Fame

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.
This page needs some cleaning up to be presentable.

Multiple versions or instalments of this work have been lumped into this page. Multiple Works Need Separate Pages, and this page needs to be turned into either a franchise page or a disambiguation page.

I'm gonna live forever, I'm gonna learn how to fly (High!)
I feel it coming together, people will see me and cry.
I'm gonna make it to heaven, light up the sky like a flame.
I'm gonna live forever, baby remember my name!

A musical film in 1980 that later became a stage musical and then was remade in 2009, Fame is the story of some students of the New York High School of Performing Arts, a very exclusive school (which has since been merged with the High School of Music & Art to become the Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts). The students find themselves cooperating amongst themselves and with the faculty, even as they compete for chances in the real world to make their dreams of stardom come true, and the obstacles that stand in their way on a personal level.

Fame is an interesting example in that, along with the silver screen and the stage, it's also been presented as a musical television series, several times. The most recent attempt, in 2003, was an In Name Only Reality Show similar to American Idol.

The original film received two Academy Awards: one for the score in general, and one for the title track. It was added to the National Film Registry in 2023.


Tropes used in Fame include:

The movies provide examples of:


The musical version provides examples of:

Lambchop: Sorry I'm late! My bus had a flat and I missed the ferry. See, I come from the end of the world - Staten Island.
Ms. Sherman: Miss Lamb, that's no excuse.
Lambchop: I know, it's a curse!

  • Doomed Protagonist: Carmen
  • Good Bad Girl: Carmen
  • Fridge Logic: Wait, a performing arts high school, and not ONE gay kid?!
  • Hippie Teacher: Ms. Bell and Mr. Sheinkopf.
  • Hollywood Pudgy: Mabel, depending on the actress. She can be any size, but the point is, she's fat for a dancer.
  • Ho Yay: "Can't Keep it Down" is full of it. In some productions, Nick and Joe Vegas Ho Yay it up during the Romeo and Juliet scene with Serena.
    • Not to mention that Serena is half-convinced Nick is gay.

"You'll probably go off to New Haven and meet some guy and forget all about me!"

  • Inner-City School
  • Large Ham: Mabel.
  • Lovable Nerd: Schlomo. Just ask Carmen.
  • Massive Multiplayer Ensemble Number: "Pray I Make P.A./Hard Work".
  • Nice Guy: Schlomo.
  • Pet the Dog: After spending most of the production being overly strict and a bit harsh on her students, Miss Sherman's offer to help Tyrone learn how to read and her subsequent song, These Are My Children, definitely comes across as this, as well as a Crowning Moment of Heartwarming.
  • Shrinking Violet: Serena, until she comes out of her shell.
  • Single Girl Seeks Most Popular Guy: Serena and Nick.
  • Single Woman Seeks Good Man: Carmen and Schlomo.
  • Stern Teacher: Ms. Sherman. Tough as hell, but she's got a soft spot for Tyrone.
  • Tomboy: Lambchop
  • Tragic Mulatto: Carmen verges on this - she gets hooked on drugs and has lots of anonymous sex in L.A., then dies of an overdose.
  • Villain Song: Miss Sherman's half of "The Teacher's Argument" verges on this, since she's trying to convince Miss Bell that Tyrone will never make it as a dancer.
    • Not entirely true: Miss Sherman is trying to convince Miss Bell that even though Tyrone is extremely talented, he needs to be prepared for whatever happens if he doesn't make it as a dancer. It's more of an "if," not a "when."
      • It's still the closest anyone in the musical comes to a Villain Song, since the audience isn't supposed to sympathize with Ms. Sherman.