If you chase fame, you make bad choices. Being famous isn't

Host: The city was buzzing beneath a velvet night, neon signs pulsing like electric hearts. A thin drizzle fell, painting the asphalt with reflections of billboards that flickered with the faces of stars — their smiles frozen, their eyes hollow. In a small rooftop bar, the air was thick with the smell of cigarettes, cheap whiskey, and ambition.

Jack sat near the edge, looking down at the traffic, his grey eyes narrow, watching the lights weave like nervous veins through the city’s skin. He was tall, lean, a silhouette carved from restlessness and reason. Across from him, Jeeny curled her hands around a coffee cup, her hair falling forward as she studied him — the glow from the streetlamps dancing across her face, soft, human, and still.

Jeeny: “Justin Theroux once said, ‘If you chase fame, you make bad choices. Being famous isn’t interesting.’ Do you believe that, Jack?”

Jack: “Of course. Fame is a disease dressed in admiration. People chase it because they think it means value, but it’s just visibility—and visibility isn’t worth much when the light is artificial.”

Host: A gust of wind swept across the rooftop, rattling the empty glasses on the table. Below, a crowd of tourists laughed, their voices rising like shards of noise through the night air.

Jeeny: “You say that like fame is poison, but what about those who earn it through meaning — the artists, the thinkers, the ones who move the world? Don’t they deserve to be seen?”

Jack: “They deserve to be heard, not idolized. That’s the difference. Fame doesn’t amplify meaning — it distorts it. Look at Van Gogh. He died in poverty, unknown, and now the world sells his pain for millions. The art mattered. The fame came too late to save him.”

Host: The city lights flickered on Jeeny’s eyes, and for a moment, they reflected the same sorrow — that quiet ache for all the voices that the world only hears when it’s too late.

Jeeny: “But fame, in its purest form, is just recognition. It’s a mirror the world holds up to you, saying, ‘We see you.’ Isn’t that what every human being wants — to be seen?”

Jack: “Maybe. But mirrors don’t love you, Jeeny. They just show you your own reflection until you forget who you are. You start posing, performing, pleasing the image, not the truth.”

Host: He leaned back, his hands resting behind his head, the glow from a passing helicopter cutting across his face like a flashbulb — for a second, he looked like one of those actors in an interview, tired, overexposed, and haunted.

Jeeny: “You talk as if fame is a trap, but some people use it for good. Think of Malala, or Greta Thunberg — their voices reached millions because the world paid attention.”

Jack: “Yes, but they didn’t chase fame — it found them. That’s the difference. They stood for something, and the world turned its head. The moment you start chasing the attention, you lose the purpose. You become the brand, not the belief.”

Host: The rain picked up, softly drumming on the metal railings, the sound like a heartbeat under their conversation.

Jeeny: “But isn’t wanting to be known also human? Even children crave to be seen by their parents. Maybe fame is just an extension of that — the child in us asking the world to look.”

Jack: “Then maybe we’ve all grown up wrong. Because the moment you need the world’s eyes to validate you, you’ve already lost your own reflection. That’s why so many famous people collapse under the weight of it — because adoration without understanding is just loneliness in disguise.”

Host: The bar quieted for a moment; a song by Leonard Cohen started to play — his voice a gravelly hymn to broken dreams. The sound wrapped around them like an old coat.

Jeeny: “You’re right about the loneliness, Jack. But I think the problem isn’t fame itself — it’s what we expect from it. We think it will fill us, but it only echoes what’s already inside.”

Jack: “And what’s inside most people is emptiness. That’s why fame sells. It’s a substitute for substance. People don’t want to be good anymore — they want to be known.”

Jeeny: “But to be known, even briefly, can be beautiful, Jack. Think of artists who die, and their work keeps breathing — that’s a kind of immortality.”

Jack: “It’s not immortality. It’s relics of the dead, worshiped by those who never knew them. That’s not life; that’s memory sold as myth.”

Host: The wind howled, rattling the umbrellas and signboards below. Jeeny watched him, her eyes searching, the lines of her face soft but steady — like someone who believes even when belief has cost her something.

Jeeny: “You sound like you’ve been close to fame before.”

Jack: “Close enough to smell the plastic on it. I once worked for a music label, saw kids walk in with dreams and walk out with contracts that sold their souls. The fame they wanted came, but it didn’t love them back. It never does.”

Jeeny: “But maybe it’s not about love, Jack. Maybe it’s about impact — leaving something behind, even if it’s flawed. Don’t you ever want to be remembered?”

Jack: “No. I’d rather be understood by one than worshiped by millions. Fame is memory without intimacy. It’s applause without touch.”

Host: His voice lowered, almost a whisper, blending into the rain. For a moment, Jeeny didn’t speak. Her eyes drifted toward the skyline — the towers, the billboards, the names of those who had climbed so high they’d forgotten the ground.

Jeeny: “Maybe the trick isn’t to chase or reject fame, but to outgrow it. To use it like a lantern — bright enough to show the way, but never to blind yourself with its light.”

Host: Jack studied her for a long time, his eyes steady, his breath slow. The rain softened, and the sound of Cohen’s voice faded into silence.

Jack: “You always find a way to make hope sound reasonable, don’t you?”

Jeeny: “Hope is reasonable, Jack. It’s the only thing that makes sense when the world is chasing the wrong things.”

Host: A smile broke across Jack’s face — not one of amusement, but of surrender. He looked out over the city, the lights shimmering like false stars below, and for the first time, his eyes softened.

Jack: “Maybe fame isn’t interesting, like Theroux said. But meaning — that might be.”

Jeeny: “Then maybe we should chase that instead.”

Host: The rain stopped, and the clouds parted. The moon appeared, casting a silver glow across the rooftop, washing the neon in truthful light.

They sat there — two souls, quiet, alive, unseen — as the city beneath them continued its chase for fame, blind to the peace that hid in the stillness above.