Top 10 Sorta Famous People
With Really Famous Names

A name is everything for a celebrity.  It's the words on the marquee on premiere night.  It's the sound of a screaming fan.  It's what the world remembers after a celebrity is long gone.  Everyone knows names like Michelangelo, Plato and John Candy.  And who really remembers what they looked like?  Granted, I know exactly what John Candy looks like.  But the point is, the name is what stays with the world after the person has left.  And depending on how famous a celebrity gets, there is no limit to how long the name remains.  For instance, "Machiavelli", good name choice, long shelf life.  "Fabio", bad name choice, no long-term potential.  But even if a name is so catchy that people can't get enough of it, there is still something that can wreck a name's ability to create an identity.  And that is when another person has the same name.  In the film Office Space, the character Michael Bolton describes the difficulty in sharing a name with someone famous.  The fictitious Michael Bolton says of his name, "There was nothing wrong with it. Until I was about nine years old and that no-talent assclown became famous and started winning Grammys."  His coworker Samir replies, "Well, why don't just go by Mike instead of Michael?  And Bolton replies, "Why should I change it, he's the one who sucks."  Bolton's anger and stubbornness is consistent with that of a man who has been stripped of his identity by a famous person who, by being famous, has defined all that is associated with the name.  Last week, I saw the news that Anna Nicole Smith's son had died, she had given birth to a baby girl and that her lawyer, Howard K. Stern, was the father of her baby.  And I only had one emotion.  Sadness.  No, no.  Not because her son had died, although that's sad.  But that Anna Nicole's lawyer had to go through life with the name "Howard Stern" and that probably it got so awkward introducing himself, that he felt he had to add his middle initial, "K".  You know that "K" wasn't for style.  But the phenomenon of a quasi-celebrity sharing a name with a super-celebrity is not unique to K. Stern.  Here is the Chinese National Day Sunday Special:

The Top Ten Sorta Famous People With Really Famous Names

 

 

 

 China
 Shanghai Daily
 China Daily
 People's Daily
 South China Morning Post
 News From China
 Shanghai Expat
 That's Shanghai
 City Weekend
 Danwei
 Wanbro

 U.S.
 New York Times
 New York Post
 CNN
 MSNBC
 Michigan Daily

 Sports
 ESPN
 CBS Sportsline
 Major League Baseball
 NYGMen
 Deadspin
 Bronx Banter
 MGoBlue
 Michigan Sports Center

 Entertainment
 Rolling Stone
 Internet Movie Database
 Spin
 The Wowz
 Pollstar
 Maxim
 TMZ
 J-L Cauvin

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 News
 BBC
 News/U.K
 NPR
 News/U.S.
 WCBS
 News/New York
 WINS
 News/New York
 WBBM
 News/Chicago
 WWJ
 News/Detroit
 KFWB
 News/Los Angeles
 KCBS
 News/San Francisco
 Air America
 Talk/U.S.
 
 Sports
 WFAN
 Sports/New York
 WSCR
 Sports/Chicago
 WXYT
 Sports/Detroit
 WIP
 Sports/Philadelphia