Donnalyn Bartolome and How to Build a Celebrity
The crucial ingredients that help celebrities retain their status
Hey, bestie. How have you been?
So, so sorry for the late mail.
Two notes before we begin:
My last newsletter was read by 275 people!! I am both thrilled and scared by this stat. I mean, it’s not a lot. But when I started this newsletter, I was imagining that it will only be read by, like, 10 people max. But wow. What a number. Thank you!
I started this edition of good bones 2 weeks ago, right after I published the first one. A lot has happened since then. But I think we can still relate some parts of it to the recent issue about a certain celebrity. Or not! I’ll let you decide.
Enjoy!
Donnalyn Bartolome and How to Build a Celebrity
by JP Campos
I have a confession to make. I know Donnalyn Bartolome. Not as the social media influencer that she is today, but as a former co-worker.
I was 18 and still in university when I was recruited to take on the role of multimedia producer for a magazine show on one of the country’s television channels. The hook was interesting: The show, which aimed to promote an online music app, was envisioned to have a strong social media presence and a tie in with its on-air counterpart. The hyper-narrative elements of the project would allow me to experiment with two different mediums which, in 2013, was almost unheard of.
The show broke new ground. It laid out a strategy that would be adapted by other shows and networks. It created a blueprint for the convergence of new media and old media. And, perhaps more importantly, it showed other decision-makers in the industry that they had to start looking at new media to find and/or manufacture a new set of celebrities.
Donnalyn Bartolome (along with the likes of JaMich, Kimpoy Feliciano, Lloyd Cadena, Erwan Heussaff, and many others) proved that the game of celebrity-making would change dramatically. Bartolome wasn’t as big as she is now back then, but she sure was a rising star. She had, in hindsight, a solid brand, a savvy fanbase, and an unspoken yet obvious vision of where she wanted to take her status.
Among all the online influencers featured on that show, it was Donnalyn that rose above everyone. She’s released hits such as Kakaibabe and Happy Breakup, earned a living by becoming a full-time lifestyle influencer, and was on popular media over and over again.
And every time she ends up in the news, I feel a mix of pride and guilt. Pride because I was involved in bringing her to television—a media technology that truly makes one a household name. And guilt because now we cannot not not hear about her.
A little bit of context:
On January 3, Donnalyn Bartolome, a local social media celebrity posted on her Facebook page a grating remark in connection to the resumption of work. In her status, she asked why people are disappointed that holidays were over when, instead, they should be happy that they have a chance to improve their and their family’s lives.
She also said that she even likes to work on January 1st because she believes this means she will have a job for the whole year. And if one’s work doesn’t make them happy, one should simply find a job that will.
“Change mindset, it’s 2023,” she added.
The remark was not well-received.
Labor organizer Luke Espiritu said: "For unionists, labor organizers and those struggling with work, ['just be grateful' is] what the capitalists usually reply when workers air their issues with their jobs."
Esquire Philippines did not mince words either. Bryle Sulatra wrote: “People like Bartolome think that, just because they had their own challenges, everyone can escape theirs, too. While these hero stories can serve as inspiration in some way, they often forget to tell us about the part of privilege most people just seem to ignore: success can sometimes just be pure dumb luck.”
What we overlook about the recent issue with Donna
Everyone is looking at the recent issue involving Bartolome as a matter of privilege. And I do not disagree. Much has been said about that.
Instead, I want to dig a little deeper and look at the why of the matter.
Why did she feel compelled to say something at that time? Why did she have to make it about her? Why did she have to preach about something she obviously know not much about?
To answer these questions, we have to understand lifestyle influencer culture.
First, the conventional understanding of how these actors operate is that they want to be relatable. But there’s something missing here. Influencers do not just want to be relatable; they want to be ~*aspirational*~.
A person who talks about hardships all the time hardly sells. But throw in the narrative of overcoming those hardships? Now, you have a lifestyle influencer!
We see it pretty much everywhere: in Alpha Male podcasts that talk about picking up girls packaged as overcoming shyness/awkwardness and owning your “alpha-ness,” in Team Payaman and Mimiyuh’s vlogs that use their characters as currency, and in other online personalities that artfully combine common man lingo with their luxurious lifestyles. And the irony often escapes us: we can relate to them, but also know that they are already on a different level. We see them as just like us but are also aware that they are celebrities in their own right. We see them as friends but also as idols that we aspire to be.
Donnalyn is not immune to this. She successfully manufactured a girl-next-door persona while obviously flexing a life that not everyone can achieve. It’s part of her online identity. And you can see manifestations of it over and over and over again.
This leads us to the second facet of influencer culture: branding. If you haven’t noticed, online influencers have their own “beats.” It’s subtle, but it’s there. There are influencers who focus on spiritual wellness, fashion, technology, homemaking, etc. We know who to watch for particular moods and interests. They fashion themselves into archetypes. Online influencers are so good at owning their beats that journalists have been recently encouraged to adapt to the changing times—strengthen their branding and learn from influencer culture.
For Donnalyn, the mood is light and positive. In her world, there is always a silver lining to every dark cloud. This approach to life resonates with a lot of people. Those who subscribe to her fandom are remarkably aware that life is shitty. But what Donnalyn provides is a shift in thinking that there is still something to be thankful for despite this shitiness. It’s a very marketable POV. Such a brand was carefully crafted, allowing her to repurpose it for every significant event we experience as a society.
Lastly, the world that Donnalyn operates in—the lifestyle influencer space—takes cues from celebrity culture, but with certain adjustments. For one, if conventional celebrities want to sell you the fantasy of having your own glam team with make-up artists, hairstylists, wardrobe stylists, road managers, personal alalays, etc., online influencers want to sell the idea that they are doing everything on their own: That they are just like you, and you can be just like them. There’s some truth to this, as many online influencers start their careers in their bedrooms. But an online influencer as big as Donnalyn? She already has her own team—a set of factory workers tasked to furnish, push, and take care of her brand.
The second adjustment is on how celebrities maintain their spot in people’s psyches. If conventional celebrities make noise by getting involved in gossip and scandals, online personalities make noise by keeping visibility at all costs. The turnover of influencers in the online space is fast and unforgiving. You disappear for a month and people forget about you. So it’s crucial for them to churn out as much content as possible on all platforms. As Donna’s recent road bump shows, this makes them more prone to making glaring mistakes. But this also shows that an issue is actually good for their career—it makes their names and faces more visible. It also provides them an opportunity to ride the wave, release even more content, be more visible, and be more talked about. The only parameter is that these issues must not be too big. No overly cancellable offense. No involvement in actual crimes. Just big enough to have people argue in your comment section without much riding on it, but also just small enough so they don’t get banished forever. The internet will move on, but you are back in the limelight.
The recent shitstorm Donnalyn Bartolome faced is not so different from conventional celebrity culture. Gossip mixed with fantasy has always been the formula for maintaining a celebrity’s social status. Not talent. Not skills. Not level of attractiveness. If the three mattered, we wouldn’t have the Kardashians.
Of course, the media’s role in manufacturing a celebrity cannot be understated. In the paper Celebrity Firms: The Social Construction of Market Popularity, the writers argue that the media is a central facet of celebrity production because of its control over “the technology that disseminates information” and “the content of the information disseminated.” The media, according to the paper, produces and sells cultural products—including a society’s celebrities—by dramatizing and sensationalizing stories so as to provoke emotional responses, moral dilemmas, and social sentiments. We don’t refer to news as stories for no reason: the narratives crafted by the media, culled from events that signal a change in or shift from the status quo, are presented with characters and conflicts to help the public have a more dramatic view of reality. A linear, coherent, and consistent narrative helps celebrities become celebrities.
In the end, it truly doesn’t matter if you love or hate Donnalyn for what she said. What matters, truly, is that there are people who willingly buy into her story. As an online lifestyle influencer, she has control over her own channels. More importantly, she has control over her own content.
We can view the recent issue as a misstep for her. But is it, really? Is it a misstep when the stories that came from the issue simply strengthened her brand? Is it really a misstep when her name has been talked about on all known social media platforms? Is it really a misstep when the biggest media channels covered her story with much interest? Is it really a misstep when a simple Facebook status provoked so many emotional responses? Maybe. I mean, she lost a few thousand followers in the past weeks. But the 1.3 Million people who talked about her in those same days are a testament that her celebrity status hasn’t gone down. In fact, it may have just got even stronger.
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~JP Campos
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well said 🤍