2ge+her: the ultimate constructed reality?
April 8th, 2008 by Loretta 
2ge+her - click here for the entire movie on youtube
(I hope this makes sense…)
So, throughout class I was thinking a lot about how the boy band craze affected my life… and while I completely perpetuated the false, constructed rivalry by being a strict BSB fan only; I think one of the most intriguing, hilarious and complex phenomena to come out of this period has to be – 2ge+her.
In short, 2ge+her is a completely fictional boy band created to capitalize on and simultaneously mock the boy band hysteria of the moment. The band was first revealed in a mocumentary about the formation and rise of a new boy band to rival the dominant group – Whoa!. This mocumentary was the first feature-length film produced specifically to air on MTV and I distinctly remember the hype and my excitement building up to the commercial-free broadcast in 2000. The band went on tour one summer as the opener for Britney Spears. And the group was given a sort of reality TV show extension from the movie that was short lived due to the sudden death of the youngest member, Michael Cuccione.
(My personal attachment: I saw them at the Granite Run Mall after school one afternoon. It was kind of a major deal for me… at the time. And I bought one of their albums. My love for BSB was much greater than my appreciation of 2ge+her but I think it’s fair to consider my youthful self a fan.)
I think 2ge+her is relevant to our discussion in class for two main reasons: 1) the construction of the musician-fan identities and relationships; and 2) the consumption of the performer’s multiple identities.
This “Boy Band Training” clip from the movie highlights the commodification of the boys in order to provide individual personas for the fans to identify with. It acknowledges the need to present constructed identities that will be judged not only by the media but more importantly by the fans. Also, prior to this scene, as the boys are individually found and brought together to form the group, each one is chosen due to the necessity to fill/cast a distinct character type. They end up with a well-rounded group:
Jerry O’Keefe (Evan Farmer) – “the heart-throb”
Mickey Parke (Alex Solowitz) – “the rebel”
Chad Linus (Noah Bastian) – “the shy one”
Doug Linus (Kevin Farley) – “the older brother”
Jason “QT” McKnight (Michael Cuccione) – “the cutie”
But 2ge+her not only highlights the absurdity and falseness in constructing commodified identities to cater to the audience-consumers, it also complicates the multiple identities that we discussed in class. So for “the heart-throb,” there is Jerry O’Keefe who has an entire history and personality that the fans are privy to through the tv show and movie, and then there is Evan Farmer, the actor, whose identity is completely obscured by the constructed O’Keefe. It isn’t until a few years later with the TLC reality show “While You Were Out” where Evan Farmer, as the host of the show, becomes the commodity consumed. But this publicly televised version of Farmer still is not the private Farmer who audiences may feel connected to… and really- it probably doesn’t matter at all which identities fans identify with but as Brandon pointed ount in class- how these identities affect the fans…
Overall, I thought that it was another interesting example of the degrees of distance between a fan and the fan object. I also think that 2ge+her is a specific case, and I can’t imagine there are still fans of 2ge+her who struggle with defining themselves in relation to this group; but the 2ge+her project provides an extreme model of fan interactions and the construction of commodified identities.
A few parting questions/thoughts:
- What do you think the intent of creating 2ge+her was? Was it simply to capitalize on a fan? What is the underlining commentary on the band boy craze?
- How does 2ge+her compare to “real” boy bands? How does 2ge+her vary from any other transmedia franchise?
Posted in Industry, music | 3 Comments »
I very distinctly remember being totally confused by the 2ge+her thing. I could not for the life of me figure out what their deal was–I was pretty sure that they were a fake boy band (one of their members was like, 40. That was a dead giveaway) but they also seemed to have a hit single that played in regular rotation on MTV (The arithmatically genius composition “U + Me = Us.”) I think it’s a really interesting phenomenon that fans can be completely aware of the constructedness of their fan object and their very fandom–despite their awesome mathematical skills, I wasn’t a fan of 2ge+her, but clearly people were–and just not care.
I also think that this is fairly new–I don’t see the Jenkins’ fan jumping on this kind of bandwagon. Part of the difference is that it removes the challenge from fandom. The producers are doing all of the work for the fan–constructing the boys’ identities, reaching out to other fans and fandoms (i.e., poaching other boyband fandoms), providing details on the characters/actors lives, documenting their lives in their minutae, etc. Removing the challenge also removes the exclusivity of the fandom–it’s too easy to join to give someone pleasure in their special knowledge.
I am really glad that Loretta brought up 2ge+her because it continues the discussion of how much boy bands and their surrounding fandoms are often constructed.
While I was reading this post, I also was reminded of the show, Making the Band, which is now in its 4th season, but which originally came out during the heyday of boy bands. Produced by Lou Pearlman, the man responsible for the creation of the Backstreet Boys and early managment for *NSYNC, Making the Band was a reality show in which a group of young men were auditioning to create a boy band, eventually called O-Town, while living together under one roof. This sort of Real World-esque quality of the show emphasized the contestant’s personal lives and personalities, making one believe that this competition was about much more than finding the best band on talent alone.
The show really emphasized the many stereotypes about boy bands and was sure to include the different personality types that all boy bands seem to have: pretty boy, sensitive guy, bad ass, etc. Now, while the show claimed to pick the best band, based on musical talent, I really feel as if the members were chosen as to create the most marketable group for music consumers. The “hit” songs, “Liquid Dreams” (yes, that was the title) and “All or Nothing” the group released were not particularly good, and the group did not stay together very long. This is perhaps a testament to their lack of musical ability and the fleeting nature of their popularity.
It is also interesting to notice in the “All or Nothing” music video that many images of female O-Town fans are included. These fans are portrayed as being love-struck as they sing all the words to the song with the group. To me this really plays into the fact that this band is dependent on the female fan base that most likely watched the Making the Band show and fed into the constructed popularity of the group.
I never realized how much the realms of reality tv/documentaries and music collide. There were and are tons of programs all about constructing different groups.
For instance – the Pussycat Dolls show that was on now or recently about finding a new member. But I’ve never seen it so I don’t fully understand how it fits in…
Also- where does Miley Ray Cyrus/Hannah Montana fit into this? I’ve never seen the show but I know she went on tour this summer and performed as both herself and the character. The name of the tour was “The Best of Both Worlds.”