I can see Zooey Deschanel singing in the opener for New Girl but all I hear is "I'm cute I'm cute look how cute I am I have big beautiful blue eyes how cute."
Well, that’s what Zooey Deschanel does for a living - right down to the cutesy-poo misspelling of the name ‘Zoë’. Can’t complain too hard if the product is exactly what it says on the tin.
I liked her ten years ago in Big Trouble, though. She was different then. Also I thought that "Zooey" is the name she was born with, so can't help that.
‘Can’t help that’ is a bit of an overstatement. How many people in show business actually use their legal birth names? I can’t help thinking of Duncan Jones, the director, who was cursed at birth with the moniker of Zowie Bowie. Cutesy-poo can be overcome if the will is there.
Yes, I meant that it wasn't her idea to begin with. I was thinking about people's stage names before but I didn't mention that because I didn't think it would change matters much. Of course some people adopt better names, but it's such a personal thing, it's difficult to change your name and be called something else. Even spelling your name differently than what you're used to growing up could conjure any kinds of emotions.
Of course I have no idea if she considered or went through any of that, or even sees her name as cutesy.
Perhaps she doesn’t, but I have read articles about her by those who do. Since she has risen to stardom by being cutesy, I’m sure the studios that hire her are banking on the additional cute-value of that spelling. This kind of thing has a long history. When Beatlemania blew up in America, Ringo was the most popular Beatle, because he was the ugly duckling with the funny name. That kind of thing still sells - as people who invent product names can probably tell you.
If you could hear anything else over Ms. Deschanel’s thunderous roar of ‘I’m so cute!’, it might just be, ‘I don’t have anything else that justifies my being a star.’ I suspect nobody involved wants to risk finding out if that’s true.
As I understand it, one (a couple?) or several of her parents happened to like J.D Salinger's work (rightly so), and thus chose the name for her. I don't know how much that affected her psyche, being named after a fictional boy with an interesting spelling of a girl's name. It would explain the tomboyishness evident during her early career (probably the source of my shipping, the aforementioned "Big Trouble," complete with 100 percent deadpan delivery).
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*rueful grin*
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Of course I have no idea if she considered or went through any of that, or even sees her name as cutesy.
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If you could hear anything else over Ms. Deschanel’s thunderous roar of ‘I’m so cute!’, it might just be, ‘I don’t have anything else that justifies my being a star.’ I suspect nobody involved wants to risk finding out if that’s true.
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