Why all of Hollywood is playing the imitation game

Three observations:

1. imitation confused

The year ended in imitations. So Halloween, which is actually Irish but now has more of an American connotation, is increasingly gaining a foothold in Germany, or rather in Berlin, where you could see children taking part in the still very open, German appropriation of the festival: a Halloween march, which is a mixture of a lantern parade, i.e. with Lanterns and lantern songs, and carnival, which included costumes and a marching band, but then – like New Year’s Eve – ended in fireworks. In America it is now common practice for stars to dress up as other stars on Halloween.

So Halle Bailey finally went as Halle Berry, Adele dressed up as Meryl Streep in Death Suits Her (1992), and Kylie Jenner posed as Demi Moore in Striptease (1996). Whereas Moore was in the cinema at the same time (“The Substance”2024) one could watch as she – significantly younger – used a fictitious syringe to peel an even younger self out of her own body, which then imitated her life as a television aerobics entertainer, but nevertheless changed it in keeping with the times. And Timothée Chalamet? The one who made his money this year by first imitating Bob Dylan (“A Complete Unknown,” film released in 2025) and is now imitating table tennis star Marty Reisman? He attended his own look-a-like contest in New York.

2. imitation created

Meanwhile, Halsey is releasing THE GREAT IMPERSONATOR, a concept album that explores the interesting question: To what extent are you always just a reflection of the time in which you live? In 2014, Ashley Frangipane became Halsey. But what would her music have sounded like if she had started pop in a different era? The album’s songs are their respective, hypothetical answers. Her song “Lucky” is set in the early 2000s and takes on the chorus of Britney Spears’ “Lucky” (2000). It also alludes to Britney’s life in several scenes in the video, but Halsey still sees this video as more like early Pink similar. Halsey’s version of a Cranberries ’90s hit “Ego,” on the other hand, sounds exactly like Avril Lavigne on LET IT GO (2002). While Halsey’s version of a late ’70s Stevie Nicks with “Panic Attack” sounds more like Taylor Swift’s RED era (2012).

3. barbara what’s going on

You can hear how far everything moves away from its origin from copy to copy when you listen to Shirin David’s latest single “It Girl” (“I’m twelve out of ten, I’m brutally good-looking”), which is sold as rap, but is basically a readymade for TikTok memes, compares it to the Shirin David diss track “Barbara was da los” that was released around the same time. The Leipzig battle rapper Vita not only comes with the necessary, catchy rap flow, but also with deep-seated takes: “Then you pay money so that Hiphop.de can get you posted / Girl pay even more so that the diss is heard here too ‘n is ghosted.” Vita lands on the sobering, but not entirely dismissible, line: “Everything that defines you can be bought.”

The only thing that isn’t accurate is Vita’s criticism that Shirin David is still copying Nicki Minaj. Apart from some emphasis reminiscences and the slightly overused “Brr” onomatopoeia, this imitation really bears no resemblance to its original. Vita asks, “Still, you’re not her, so who are you, Shirin?” Halsey asks, “I’ve spent half my life not being me. Who am I?” Maybe everyone can be comforted with slightly modified lines from a very good old Tocotronic song: There is no true self. Feel and regret nothing! Spit in the face of the deniers.

This column first appeared in Musikexpress issue 1/2025.