Hunter fans and naysayers of Gossip Girl must have been surprised to see the show’s production company on campus in mid spring taping scenes for an episode. And they might have been even more surprised to see a Hunterite starting a reoccurring role on the CW Television Network show.
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Hunterites – fans and critics – of the CW Television Network’s Gossip Girl must have been surprised to see the shows production company on campus in late March to tape scenes for an episode to be broadcast in late April.
Gossip Girl is a spin off of an award winning book series by Cecily von Ziegesar that revolves around the lives of young, elite teenagers living in Manhattan’s Upper East Side. The stories are based loosely on Ziegesar’s alma mater, The Nightingale-Bamford School. The series is an over-the-top exaggeration of the books and has enough drama and scandal to hook viewers.
Nick Antonelli, a creative writing major from Manhattan’s Upper East Side, said the show doesn’t do the books justice. “I worked in the children’s section of a library,” he said, “and I’ve read all the books. The show really doesn’t follow the story.” Asked what he liked most about Gossip Girl, Antonelli, dressed in a tight black shirt, jeans and gray and pink Nikes, said, “I’m all about guilty pleasures.”
“I think it’s cool they filmed at Hunter. It brings attention to us, which is a good thing,” said Antonelli, a self proclaimed gossiper himself. “Most of my friends are girls so we usually wind up gossiping.”
Antonelli said he felt that gossiping was a pretty safe practice and that it differs from rumors. “Gossip is usually truth while rumors are generally made up,” he opined.
Antonelli also said “gossip rarely spirals out of control.” In a Psychology Today article, The Real Slant on Gossip, Robin Westen wrote that gossip serves important social and psychological functions. Others begged to differ. In a recent New York Times article, Weaning Teenage Girls Off Gossip for One Hour at a Time, Dan Levin wrote that gossip can cause deep emotional wounds, destroy reputations and crumble friendships.
His article reported that a dozen Jewish high schools in New York recently imposed a program to curb gossiping among girls. The program was described as a part of a national campaign at Jewish schools to use religious teachings to raise awareness about the power of speech, for good and for ill. Rachel Simmons, author of a book about teenage gossip, Odd Girl Out: The Hidden Culture of Aggression in Girls, was quoted as saying in Levin’s article, “Gossip confers power, coheres friendship and damages reputations.”
Gossip Girl revolves around the lives of Blake Lively’s character Serena van der Woodsen and Leighton Meester’s Blair Waldorf, their families and friends. The teens, not yet out of high school, are shown having sex, doing drugs and partying. The gossip girl, in turn, uses the information to expose and sometimes sabotage them. Picture, right: Setup for mock SAT exam on first floor of the Hunter North building.
Christine Jung, a 21-year-old liberal arts major identified herself as a “closet fan” who hadn’t watched recent episodes at the time she was interviewed. “They’re very trendy,” she said. “I sat through it for the style, apart from that it’s a little unrealistic and dramatic.” Jung said she hadn’t watched recent episodes but could tell from the commercials that it was getting a bit provocative. She was referring to a commercial for episodes that started airing on Monday, April 28. The commercials show a string of images of two of the cast members naked kissing passionately while the letters OMFG (Oh My Fucking God) flash on and off the screen.
“That’s kind of why I stopped watching. It’s all about who’s dating who and who’s sleeping with whom,” Jung said.
The filming in March wasn’t Hunter’s only connection to the widely popular television show. Yin Chang, a creative writing and media studies double major at Hunter, was also Gossip Girl’s newest reoccurring guest star. She plays a stereotypical Asian nerd. In a recent article for the Hunter Envoy, an independent student-run newspaper, Chang was quoted as saying of her role, “I wasn’t offended but I was like, Wow, can’t there be a normal Asian girl?” Logo, lower right: Icon with picture of Yin Chan.
The show causes some students interviewed by this reporter to wonder if the content is really something worth applauding. Wendy Rivadeneira, a senior, said, “I have (watched the show), I like it, kind of, there are cute boys, I can’t really commit to it.” Rivadeneira said the show lacked the depth to make her a loyal fan. A creative writing and media studies double major, she said that although she thought nothing of the filming at here on campus, she found gossip to be totally negative. “It’s hating, you should keep people’s names out of your mouth,” she said.
Jung, a member of Hunter’s Korea’s Campus Crusade for Christ & Intervarsity, said she tries not to gossip. “I’m a Christian,” she said, “so I think gossip is very dangerous and unnecessary.” “I truly believed that if you don’t have anything constructive to say you shouldn’t say anything at all.”
The WORD’s Ingrid Montanez can be reached at MontanezI@aol.com.