Since she was 13 years old, Zendaya, the 24-year-old actress of HBO’s Euphoria and the batch of Spider-Man films, has been on the road to fame. In the Disney Channel sitcom Shake It Up!, about two typical teenage girls who also happen to be backup dancers on a local TV show, young Zendaya Coleman co-starred with another future star Bella Thorne. (At the time, Hannah Montana and High School Musical cast a pall over all Disney Channel programming.) But it wasn’t until the 2015 Oscars that she rose to popular fame, the kind of fame where you can get away with using only one name because you’re so well-known.
At that time, Zendaya, then 19 years old, happened to walk the red carpet wearing a white silk gown and sporting dreadlocks. Online critics condemned the Fashion Police section as racist as the outrage came thick and fast. Zendaya could have easily allowed those commentators to portray her as the helpless victim of Rancic’s ignorance throughout the ensuing uproar. Instead, she quickly seized the reins of the story.
By the time the dust had settled, Zendaya had evolved into the kind of celebrity that everybody who is even remotely familiar with pop culture is expected to know something about and have an opinion about. Her star was only just starting to rise.
The way Zendaya handled the Oscars scandal even back then, at the very beginning of her greater prominence, was telling. Her statement contained every aspect of deft celebrity image management that she has since incorporated into the core of her public character. Therefore, you must comprehend why Zendaya’s answer to the 2015 Oscars scandal was so successful in order to properly comprehend why she has become such a household celebrity in such a short period of time.
Source:vox
