Tough Times for Teenagers

The drunk driving arrest of Lindsay Lohan on Saturday reminds us yet again what lousy role models our culture offers its population of teenage girls. And that’s just when that demographic group has proven itself more valuable than ever to the entertainment industry. Nearly every time Ms. Lohan appears on screen, it’s a hit — and every time she crashes her Mercedes convertible, it’s a cautionary tale of how Hollywood breeds movie stars too young, and unleashes them on the world before they’re ready. “I wouldn’t ever want them to not take my picture,” Ms. Lohan told Nylon magazine last month, of the paparazzi who tail her everywhere. “I’d be worried. I’d be like, ‘Do people not care about me?'” It’s tragic to think that Ms. Lohan feels it necessary to keep herself famous by maintaining a lifestyle of substance abuse and bad behavior. It’s even sadder to realize that it works. Her antics still sell more magazines, if not movie tickets, than any 20-year-old in Hollywood.It’s a tough time to be a teenage girl in search of role models. Your uplifting entertainment options now include “Legally Blonde: The Musical,” a half-baked Broadway show that tacks forgettable songs onto a familiar movie plot, or “Gossip Girl,” a fall series on the CW that has inexplicably attracted buzz from all corners, or the “Clique” novels that have half the plot intensity of a juicy episode of “America’s Next Top Model.” The New York Times reported Sunday that 9-year-olds read People magazine and Us Weekly the way a previous generation subscribed to Highlights; the real-life lunacy of Ms. Lohan and Paris Hilton now provides the drama young girls yearn for. No way around it: There’s a frightening scarcity of strong storytelling and rich, noble characters — never mind movie stars — to serve as positive inspirations for a generation lost in MySpace.What happened? It was only three years ago that “Wicked” boldly announced that Broadway would now reinvent itself for a new generation. (It made perfect sense that one of its creators had been responsible for the wonderful teenage-girl television drama, “My So-Called Life.”) Suddenly it seemed possible that musicals could combine the wit and charm of Rogers & Hammerstein with the energy and angst of contemporary youth. Its flip-side analysis of the “Wizard of Oz” turned out to be an empowerment tale for young girls, and still packs in audiences the way “Rent” did a decade earlier. But what followed? Sadly, nothing. Retreads of movies like “The Wedding Singer” and “Legally Blonde” sell tickets, but they damage Broadway’s long-term chances by being boring. No one will sit through those shows twice, whereas “Wicked” could last forever on repeat business alone.Don’t count on television to pick up the slack. This spring marked the end of two well-done teenage series, “Veronica Mars” and “The Gilmore Girls,” and nothing looks likely to replace those shows for mother-daughter appeal. It’s probable that those audiences will gravitate even more to reality shows such as “Project Runway” and “America’s Next Top Model” for family viewing. Nothing wrong with that, but it’s hard to find role models among the desperate wannabes who populate reality television. The story arcs repeat themselves endlessly, and eventually we’ll tire of Tyra Banks just as we no longer care who wins “American Idol.”The seeming success of “Legally Blonde” comes almost as an insult to our intelligence; it’s a calculated, producer-driven enterprise designed to prod hundreds of dollars from our wallets to keep our teenage girls entertained. But they won’t be — not if they liked “Wicked.” They’ll know the difference. The “Legally Blonde” score doesn’t deliver a showstopper, the story has no emotional resonance, and Reese Witherspoon (who single-handedly carried the movie version to success with her charm) stayed home. At least its lack of a Tony nomination for Best Musical gives hope for the future, that the arbiters of taste on Broadway know the difference between pandering and poetry.For sheer sadness, nothing beats the mess that Ms. Lohan has made of her life. Is it, as the tabloids would have us believe, bad parenting that led Ms. Lohan astray? Or is it a culture that rewards beautiful teenagers like Ms. Lohan with money and freedom, and lets them loose on the world before they’re equipped to make smart decisions? “Popular,” a hit song in “Wicked,” poked fun at the absurdity of a culture that rewards looks over brains: “It’s not about aptitude, it’s about the way you’re viewed,” the song acknowledged with appealing honesty. Can a flame-haired, fame-addicted young girl like Ms. Lohan still turn her life around and make a positive contribution to the world, and to our culture? That’s the most dramatic question teenagers will be following in the days and weeks to come — as they scan the landscape for new and better ones, and come up empty.

Tough Times for Teenagers

Tough Times for Teenagers

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