Abstract
In August 1911, American press agent George Sinclair published a tongue-in-cheek catalogue of ten ‘ready-made’ press stories that the modern actress ‘might well enjoy’. Writing at a time when the profession was moving away from spectacular stunts towards more credible news stories, Sinclair exposes the workings of the publicity machine, offering a fascinating snapshot of the period’s most popular publicity ‘plants’. These fake stories include ‘The Matrimonial Story’, wherein Miss _____ _____ (Sinclair conveniently left blanks for the attention-hungry actress to insert her own name) becomes engaged to Reggie Backslider, ‘heir to the Backslider millions’; ‘The High Government Official Story’, wherein Miss _____ _____ is revealed to be the daughter of a high-ranking government official; ‘The Rescued from Drowning Story’, wherein Miss _____ _____ nearly drowns while taking an early-morning ‘plunge in the Atlantic’; ‘The Wounded on the Stage Story’, wherein Miss _____ _____ is stabbed onstage by a paper knife; and the much-abused ‘The Lost Diamond Story’, wherein Miss _____ _____ ’s precious jewels, valued at over $10,000, are stolen from her apartment (Sinclair: 368–72).
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© 2009 Marlis Schweitzer
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Schweitzer, M. (2009). Surviving the City: Press Agents, Publicity Stunts, and the Spectacle of the Urban Female Body. In: Hopkins, D.J., Orr, S., Solga, K. (eds) Performance and the City. Performance Interventions. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-230-30521-2_8
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