In a recent study ("Elvis: Dead and Loving It -- the Influence of Attraction, Nostalgia, and Risk in Dead Celebrity Attitude Formation"), four researchers at the University of Memphis noted that "celebrity worship is often associated with poor mental health, such as social dysfunction, depression, and anxiety" as well as a "lack of education."
Yet ours is a celebrity-obsessed culture, and even for the sane among us, that obsession does not necessarily end with a celebrity's death. Before Jackson's passing, the university researchers polled 161 college students and discovered the most popular dead celebrity among the students was Chris Farley, followed by Heath Ledger, Bernie Mac, Marley, Tupac Shakur and Presley. Monroe was No. 9; Morrison did not make the list at all.
"There's a thread running there," USC professor Leo Braudy, who has extensively studied celebrity culture, said of the roster.
Braudy argues that show business is a "secular religion," and thus certain dead celebrities come to be seen as "secular martyrs" worthy of elaborate displays of devotion.
"It's someone who's committed suicide or has died before his time," he said. "Someone cut off, a person of lost potential." Thus the posthumous cults for Cobain, Lennon and James Dean, all of whom died unexpectedly (and violently) and who, perhaps as a consequence, ranked high in the dead-celebrities survey.
The phenomenon of the celebrity martyr, Braudy said, can be traced to silent-movie star Rudolph Valentino, whose 1926 death after an appendicitis operation sparked a riot at the New York funeral home where the service was held.
But fame is relative and memories can be short. Today, Valentino's crypt in the Hollywood Forever cemetery attracts scant attention beyond film buffs. On a recent visit, the crypt was bedecked with vases of dead flowers. Three tourists snapped a picture but then quickly wheeled away to look at the crypt for actor Peter Finch.
As Braudy said, "Once the generation passes that had an emotional connection" to the dead celebrity, the worship phenomenon is "more of a historical interest."
But as long as a VIP's memory remains fresh, his or her grave site can become a major hassle for the living.
Celebrity graves can make tempting targets for criminals. A few months after his 1977 death, the remains of silent film star Charlie Chaplin were stolen from the Corsier-sur- Vevey cemetery in Switzerland. (They were later recovered and reburied.) Dean, killed in a 1955 car crash, was buried in his hometown of Fairmont, Ind., where the headstone has been chipped away by fans and was once even stolen intact. (It was found and returned.)
