Falling foul of public...it isn’t hard to do as stars discover

When Hollywood actress Gal Gadot brought together her celebrity friends for a mash-up rendition of John Lennon’s Imagine, her intentions were (most likely) to raise hope and call for unity during the difficult months of quarantine.

But, as sociologist Dr Debra Ferreday explained, the end result left the A-listers looking out of touch, rather than spreading the “we’re all in this together” message they wanted to portray.

She said: “There’s an instinct that the public wants privileged access, and they want intimacy and realness. And it’s just unfortunate that when we actually see the way that celebrities live, we see how glaring the inequality actually is between us and them.

“The Imagine video was a moment where the veil kind of slipped – rather than feeling privileged to see celebrities in their natural habitat, we suddenly think, ‘Oh, actually, these people are hugely privileged’. They have huge power and resources that we don’t have. And that becomes kind of unignorable.”

Dr Ferreday, who specialises in society’s relationship with celebrity culture, also believes the difficult early months of this year have made society re-evaluate our definition of fame, and she admits it’s unsurprising we have shifted our attention towards more real, everyday people.

“Who would have thought five years ago, activists would be on the cover of Vogue?”

Over the coming months when life begins to slowly return to normal, Dr Ferreday believes audiences won’t forget the pandemic and quickly shift back to the traditional notion of celebrity.

She explained: “There will inevitably be a desire for a return to glamour, but it doesn’t have to be as polarised as one versus the other.”

Actress Gal Gadot