The Culture Channel

To give another perspective... I use them as avatars in my writing. I know very little about the celebrities beyond their names, what they look like, what films they've been in and country of origin. I don't even watch or read interviews unless I come across them randomly while in a waiting room or whatnot. But everyone else knows those basic things too (it really is a bit like the pantheon of our times), which means that in terms of story you can skip a whole heap of description and setup and letting the reader know who the characters are friends with and get stright to the plot. Basically, I "cast" the celebrity personas in my stories, and they have no relationship to the real lives of the actors at all. They are as fictional as any roles the actors might play in the movies.