Who?

When I read the news, I sometimes feel like I'm on Mars. Jennifer Aniston and Brad Pitt are breaking up? I'm not sure who they are: actors apparently. I gather they got married, but actor's marriages break up at such extraordinary rates that I've no idea why this divorce should be a surprise. "Journalism largely consists of saying 'Lord Jones is Dead' to people who never knew that Lord Jones was alive."

I guess it makes sense that the marriages of actors should be ephemeral. Their careers are based on giving false impressions, and they get to be very good at it. Apply those skills during the "getting to know you" time, and you can fake out the other party. Faking out a spouse is harder. So perhaps you'd feel cheated because your spouse doesn't look quite as good before the attentions of a dozen makeup men, or talk so well unrehearsed. If any news attention at all (marriage, divorce, arrest) is good for the career, then mayfly marriages are logical.

Actors used to be looked down on and not trusted much, because their profession was lying. We've gotten away from that, and I think it says more about us than it does about possible changes in the profession of acting. Perhaps we're more Accepting(™), or perhaps we're so hungry for illusion and entertainment that we don't care, or perhaps we're not so sure whether lying is actually evil.