A star vehicle is a production created to promote and enhance the career of a star, showcasing their unique talents. Hollywood has evolved from studios creating an image for their undersigned actors to actors self-promoting through agents. Star vehicles can also revive fading careers, as seen with John Travolta in Pulp Fiction.
A star vehicle is a film, stage show, or television show produced primarily to enhance the career of a star. The purpose of a star vehicle is to promote an artist in hopes of launching a bankable star. A reliable star is an artist who forces people to see a movie, theater or TV show because she is in the project.
A successful star vehicle showcases the promoted star’s unique talents. Sometimes a starvehicle is created to show a star from another genus entering a new genus. For example, many stand-up comedians have had star vehicles created to help them move more easily into an acting career. The Seinfeld television show was created especially for stand-up comedian Jerry Seinfeld. It was a “show about nothing” because it showcased his unique comedic style of pointing out life’s little details like “king-gifts” and “big salads.”
Hollywood has an ever-evolving system for producing profitable stars through star vehicles. In the early days of Hollywood, movie studios had undersigned actors like Lucille Ball and Marilyn Monroe. They were given different hair styles and trendy looks to fit the image the studio wanted them to have and were given film after film as a star vehicle to showcase that image. For example, The Wizard of Oz was a star vehicle designed to capture the expressive acting style and amazing singing voice of Judy Garland and the film made her a huge star.
In the late 1960s, actors were able to become stars with the help of agents rather than being tied down to a studio. Also, the more successful an actor became, the more he was able to self-promote via a star vehicle. For example, the TV show I Love Lucy was a star vehicle for both Lucille Ball and her husband Desi Arnaz.
Rather than the beautiful sophisticated image she had had when under contract to the studio, Ball created a new image for herself as a flamboyant redhead and became a much bigger star than she had been under studio scrutiny. Arnaz’s role as her Cuban bandleader husband showcased their talent perfectly and the couple were able to further their talents in I Love Lucy by setting up their own production company called DesiLu.
A star vehicle can also help revive a fading career, as was the case with John Travolta. He had risen to fame in 1975 when he played Vinnie Barbarino on the TV show Welcome Back Kotter, which was actually supposed to be a star vehicle for Gabe Kaplan. Travolta also had smaller theater roles on Broadway and then had huge success in the 1977 hit film Saturday Night Fever and the hit musical Grease in 1978.
After two decades, Travolta’s star seemed understandably to fade as the demographics of movie audiences were shifting. However, Quentin Tarantino wrote the 1994 blockbuster Pulp Fiction and the lead character, Vincent Vega, especially for Travolta. Pulp Fiction was a stellar vehicle that turned Travolta into a dependable star for a whole new generation of moviegoers.
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