Entertainment journalism is any form of
journalism
Journalism is the production and distribution of reports on the interaction of events, facts, ideas, and people that are the "news of the day" and that informs society to at least some degree. The word, a noun, applies to the occupation (pro ...
that focuses on
popular culture
Popular culture (also called mass culture or pop culture) is generally recognized by members of a society as a set of practices, beliefs, artistic output (also known as, popular art or mass art) and objects that are dominant or prevalent in ...
and the
entertainment
Entertainment is a form of activity that holds the attention and interest of an audience or gives pleasure and delight. It can be an idea or a task, but is more likely to be one of the activities or events that have developed over thousan ...
business and its products. Like
fashion journalism
Fashion journalism is a component of fashion media, with a focus on writing and photojournalism. Fashion journalists write about fashion events, trends and have to cultivate and maintain a relationship with stylists and designers. A fashion jour ...
, entertainment journalism covers industry-specific news while targeting general audiences beyond those working in the industry itself. Common forms include
lifestyle,
television
Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication Media (communication), medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of Transmission (telecommunications), television tra ...
and
film,
theater
Theatre or theater is a collaborative form of performing art that uses live performers, usually actor, actors or actresses, to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place, often a stage. The p ...
,
music
Music is generally defined as the The arts, art of arranging sound to create some combination of Musical form, form, harmony, melody, rhythm or otherwise Musical expression, expressive content. Exact definition of music, definitions of mu ...
,
video game
Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, game controller, controller, computer keyboard, keyboard, or motion sensing device to gener ...
, and
celebrity
Celebrity is a condition of fame and broad public recognition of a person or group as a result of the attention given to them by mass media. An individual may attain a celebrity status from having great wealth, their participation in sports ...
coverage.
Comparison with news journalism
News journalism deals with information of current events or reports of events that have previously occurred.
The main purpose of this type of journalism is to inform.
Entertainment journalism deals with information of the entertainment industry such as films, television shows, events, music, fashion and video games among others.
The main purpose of this type of journalism is to entertain.
In this area of journalism, however, it is not just about the pure reproduction of facts, as the Central European journalist
Norman Schenz
Norman Schenz (born 1977) is an Austrian journalist and moderator. He was program director of the radio station Antenne Wien, founding member of the newspaper Österreich and is since 2011 leading society reporter (Austrian German: "Adabei") of th ...
sums it up: "We no longer just write about an event, we tell stories"
Journalists can skew facts in a particular matter that cause their story to come across as entertainment.
This action can have a profound effect on the
consumer
A consumer is a person or a group who intends to order, or uses purchased goods, products, or services primarily for personal, social, family, household and similar needs, who is not directly related to entrepreneurial or business activities. ...
, making the authenticity of the report questionable.
Cases of this problem can occur in
news articles
An article or piece is a written work published in a print or electronic medium. It may be for the purpose of propagating news, research results, academic analysis, or debate.
News articles
A news article discusses current or recent news of ei ...
,
magazines, and
documentaries
A documentary film or documentary is a non-fictional motion-picture intended to "document reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction, education or maintaining a historical record". Bill Nichols has characterized the documentary in ter ...
.
Popular forms
Lifestyle and celebrity
This is focused on
celebrities
Celebrity is a condition of fame and broad public recognition of a person or group as a result of the attention given to them by mass media. An individual may attain a celebrity status from having great wealth, their participation in sports ...
and their lifestyles and feeds off television
soap opera
A soap opera, or ''soap'' for short, is a typically long-running radio or television serial, frequently characterized by melodrama, ensemble casts, and sentimentality. The term "soap opera" originated from radio dramas originally being sponsored ...
s,
reality television
Reality television is a genre of television programming that documents purportedly unscripted real-life situations, often starring unfamiliar people rather than professional actors. Reality television emerged as a distinct genre in the early 19 ...
, members of
royal families
A royal family is the immediate family of kings/queens, emirs/emiras, sultans/ sultanas, or raja/ rani and sometimes their extended family. The term imperial family appropriately describes the family of an emperor or empress, and the term p ...
, and the like.
Red carpet reporting and interviewing of celebrities during film festivals and award shows are part of entertainment journalism.
Film
A review or analysis of a
motion picture
A film also called a movie, motion picture, moving picture, picture, photoplay or (slang) flick is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, feelings, beauty, or atmospher ...
released to the public.
The critic's review or analysis is subjective and informative, with a focus to inform and entertain the consumer.
Film criticism is considered to have had a major impact on the integration of the cinema into
mainstream media
In journalism, mainstream media (MSM) is a term and abbreviation used to refer collectively to the various large mass news media that influence many people and both reflect and shape prevailing currents of thought. Chomsky, Noam, ''"What makes ma ...
.
It is stated that film criticism wasn't fully accepted as an art until film was widely accepted in the 1960s.
The Internet has further advanced the acceptance of this entertainment journalism with the introduction of film blogs and film review sites.
Some popular film review sites and blogs include
Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wan ...
,
IMDb
IMDb (an abbreviation of Internet Movie Database) is an online database of information related to films, television series, home videos, video games, and streaming content online – including cast, production crew and personal biographies, p ...
, and
Metacritic
Metacritic is a website that aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created by Jason Dietz, Marc ...
.
Video game
A form of journalism that covers all aspects of the
video game
Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, game controller, controller, computer keyboard, keyboard, or motion sensing device to gener ...
industry. The birth of the
computer age in the 1990s forced media companies to release content that would attract consumers in the video game generation.
Visually stimulating print
magazines were introduced into the market, covering the
video game industry
The video game industry encompasses the Video game development, development, marketing, and Video game monetization, monetization of video games. The industry (economics), industry encompasses dozens of job disciplines and thousands of jobs wor ...
.
Some popular video game review sites and print based magazines include
IGN,
Game Informer
''Game Informer'' (''GI'', most often stylized ''gameinformer'' from the 2010s onward) is an American monthly video game magazine featuring articles, news, strategy, and reviews of video games and associated consoles. It debuted in August 1991 ...
,
Nintendo Power
''Nintendo Power'' was a video game news and strategy magazine from Nintendo of America, first published in July/August 1988 as Nintendo's official print magazine for North America. The magazine's publication was initially done monthly by Nint ...
, and
GameSpot
''GameSpot'' is an American video gaming website that provides news, reviews, previews, downloads, and other information on video games. The site was launched on May 1, 1996, created by Pete Deemer, Vince Broady and Jon Epstein. In addition ...
.
Internet
The rise of the
internet
The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a ''internetworking, network of networks'' that consists ...
allowed many amateur and semi-professional personalities to start their own
blog
A blog (a truncation of "weblog") is a discussion or informational website published on the World Wide Web consisting of discrete, often informal diary-style text entries (posts). Posts are typically displayed in reverse chronological order ...
s and personal fan sites relating to entertainment journalism.
The
Me Too movement
#MeToo is a social movement against sexual abuse, sexual harassment, and rape culture, in which people publicize their experiences of sexual abuse or sexual harassment. The phrase "Me Too" was initially used in this context on social media ...
can trace its roots to entertainment journalism as the centrepiece of it is
Harvey Weinstein
Harvey Weinstein (; born March 19, 1952) is an American former film producer and convicted sex offender. He and his brother, Bob Weinstein, co-founded the entertainment company Miramax, which produced several successful independent films inclu ...
, a
Hollywood
Hollywood usually refers to:
* Hollywood, Los Angeles, a neighborhood in California
* Hollywood, a metonym for the cinema of the United States
Hollywood may also refer to:
Places United States
* Hollywood District (disambiguation)
* Hollywoo ...
mogul who not only produced independent and blockbuster films but has also worked on television and theater.
See also
*
Infotainment
Infotainment (a portmanteau of ''information'' and ''entertainment''), also called soft news as a way to distinguish it from serious journalism or hard news, is a type of media, usually television or online, that provides a combination of in ...
*''
Journal of Religion and Theatre
The ''Journal of Religion and Theatre'' was a peer-reviewed academic journal covering research on the relationship between theatre and religion. It was abstracted and indexed in the MLA International Bibliography. It was established in 2001 wi ...
''
References
{{Journalism
News