Film fraternity
7	Shahid Kapoor & Priyanka Chopra	Film fraternity	Abhay Deol	Film fraternity
8	Amitabh Bachchan & Shweta Nanda	Film fraternity	Anushka Sharma	Film fraternity
9	Shah Rukh Khan	Film fraternity	Ranveer Singh	Film fraternity
10	Rani Mukerji & Vidya Balan	Film fraternity	Freida Pinto	Film fraternity
11	Lara Dutta & Mahesh Bhupathi	Film and sports fraternity	Lady Gaga	Film fraternity
12	Hrithik Roshan & Suzanne Roshan	Film fraternity	Yuvraj Singh	Sports fraternity
13	Ajay Devgn	Film fraternity	Shahid Kapoor	Film fraternity
14	Best of Koffee with Karan Season 3	-	-	-
15	Sajid Khan, Riteish Deshmukh & Boman Irani	Film fraternity	Kangna Ranaut	Film fraternity
16	Anushka Sharma & Ranveer Singh	Film fraternity	Neil Nitin Mukesh	Film fraternity
17	Madhuri Dixit & Sonakshi Sinha	Film fraternity	Asin	Film fraternity
18	John Abraham	Film fraternity	Rani Mukerji	Film fraternity

Figure 1.

Guest profiling in the two talk shows.

Figure 1 brings out a clear comparison between the two subsequent talk shows aired on Star World, with celebrities who do not belong to the film fraternity hardly making it onto the guest list.

Talk shows in the Indian mediascape, especially in the English General Entertainment segment, do have a strong bourgeois domination. The dominant presence in the bourgeois realm is of the film fraternity. This also means that in the popular culture of India, celebrities who feature in talk shows are predominantly actors or technicians from Bollywood. Although sports and its cultural engagement is very strong, especially in the case of cricket, yet the instances of sports celebrities being interviewed on celebrity talk shows are significantly less than Bollywood personalities. Sports personalities who are interviewed also have an evident connection to Bollywood. Yuvraj Singh’s father was associated with Bollywood and Mahesh Bhupathi is married to Bollywood actor Lara Dutta. In every way, Bollywood reigns supreme in talk shows as popular culture and also shapes such platforms as a hot breeding ground for brand building or positioning efforts for top celebrities from the film fraternity.

Intertextuality

‘Intertextuality is most commonly defined as the process of making connections between current and past texts; of interpreting one text by means of previously composed text’ (Shuart-Faris and Bloome, 2004: 375). ‘Text’ is not restricted to printed text, but also refers to the social construction of text through films, television, radio and new media. In this study, the aim is to try and establish how the process of signification in SSIMD is distorted by the interviewer in the form of posing pertinent intertextual questions, while the interviewee, in the form of answering the intertextual questions, actively attempts to resurrect/distort/reposition or balance the intertextual perception of ‘celebrity’. There are two tools that help in identifying how celebrities used SSIMD as a platform for branding.

Horizontal intertextuality is the norm followed by the academic world. The intertextuality that operates in the viewers’ minds is both interesting and multilayered. The celebrities refer to celebrities to boost their own image or the other celebrity’s image, sometimes also to weaken the other celebrity’s image. These efforts, when a celebrity compares, rejects, rebukes, praises or makes implicit references to another celebrity in their fraternity, essentially constitute horizontal intertextuality, signifying that the references are at the same level. When references are made to stalwarts from myriad industries, to celebrities from other fraternities or to politicians, it signifies vertical intertextuality. However, the manifestations in the viewers’ minds have infinite possibilities.

In vertical intertextuality, manifestation of text begins with the primary level, which is the actual content, followed by the secondary level, where the text is manifested as content in other media forms such as in magazines, newspapers and radio. At the next level, the text manifests as tertiary text, where the viewers of the talk show themselves engage with the content to produce yet another form of text. These manifest as blogs, social media posts, conversations, memes and also result in mash-ups and viral communication. The impact can be phenomenal. According to Fiske, at the third level, ‘viewers make themselves out of their responses, which circulate orally or in letters to the press, and which work to form a collective rather than an individual response’ (Fiske, 1987: 100).

Fiske further points out that ‘[i]ntertextuality is the aggregate of all and an essential part of reading any one’; however viewers will have different intertextual aggregates of the personality in the talk show ‘according to the variations in their intertextual experience’ of the personality (Fiske, 1987: 87).

Often the manifestations are diverse and there are many layers to it. Therefore, the intertextual potential is essentially both premeditated and unforeseen. Premediated intertextuality is delivered by consuming the content as such. This triggers multiple manifestations, making talk show texts expansive, complex and highly discursive. Table 2 highlights instances of intertextuality, their manifestation as tertiary text and how they are used as a brand repositioning tactic.

Table 2.

Delving into the discourse.

Celebrity	Brand positioning	Intertextuality/Tertiary text reading between the lines and what attracted tertiary text from media?
Ranbir Kapoor	Uses SSIMD more like a matrimonial platform: ‘I’m 28 years old, I don’t have a girlfriend’. Brand reaffirmation by parent: Ranbir’s mother says, ‘I call him Raymond – the complete man’ A platform to express opinion on past relationships and a damage control tool: ‘I still respect Deepika a lot. I had a beautiful relationship with her. She has some angst against me. I think it would have been more graceful if she could pick up the phone and speak to me about it rather than speak on a public platform. She didn’t do it’.	Wanting to erase ‘Casanova’ or playboy image. Repositioning and reaffirming Ranbir as an eligible bachelor. He goes on to say, ‘I want to be in love. I want to love one person. I want to make that person happy. I want to have a lovely life with that person’. Tertiary manifestation example: ‘Ranbir Kapoor speaks his heart, on Simi Garewal’s chat show’ (bollywood.celebden, 201)
Deepika Padukone	A platform to express opinion on past relationships and a damage control tool: ‘We’re very very good friends’. On current relationship status, referring to Siddharth Mallya: ‘It’s too early to say or define it. . .. He’s very attractive and good looking, so why not?’ An excellent tactics to keep the suspense brewing and stay in the news. Repositioning and reaffirming tactics: Creating a new image and trying to erase the negative image created because of the rift between her and Ranbir Kapoor: ‘I’m a very giving person in a relationship. . .. I don’t expect anything in return, but I do expect them to appreciate what they have’.	Deepika was Ranbir’s ex-girlfriend, hence her episode logically followed Ranbir’s. Tertiary manifestation example: In New Media – ‘Bolly Buzz – Simi “bore” wala show with Deepika’ (indiafx, 2011).
Siddharth Mallya	A platform to express opinion on past relationships and a damage control tool. Uses SSIMD to resurrect a playboy representation of himself, consciously avoiding any explicit declarations on current relationship status: ‘I enjoy life. But I also know my responsibilities’; ‘No apologies for being a playboy’. Suggests he is not in a relationship with Deepika: ‘have plenty of female friends, but they don’t draw media attention because they aren’t stars’.	At the time the show was aired, there were speculations that Siddharth Mallya was Deepika Padukone’s boyfriend, hence this episode followed Deepika’s. Tertiary manifestation example: Star World’s efforts in manifesting its content through YouTube: ‘Simi Selects India’s Most Desirable – Siddharth Mallya Exclusive’ (StarWorldIndia, 2011).
Sonakshi Sinha	Comes across as a ‘papa’s girl’, with a protective family’. Is this differentiation? Unlike other celebrities, she declares, ‘I’m not a romantic!’	Except for her dance moves for a song from her movie, Dabangg, there was not much fodder unlike the other episodes.
John Abraham	Repositioning: Comes across as recovering from heartbreak after his break-up with actress Bipasha Basu: ‘I probably didn’t match up to a lot of things. . .’. Wants to move away from the ‘sex symbol’ tag attached to him: ‘I try to run away from it but it keeps catching up’. Wants to project himself as a serious actor.	Tertiary manifestation example: A controversial tertiary text – ‘John Abraham reshoots his episode with Simi Garewal’ (Parkar, 2011).
Sonam Kapoor	Image built as a person entrenched in family values: ‘I believe in marriage’. Self-image: ‘I’m not very critical. I’m not judgemental’. Consciously builds a positive image: ‘I have a clear conscience, I don’t play games’, and the image of a confident independent woman, ‘I haven’t taken a penny from my parents since I was 18’.	Tertiary manifestation example: ‘Sonam Kapoor confides on Simi Selects India’s Most Desirable’ (Oneindiaentertainment.com, 2011).
Asin	Embarrassment for Asin: Her father’s jovial comments, intended to act as a reverse positioning tactic, backfired, like ‘She has stolen my identity’; ‘She’s a rowdy’; ‘She once slapped a chap who passed a comment about her when she was in school’. About Neil Nitin Mukesh: ‘I admire Mukesh’s simplicity and friendly nature’. Image projected as a perfect, ingenuous person with a few apparent yet lovable flaws.	Asin was linked with Neil Nitin Mukesh, hence her episode is aired after Neil’s. Asin denies the rumours, affirms she’s single. Tertiary manifestation example: ‘I respect Salman but don’t desire him’ (Deccan Herald, 2011)

Delving into the discourse

The various levels, types of intertextuality, and their manifestations in the discourse are perceptible observations, represented in Table 2. The analysis (Table 2) reads the brand positioning, intertextuality and tertiary textual manifestation of text. There are four types of brand positioning tactics identified and these make interesting parameters one could use for talk shows on other platforms. SSIMD worked as: (1) a brand positioning platform; (2) a brand repositioning or damage control platform; (3) a positive self-image building platform; and (4) a reverse positioning platform, revealing how positive affirmations constructed through apparently negative image building can help or sometimes backfire too. The engagement with the primary text alone does not signify the reality that is built, rather it is influenced, manipulated, redefined, rebuilt and played upon through the myriad manifestations that lead to an intertextual truth or opinion:

. . .all that appears to our eyes is a truth conceived as a richness, a fecundity, a gentle and insidiously universal force, and in contrast we are unaware of the will to truth, that prodigious machinery designed to exclude. (Foucault, 1970)

As noted by Foucault (1970), there is an inherent friction between truth and ‘will to truth’ and the perception of truth itself. Drawing parallels from this view, it can be extended to also identify the limitation. The limitation of the study is that the effect or impact of the mass mediated text generated by the two individuals can be perceived but cannot be empirically proven. Nonetheless, this study draws attention to explaining the link between text and society and its mediations, thereby helping us identify the key concepts emerging from the talk show and how it is used as a brand positioning tool.

The subsequent sections aim to interpret concepts identified, such as contamination of memory and contamination of reality, commodification of content, control over the process of signification and an emergence of vulture culture.

Contamination of memory and contamination of reality

Discursive content is consumed by the audience, it is a narrative that is weaved by celebrities predominantly about celebrities. The viewers belong to different walks of life, often watching with curiosity or admiration or awe or simply binge-watching! One could watch episode after episode, a few may process the narrative to a greater degree than others, and a few may just brush aside thoughts, opinions or judgements by simply consuming what ensues. Either way, our ability to reflect, reminisce and develop a judgement gets compromised due to the expansiveness and discursivity of text when put together as a series. This envisages another effect, revealing yet another pattern best understood as ‘contamination of our memory’ as put forth by Jean Baudrillard. Baudrillard (1994) points out that ‘. . .simulation threatens the difference between the true and the false, the real and the imaginary’ (p. 3). Adorno and Horkneimer stress on a similar trajectory, suggesting that real life overlaps with the spectacle they consume and fail to pay attention to its methods:

Those who are absorbed by the world of the movie – by its images, gestures, and words – that they are unable to supply what really makes it a world, do not have to dwell on particular points of its mechanics during the screening. (Adorno and Horkneimer, 1944: 34)

There is relentless overlap of imagery and reality, in a vicious loop. Talk shows often reaffirm stereotypes and archetypes of understood celebrity norms and productions. The representation of characters in movies distorts reality and reality’s perception. The same thought can be extended to talk shows too. As Baudrillard (1994) explains, hyperreal is a kind of virtual reality that is produced by models of what we want reality to be (as cited in Lane, 2009: 98). It is this hyperrealism that was constructed through SSIMD, which was consciously used as a platform to redefine the brand perceptions of the celebrities. The blurring of simulation, as Baudrillard says, materializes as a discursive narrative between celebrities, cautiously crafted to often erase negative associations and build on desirable traits, anecdotes or memories. The ‘real’ and the representation blur into one another, making it hard to fathom what could be real or plausible. In navigating in that direction, establishing simulation becomes the biggest challenge.

Commodification of content

‘Commodification of content’ is one of the three analytical tools proposed by Moscow (1996) for rethinking and renewing the political economy of communication. The commodification of personal life initially began with Rendezvous with Simi Garewal, which too was positioned as divulging the personal life of celebrities. Garewal is said to have given a small speech on the occasion of the 100th episode of her show, revealing the implicit positioning: ‘Rendezvous revealed the human story behind glamour’ (Perry, 2008). Often talk shows augment a celebrity’s glamour image through a series of promotions before an episode is aired. They also carry an entrenched avowal of unmasking or uncovering the ‘human story’ or boy/girl next door imagery in a charm to present realism; all this is done after applauding the glamour association with a celebrity. This trend was neither new nor unique to Simi Selects India’s Most Desirable.

The personal information of a desirable celebrity is commodified in each episode of SSIMD. There are two questions that need to be asked at this juncture: what ‘personal information’ about a celebrity is of interest and why is a celebrity ‘desirable’? To answer these questions, Garewal’s interview published on TellyBuzz’s online platform could be considered here. She gave a categorical, if perplexing, answer:

They would need to have the whole package! That means they would have to be single and eligible. They would have to have glamour, beauty, sex appeal, life-style, and talent – everything that makes people look at them as objects of desire. (Garewal, 2011)

This also explains why the film fraternity dominated the guests’ list, as in the world of hyperreality, co-produced by the producers of content, the viewers, the film celebrities, altogether are said to have the ‘glamour, beauty, sex appeal and life-style. . .’, as Garewal points out. Essentially, commodification remains strong, sanctioning a bold marketing strategy and powering the text to travel through various levels of intertextuality.

This paves the way to presenting yet another layer of analysis and inference, with the subsequent segment in that direction, perceiving commodification in three core segments: (1) archetype as commodity; (2) capital as the link between archetype and commodity; and (3) media economics, and finally the set of outcomes have been assessed, analysed and enumerated.

Archetype as commodity

The continuous engagement with certain forms of content makes both the producers and viewers of the content organize the patterns. These patterns then become the norm, dictating the genre. Patterns also have strong characteristics and recall value, making it an archetype. When there is familiarity about a particular archetype, it can be viewed, consumed and marketed as a commodity. Viewing archetypes as commodity is a profound and insightful direction this work attempts to highlight:

The world at once present and absent that the spectacle holds up to view is the world of the commodity dominating all living experience. The world of commodity is thus shown for what it is, because its development is identical to people’s estrangement from each other and from everything they produce. (Debord and Knabb, 1983: 17)

When a show is arranged promoting celebrities, narcissistic consumption of content is at play. The viewers get connected to the narrative, influenced by the rhetorical styles of the celebrities and all this happens in certain conscious and unconscious states as the spectacle engulfs the viewer. The viewers are subconsciously fed that they are necessarily estranged from a celebrity imagery and there is constant emphasis on how a celebrity needs to be perceived, placing them on a higher pedestal, commoditizing the celebrity in the process. The image is something that gets entrenched and gets mediated as an archetype. As Debord and Knabb (1983) state, there is an indispensable estrangement from each other in play (in this context, the viewer and the celebrity), there is also an estrangement from everything they produce. The estrangement or disassociation is often in a positive direction, building on celebrity awe and creating an opinion that an ordinary person can rarely be a celebrity. In a few cases, an aspirational association also gets built as a result of the estrangement experienced. Either way, the alienation and division between a viewer and a celebrity is strong and profound. These perceptions continuously cultivate the strong divide between the viewer as common man versus the celebrity.

The optics and imagery associated with a celebrity talk show host such as Garewal produce a host who is both desirable and marketable, thereby making every aspect of the show, including the narrative produced, a package. Commodity in the current context can be best understood as a creative product encompassing the host, an array of celebrities, crew, producers, sponsors, emotions, drama, glamour, glitz and strands of spontaneity. The reason strands of spontaneity is used to describe the show is owing to the impediment one would face because of hyperreality – it would be hard to distinguish between real spontaneity and orchestrated spontaneity. The significant question to be posed at this juncture is whether Garewal’s image can be understood as an archetype and how well it fits the notion of a commodity. The archetypal descriptions are already strong and a few strong archetypal imageries come out in the texts highlighted below:

The Indian Encyclopedia reports, ‘This lady in white (Simi Garewal) has spelled class and sophistication in whatever she has done. She has lent a special charm and charisma to all her ventures be it acting, directing or hosting a show. . .’. (Kapoor, 2002: 2540)

We hug and kiss the air and say how silly it is to act like society ladies. Neither of us have any idea what it is exactly that society ladies act like but we’re pretty sure they dress like Simi Garewal and kiss the air all the time. (Romany, 2005)

Garewal’s archetype is convincing, consistent and identifiable. Even by merely using the two texts highlighted, the essence of Garewal’s archetype is captured and can be best encapsulated using the above description, as ‘a lady in white with class and sophistication’ and ‘society lady’, and hence there is an apparent construction that is built implicitly as ‘audience’ perception – this is Garewal’s strength as a host. The archetype is strong in the intersubjective spaces as the host also consciously maintains these patterns in all her shows and appearances. When the archetype is formidable, the potential to transform into a commodity is high. This transcends to a space where the projection or use of Garewal’s archetype can feature as a commodity signifying class and sophistication. A news report describes her as ‘India’s Oprah Winfrey in white’ (Bamzai, 2019). It leads to a personification or anthropomorphism of celebrity archetypes.

The engagement with the text and its manifestation, the host’s archetype, reiterates the way the television realm works, banking on capital raised by marketing archetypes as commodity. In television soap operas, the archetype of a good daughter-in-law or husband is strong. Similarly, in advertisements, we witness the compelling archetypes of a successful mother, father, student, lover, businessman and other roles that are evident to both the producers and the viewers. So, essentially, capital links the archetype and commodity, be it a talk show, a reality series, a soap opera or even a product. This link is explored in the forthcoming section, highlighting the role of capital in popular culture or rather the rule of capitalism in our neo-liberal globalized space.

Capital: The link between archetype and commodity

As Brenkman (1979) resonates Marxian observation of how, ‘Capitalism universalized division between meaning and production, we can draw parallels from this to the current scenario in consideration; of how capitalism did not just affect the body but also the bourgeois class themselves’. (Brenkman, 1979)

The archetype of Garewal, as established earlier, has capital strings attached to it. With this, we can establish a link between Garewal as an ‘individual’ and ‘how she has indeed become an instrument’ for capitalists to view her as a successful host worth investing in and as a host (instrument) capable of producing revenue through advertising, viewership and ratings. One could extend these factors to study other celebrity archetypes too.

To further substantiate the role of Garewal as an instrument or catalyst in the notion and dimensions of capitalism makes her subscribe to her own imagery, reinforcing her imagery of class and sophistication. Its manifestation in the public realm could be scrutinized to explain this, and a news report illustrates this fittingly:

For instance, several high-profile Star TV serials are doled out budgets which are often twice as high as those paid by other channels for the same kind of programming. In some cases, such as the hugely successful Rendezvous With Simi Garewal, this larger budget is required due to the intrinsic quality and cost of the production – and amply justified by the phenomenal viewership and response to the show (Banker, 1999).

Since Simi Garewal essentially stands for class and sophistication, to bring out her imagery in her show, one would necessarily need that kind of investment and budget. Her archetype and value float around as an alluring commodity that viewers would incontrovertibly consume. The economics of it plays through viewership statistics. Celebrity archetypes as capital instruments are strong archetypes, and in addition, for instance, talk show hosts when viewed as capital instruments, will have at least four things in common – strong personality, big budget, high viewership and strong intertextual potential.

When deliberating upon capitalism, the net profit or turnover, or rather the outcome (economics), is compelling to consider. Garewal has a strong archetype, the archetype has capital strings attached, so does the commodification result in real numbers for the producers or investors? How does viewership translate monetarily? These perspectives will be explored in the next section on media economics, as an attempt to fathom how the math magic happens in creative industries.

The play of numbers

Linking a talk show host’s archetype to capitalism is not an attempt to merely critique capitalism, rather it is an effort to emphasize that one cannot separate capitalism and television or capitalism from any form of media. Public service broadcasting also has inherent policies and practices that operate as capitalistic means to obtain funds, and while this statement is debatable, it is a growing reality that public service television channels do not merely operate on an allotted small budget from the government. They also bank on sponsorship and the strings of capitalism are evident. In certain markets, public broadcasting enterprises could also be seen as a threat to commercial media (Srikrishna, 2019: 570). The point of departure is that the economics of the media, or media economics, cannot be separated from emphasis on capital or capitalism. However, the critical question to ask is whether the commodification is yielding results. The commodification of personal content (celebrity life), the archetype of the host or the celebrity marketed, needs to result in making them all commercially viable, put together as a package. Whether the commodification of content is yielding results is a pertinent question to ask. According to Debord’s thesis and also to Brenkman, capital has the power to restructure the forms of discourse and situation in which communication takes place (Brenkman, 1979).

According to a report published [i]n Times of India – ‘13% of overall SEC A audience in 7 Metros have watched Simi Selects India’s Most Desirable 1620,000 out of 12425,000 individuals. . .. The most popular was the Sonam episode with a rating of 0.18 on the original slot of Sunday 9 pm Followed by the launch episode of Ranbir Kapoor with a rating of 0.11 on the original slot of Sunday 9 pm In Week 30 which is the latest week, Star World dominates Sunday 9 pm slot with 86% of the category viewership. Simi Selects India’s most desirables is generating good viewership in its category of English programs in the prime time slot and the buzz for the show is excellent just like the choice of celebrity guest in every episode’ (Wadhwa, 2011).

Scrutinizing the data, an 86 percent category viewership translates to a positive response to SSIMD and the media economics question on ‘commodification of content’ yielding favourable results is concrete, hence making the format and the ideology of packaging personal information commercially viable.

Star World’s broadcasting and distribution: A good forum for sponsors

The broadcasting industry is expected to witness robust growth in revenues, driven by growth in advertisement and subscription revenues (KPMG, 2011). SSIMD met the expectations set.

English channels command a higher advertising share with respect to the viewership share due to the strength of English premium audiences in the advertiser’s mind, similar to the case with English newspapers over Hindi and vernacular languages (KPMG, 2011).

Star World’s fit in the General English Channel category made it a suitable platform for advertisers who wanted to target premium audiences. Garewal as the host of SSIMD served the same purpose. This ideological positioning made Star World’s SSIMD a preferred platform for advertisers.

However, advertisers can influence the format of a talk show to strategically embed their brand’s personality. The co-presenter or sponsor, Neutrogena, used the platform to give away gift hampers in every episode. The hampers were personally autographed by the celebrity guest of each episode and strategically embedded in the talk show format in the Question and Answer segment. A report in The Financial Express on product placement talks of SSIMD and Neutrogena’s role in it: ‘. . .the chat show on Star World which had an insertion of skincare brand Neutrogena’s strap ad when Bollywood actor Deepika Padukone credited Neutrogena for her good skin’ (Khandelwal, 2011).

Beyond a point, the insertion seemed natural and, ‘through content commodification and intertextuality, talk shows’ intertextual commodities help blur the boundaries between programme and advertisement’ (Quail et al., 2005: 34). There is also a symbolic play between ‘white’ as the theme of the show, connecting it with Garewal’s white archetype and the brand’s veiled promotion of white skin. Hall (2012) points out how brands like Neutrogena launched whitening products to sell an ‘institutionalized colour prejudice’ capitalizing on the aspirational connect to the colour white (Ayyar and Khandare, 2012). Star World also consciously generated a strategic and attractive partnership with consistent attempts to entice advertisers:

Star World offers customized packages to advertisers in partnership with their media agencies based on their brand brief. Packages consist of the shows that are associated with advertisers for sponsorships and a mix of other programmes that have synergies with the brand environment and commercial creatives. All sponsored programmes consist of sponsors commercials to derive strong brand connect with the association (Pinto, 2008).

Thus, it can be fathomed that the commercial viability of Star World was sizeable and that it continues to be an attractive forum for advertisers. However, the predicament of capitalism remains, illustrating how Star World and SSIMD could be subjected to advertisers influencing and dictating the format of the show, which can be best explained as the lateral consequence of capital subsuming the content commodification and intertextuality, hence blurring the boundaries between SSIMD and advertising.

The trends and outcome

There are multiple outcomes and trends that evolved from the analysis, which can be recapitulated thus: (1) Garewal’s image construed an archetype; (2) archetypal image recognized and ruled by capital; and (3) the collaborative production effort between SSIMD and the role of capital played by three stakeholders, namely (a) the producers, (b) the series creative director and the host, Simi Garewal; and (c) the programming producers, Star World.

Content Production & the Big Synergy angle: The content producers of the show were Siddharth Basu, Anita Kaul Basu and Karun Prabhakaran from the Big Synergy team. Content production was expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 15–20 percent during 2011–2014 (KPMG, 2011). Big Synergy was entrusted with the content production for SSIMD. Big Synergy, a television production company, was founded in 1988, with a partnership with Reliance Media Works, a division of the Big Entertainment conglomerate of the Reliance Group (Big Synergy, Homepage, 2011). Big Synergy, headed by Siddharth Basu, specialized in adapting international formats for Indian audiences. In every way, SSIMD facilitated strategized commodification.

The other trends and outcomes include: (4) copyrights reservation with Star World, implying that the decisive control and ownership rests with Star World; (5) it is not be overlooked that advertisers and sponsors (Renault FLUENCE the primary presenter; Neutrogena as the co-presenter) can influence the format considerably, creating a precedent for similar formats to follow; and finally, (6) the ultimate control over capital and process of signification lies with Star World with peripheral control lying with the advertisers suggesting how the intertextual commodification blurs the boundaries between programming and advertising.

Control over the process of signification

Jean Baudrillard throws open a perspective that the bourgeoisie’s agenda was ‘control over the process of signification’, not just ownership of the means of production (Brenkman, 1979). The transition from capitalist domination of the economic sphere to a cultural domination is also a noteworthy interpretation in recognizing the signification means. If Star World is considered the capitalist dominating the capital or Garewal as exercising the cultural domination, it means there is an ostensible disconnect between the ownership and means of production. This uncoupling seems normative to capitalistic means of production, almost always refuting the strength of the host or content and asserting the lucrativeness as an isolated influencer placing it on the pedestal of superlativeness. In a way how the channel, host and producers place celebrity culture, in a similar trajectory, capitalist norms do not just ‘affect the body but also the bourgeois class themselves’ (Brenkman, 1979).

All the same, as established while deliberating on an archetype as commodity, it can be inferred that Star World ultimately had overall control (if not in the micro-managing context) over the capital as well as over the process of signification. If viewership declined, then strategic interference from the owners or even the decision to discontinue the talk show was with the channel, Star World. While the viewership statistics seemed reasonable, the show was eventually wrapped up. There are no clear reasons as to why it was withdrawn. One reason that floated around was that this new format was not as well received as Rendezvous with Simi Garewal and that the old series would return soon (Sharma, 2017). Whatever may have been the reason, it would understandably not be shared explicitly, as anything that would affect the viability of the celebrity ethos would prove detrimental to the production of celebrity-fed content, which seeks to promote, commoditize and monetize the innumerable strands associated with celebrity culture.

Localization strategy of transnational television channel

According to the Handbook of Language and Globalization, ‘Localization signifies the strategies by which international media companies adapt their programming to local audiences; Vernacular spectacles (local manifestations) are outcome of individual activity with regard to their resources and outcomes’ (Coupland, 2011: 224).

Conspicuously, since Star World had control over the overall process of signification, programming strategies like localization (from global to local understood as glocal) could be introduced. The partnership with Big Synergy primarily concentrated on glocalization strategies. Content, in order to appeal to different cultural groups or geographical zones, had to be tweaked and presented. In all the multiple shows in the media sphere – be it the trend-setting Oprah Winfrey show that resonated with the American dream or, in the Indian context, Simi Garewal or Karan Johan’s talk shows with palpable Hindi or Bollywood interjections, or their regional offshoots such as Koffee with Anu, later Koffee with DD in Tamil on Star Vijay – the celebrated value of the host and the connect with the local culture have been undeviating. Not even Simi Garewal could stick to the English language as meticulously as the classiness, sophistication or chic appeal of branding would demand and the number of regional lexicons in the show’s narrative stands testimony to this.

As with any commodity, the commodification of content had to be delivered keeping the cultural norms and the language in the zone of reception. The zone is in the intersubjective realm, hence can also be seen as a focal point for co-opting the globalized norms, in specific reference to celebrity talk and culture. While the localization is being adopted, there is binary opposition in operation with globalization homogenizing the audiences and their preference to consume a commodity, laden with celebrity promotion and gossip. Globalization dominates and tweaks content marginally, making the commodification viable and controlling the signification process altogether. The glocalization hegemony results in an array of glocalized content ranging from films, soap operas, game shows, cookery shows and telenovelas to talk shows.

Star World’s market share was another advantage for the channel and posed as a favourable platform to breed innovative localization in programming as well in attracting advertisers:

According to TAM data (C&S 15+, Six Metros Nov 1-27), AXN is leading the number game among English GECs, with a relative share of 49.3 per cent. It is followed by Star World, which has a relative share of 30.5 per cent; while Zee Café has 20.3 per cent (Bhattacharyya, 2010).

As a result, localization played a strong role in controlling the process of signification, and in the current context of deliberation, the process of signification was dominated by the channel reiterating the play of capitalism and its control. As iterated, homogenization forces are not to be dismissed. It is a complex unison and conflict in perpetuation, and the balance is often struck with a view to maximize economic gains. In the context of dramas, Yesil substantiates how ‘universal themes’ and ‘the de-emphasis on national identity along with the market reorientation are all aligned with the concept of delocalization’ (Yesil, 2015: 52). Talk shows or any other format in the entertainment genre can be read to acknowledge the oppositional yet homologous undercurrents of localization and globalization or delocalization.

Convergence in vulture culture

Vulture culture is read as an extension of the deliberations encircling the domination of the bourgeois realm, the intertextuality of celebrity-fed content, the contamination of memory and reality, the commodification of content and, to a certain extent, addressing control over the process of signification, too. The contamination of reality as put forth by Baudrillard and the commodification of content as propounded by Moscow along with the intertextuality, bourgeois domination paradigms converge into another construct that has a cultural subtext to it. Debord called ‘late capitalism the society of the spectacle pointing’ to the ‘new role of commodity in determining culture and its restructured relation between commodity and culture’ (as cited in Brenkman, 1979). It is a concept that emerges as a result of the infusion between commodity and culture. This has parallels to what is understood as vulture culture. ‘Vulture culture produces celebrity and relies on celebrity to promote itself’ (Quail et al., 2005: 3). Talk shows set a trend, feed into societal ideas and sensibilities and in a huge way penetrate popular culture:

Vulture culture is the process by which the media scavenge the personal narratives and popular discourses that make up everyday knowledge and commonsense. . .. Vulture Culture argues that television talk shows constitute an example of ‘nontraditional’ sites of learning and knowledge production, and as such the programs cannot be simply declared irrelevant (Quail et al., 2005).

The focus on celebrity gossip or revealing a celebrity’s routine essentially offers fodder to the curiosity of the viewers. As Quail et al. (2005) state, it is a non-traditional site of learning which influences popular culture. Celebrities’ traits, glamour, clothing, lingo, behaviour, body language, vocabulary, all permeate into the societal realm influencing and dictating fashion norms. Talk shows are a breeding ground for celebrity promotion and the deliberations in this work can also be understood as having similarities to and convergence in vulture culture.

SSIMD served as an example to fathom how the show has been used as a branding platform, especially making implicit horizontal intertextuality explicit. The dominant culture of the show was that of the bourgeois class, and the role of capital in the construction of meaning and in the working of media economics signified how it was programmed to showcase the brand and organize the brand perception of celebrities in the narrative discourse of the talk show. The control over the process of signification was restricted only up to the programming stage, after which the audiences decoded the text according to their understanding and discernment. The tacit knowledge is built around the show, its host and the celebrity guests. Gradually, this tacit form of knowledge becomes an inherent repository of understanding that is built and rebuilt, resurrected and reconstructed over time:

Talk shows are embedded with ‘discursive constructs and commercial products of a culture industry whose goal is to create and sell cultural expression for profit, in fact are part of the corporate media system and its particular axis of vulture culture’ (Quail et al., 2005: 11).

This adds the commercial viability clause to vulture culture and subsumes the outcomes identified on how cultural expression is sold for a profit, with Garewal’s image construed an archetype and the archetypal image recognized and ruled by capital. The corporate media system and particular ‘axis of vulture culture’ is apparent through the outcome traced on how it is a collaborative production effort and the role of capital that is played by key stakeholders in building this platform along with the programming producers, Star World. The discursive idea, though seemingly inert, nonetheless influences the final outcome of how the ultimate control over capital and process of signification lies with Star World with peripheral control lying with the advertisers, suggesting how the intertextual commodification blurs the boundaries between programming and advertising.

Conclusion

This study offered critical entry points to analysing media texts. The emergent trends and concepts can be read and used as critical tools to study the Indian mediascape. The control, domination and adoration of the bourgeois realm by the film fraternity can be registered as an indisputable trend. Celebrity content gets further perpetuated when celebrities appear on talk shows. It generates a type of audience-centred discourse that begins with a celebrity, and the revelations in a talk show further appear in consequent news cycles. The role of intertextuality, too, is crucial for producers of the content, the audience, the intermediaries and an operative critical lens for scholars studying television and talk shows. The growth and perpetuation of tertiary text based on original programming content is also a compulsive tendency and an interesting area of scholarship pertaining to the Indian mediascape. The discursiveness of celebrity content, owing to its compound manifestations, makes it meta-discursive, thereby enhancing its marketability further.

Localization strategies also play an important role in programming and advertising strategy. The convergence of the study results suggest a pattern of vulture culture. The talk show could also be read as an illustration of how vulture culture is propagated through the host and the array of celebrities, thereby leaving an everlasting influence in the creation of tacit knowledge that audiences absorb. Receptions studies also must look into the production strategies, content commodification, branding insights and the process of signification to understand how images have been produced and understood.

Talk shows often work as an effective branding tool, brand positioning platform and also work as a brand repositioning or damage control platform for celebrities. They are also exploited to build a positive self-image by celebrities and an interesting reverse positioning is also observed wherein positive affirmations are constructed through superficial negative image building. Contamination of memory and reality coupled with hyperreality in the mediasphere is a central tenet, especially in the domain of reception studies.

The commodification dimension observed calls for reading personal information as commodified content marked by an exchange value. The archetypical image of celebrity viewed as commodity in relation to capital is one of the strongest trends explicated in this study. The commodification of content yielded positive results and made the format and ideology of packaging personal information commercially viable. The ideological positioning and strategizing continue to be an attractive forum for sponsors, a key component that increases business sustainability. This also spells out another interesting trend, suggesting that ownership defines who has ultimate control over the process of signification. The subliminal and overt narcissism of celebrities by the celebrities’ voyages to the public sphere and becomes normalized over time.

Footnotes

Funding

The author received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

ORCID iD

Vasupradha Srikrishna

Notes

Author biography

Vasupradha Srikrishna is an interdisciplinary researcher. She heads the Department of Communication at Madras Christian College, Chennai. Her current realm of work pertains to digital communication, theories of communication and media, critical theory, gender and cultural studies. Her work frequently emphasizes the merit of and need to incorporate an interdisciplinary framework in research and innovative paedagogies in teaching. She was a visiting scholar at University of Westminster in 2012. Recently, she has been named a Kopenhaver Fellow (2021), an early career opportunity that empowers women faculty to move forward. She has worked and interacted with veteran scholars in her area.

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