Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon

Last updated

Kevin Bacon (right) with James Purefoy, who has a Bacon number of 2: Purefoy appeared in Women Talking Dirty with Helena Bonham Carter, and Bonham Carter appeared in Novocaine with Bacon. Kevin Bacon, James Purefoy (7606385516).jpg
Kevin Bacon (right) with James Purefoy, who has a Bacon number of 2: Purefoy appeared in Women Talking Dirty with Helena Bonham Carter, and Bonham Carter appeared in Novocaine with Bacon.

Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon or Bacon's Law is a parlor game where players challenge each other to arbitrarily choose an actor and then connect them to another actor via a film that both actors have appeared in together, repeating this process to try to find the shortest path that ultimately leads to prolific American actor Kevin Bacon. It rests on the assumption that anyone involved in the Hollywood film industry can be linked through their film roles to Bacon within six steps. The game's name is a reference to "six degrees of separation", a concept that posits that any two people on Earth are six or fewer acquaintance links apart.

Contents

In 2007, Bacon started a charitable organization called SixDegrees.org. In 2020, Bacon started a podcast called The Last Degree of Kevin Bacon. [1]

History

In a January 1994 interview with Premiere magazine, Kevin Bacon mentioned while discussing the film The River Wild that "he had worked with everybody in Hollywood or someone who's worked with them." [2] Following this, a lengthy newsgroup thread which was headed "Kevin Bacon is the Center of the Universe" appeared. [3] In 1994, three Albright College students - Craig Fass, Brian Turtle and Mike Ginelli - invented the game that became known as "Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon" after seeing two movies on television that featured Bacon back to back, Footloose and The Air Up There . During the latter film they began to speculate on how many movies Bacon had been in and the number of people with whom he had worked. [4] [5]

They wrote a letter to talk show host Jon Stewart, telling him that "Kevin Bacon was the center of the entertainment universe" and explaining the game. [6] They appeared on The Jon Stewart Show and The Howard Stern Show with Bacon to explain the game. Bacon admitted that he initially disliked the game because he believed it was ridiculing him, but he eventually came to enjoy it. The three inventors released a book, Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon ( ISBN   9780452278448), with an introduction written by Bacon. [6] A board game based on the concept was released by Endless Games. [7]

In 1995 Cartoon Network referenced the concept in a commercial, having Velma (from Scooby-Doo) as the central figure in the 'Cartoon Network Universe'. [8] The commercial cites connections as arbitrary as fake appearances, sharing of clothes, or physical resemblance.

The concept was also presented in an episode of the TV show Mad About You dated November 19, 1996, in which a character expressed the opinion that every actor is only three degrees of separation from Kevin Bacon. Bacon spoofed the concept himself in a cameo he performed for the independent film We Married Margo . [9] Playing himself in a 2003 episode of Will and Grace , Bacon connects himself to Val Kilmer through Tom Cruise and jokes "Hey, that was a short one!". [10] The headline of The Onion , a satirical newspaper, on October 30, 2002, was "Kevin Bacon Linked To Al-Qaeda". [11] Bacon provides the voice-over commentary for the NY Skyride attraction at the Empire State Building in New York City. At several points throughout the commentary, Bacon alludes to his connections to Hollywood stars via other actors with whom he has worked.[ citation needed ]

In Scream 2 , written by Kevin Williamson, a sorority sister played by Portia De Rossi refers to Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon. [12] Bacon himself later starred in The Following , also created and written by Williamson, and broadcast on Fox between 2013 and 2015. [13]

The annual 31 Days of Oscar event on the Turner Classic Movies television channel sometimes includes a "360 Degrees of Oscar" strand where each film shown shares an actor with the previous one. [14] It has been used as recently as 2020.

In 2009, Bacon narrated a National Geographic Channel show The Human Family Tree [15] – a program which describes the efforts of that organization's Genographic Project to establish the genetic interconnectedness of all humans. Bacon appeared in a commercial for the Visa check card that referenced the game. In the commercial, Bacon wants to write a check to buy a book, but the clerk asks for his ID, which he does not have. He leaves and returns with a group of people, then says to the clerk, "Okay, I was in a movie with an extra, Eunice, whose hairdresser, Wayne, attended Sunday school with Father O'Neill, who plays racquetball with Dr. Sanjay, who recently removed the appendix of Kim, who dumped you sophomore year. So you see, we're practically brothers." [16]

In 2011, James Franco made reference to Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon while hosting the 83rd Academy Awards.[ clarification needed ] EE began a UK television advertising campaign in November 2012, based on the Six Degrees concept, where Bacon illustrates his connections and draws attention to how the EE 4G network allows similar connectivity. [17]

In "Weird Al" Yankovic's song "Lame Claim to Fame", one of the lines is, "I know a guy who knows a guy who knows a guy who knows a guy who knows a guy who knows Kevin Bacon." [18] American rapper MC Zappa also makes reference to the game in his 2018 song "Level Up (The Ill Cypher)". [19]

The most highly connected nodes of the Internet have been referred to as "the Kevin Bacons of the Web", inasmuch as they enable most users to navigate to most sites in 19 clicks or less. [20] [21]

Bacon numbers

A map of the six degrees of Kevin Bacon. Green circles, such as Kyra Sedgewick, represent a Bacon number of 1. Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon.jpg
A map of the six degrees of Kevin Bacon. Green circles, such as Kyra Sedgewick, represent a Bacon number of 1.

The Bacon number of an actor is the number of degrees of separation they have from Kevin Bacon, as defined by the game. This is an application of the Erdős number concept to the Hollywood movie industry. The higher the Bacon number, the greater the separation from Kevin Bacon the actor is.

The computation of a Bacon number for actor X is a "shortest path" algorithm, applied to the co-stardom network:

Examples

Elvis Presley:

Therefore, Asner has a Bacon number of 1, and Presley (who never appeared in a film with Bacon) has a Bacon number of 2.

Ian McKellen:

Therefore, McAvoy and Fassbender have Bacon numbers of 1, and McKellen has a Bacon number of 2.

Because some people have both a finite Bacon and a finite Erdős number because of acting and publications, there are a rare few who have a finite Erdős–Bacon number, which is defined as the sum of a person's independent Erdős and Bacon numbers.

Photography book

Inspired by the game, the British photographer Andy Gotts tried to reach Kevin Bacon through photographic links instead of film links.

Gotts wrote to 300 actors asking to take their pictures and received permission only from Joss Ackland. Ackland then suggested that Gotts photograph Greta Scacchi, with whom he had appeared in the film White Mischief . Gotts proceeded from there, asking each actor to refer him to one or more friends or colleagues. Eventually, Christian Slater referred him to Bacon. Gotts' photograph of Bacon completed the project, eight years after it began. Gotts published the photos in a book, Degrees ( ISBN   0-9546843-6-2), with text by Alan Bates, Pierce Brosnan, and Bacon. [22]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Erdős number</span> Closeness of someones association with mathematician Paul Erdős

The Erdős number describes the "collaborative distance" between mathematician Paul Erdős and another person, as measured by authorship of mathematical papers. The same principle has been applied in other fields where a particular individual has collaborated with a large and broad number of peers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ian McKellen</span> English actor (born 1939)

Sir Ian Murray McKellen is an English actor. With a career spanning more than seven decades, he is noted for his roles on the screen and stage in genres ranging from Shakespearean dramas and modern theatre to popular fantasy and science fiction. He is regarded as a British cultural icon and was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in 1991. He has received numerous accolades, including a Tony Award, six Olivier Awards, and a Golden Globe Award as well as nominations for two Academy Awards, five BAFTA Awards and five Emmy Awards.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kevin Bacon</span> American actor (born 1958)

Kevin Norwood Bacon is an American actor. Known for his leading man and character roles, Bacon has received numerous accolades, including a Golden Globe Award, a Screen Actors Guild Award, and a nomination for a Primetime Emmy Award.

<i>Six Degrees of Separation</i> (play) 1990 play by John Guare

Six Degrees of Separation is a play written by American playwright John Guare that premiered in 1990. The play was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize for Drama and the Tony Award for Best Play.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Small-world experiment</span> Experiments examining the average path length for social networks

The small-world experiment comprised several experiments conducted by Stanley Milgram and other researchers examining the average path length for social networks of people in the United States. The research was groundbreaking in that it suggested that human society is a small-world-type network characterized by short path-lengths. The experiments are often associated with the phrase "six degrees of separation", although Milgram did not use this term himself.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Droopy</span> Fictional dog

Droopy is an animated character from the golden age of American animation. He is an anthropomorphic white Basset Hound with a droopy face; hence his name. He was created in 1943 by Tex Avery for theatrical cartoon shorts produced by the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer cartoon studio. Essentially the polar opposite of Avery's other MGM character, the loud and wacky Screwy Squirrel, Droopy moves slowly and lethargically, speaks in a jowly monotone voice, and—though hardly an imposing character—is shrewd enough to outwit his enemies. When finally roused to anger, often by a bad guy laughing heartily at him, Droopy is capable of beating adversaries many times his size with a comical thrashing.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Greg Cipes</span> American actor

Gregory Michael Cipes is an American actor. He is best known for his roles as Beast Boy in Teen Titans, Teen Titans Go! and Young Justice: Outsiders, Chiro in Super Robot Monkey Team Hyperforce Go!, Kevin Levin in Ben 10, Michelangelo in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2012), and Splaat from RoboSplaat!. He has made appearances in the television series Gilmore Girls, in the season four episode "Ted Koppel's Big Night Out", and Deadwood. Cipes has also guest starred in an episode of Ghost Whisperer in the episode "Love Still Won't Die". He appeared as a freegan in the Bones season six episode "The Body and the Bounty". He also played a man who camps out in Roseanne's yard in her series Roseanne's Nuts. From 2009 to 2018, he appeared in a recurring role as Chuck, Mike Heck's freewheeling co-worker, in the ABC television series The Middle. His film career includes playing the character Dwight Mueller in Fast & Furious, Reed in National Lampoon's Pledge This!, Sam in Vile and many more.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Robbie Rist</span> American actor

Robbie Rist is an American actor. He is known for playing Cousin Oliver in The Brady Bunch, Martin in Grady and "Little John" in Big John, Little John. Rist is also known for voicing assorted characters in television shows, games and movies, including Stuffy, the overly-proud stuffed dragon in Doc McStuffins, Whiz in Kidd Video, Star in Balto, Maroda in Final Fantasy X, Choji Akimichi in Naruto, and Michelangelo in the films Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze (1991), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III (1993), and Casey Jones (2011). Additionally, he and director Anthony C. Ferrante provided music for the Sharknado film and the theme song for the Sharknado franchise. He played Ted & Georgette Baxter's adopted son David on The Mary Tyler Moore Show. He was also the voice of the stick man from the Handi Snacks commercials.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kevin Michael Richardson</span> American actor (born 1964)

Kevin Michael Richardson is an American actor. Known for his distinctively deep voice, he has mostly voiced villainous characters in animation and video games. In film, Richardson voiced Goro in Mortal Kombat (1995) and reprises in Mortal Kombat Legends: Scorpion's Revenge (2020), Captain Gantu in the Lilo & Stitch franchise, Kamek in The Super Mario Bros. Movie, Bulkhead from Transformers: Prime, and Deus Ex Machina in The Matrix Revolutions (2003). He has also voiced characters on Seth MacFarlane's shows Family Guy, The Cleveland Show, and American Dad!, as well as several characters on The Simpsons, and Futurama.

A person's Erdős–Bacon number is the sum of one's Erdős number—which measures the "collaborative distance" in authoring academic papers between that person and Hungarian mathematician Paul Erdős—and one's Bacon number—which represents the number of links, through roles in films, by which the person is separated from American actor Kevin Bacon. The lower the number, the closer a person is to Erdős and Bacon, which reflects a small world phenomenon in academia and entertainment.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Michael Fassbender</span> German-born actor (born 1977)

Michael Fassbender is an actor. He is the recipient of various accolades, including nominations for two Academy Awards, four BAFTA Awards and three Golden Globe Awards. In 2020, he was listed at number nine on The Irish Times list of Ireland's greatest film actors.

Six degrees of separation is the theory that anyone on Earth can be connected to any other person on the planet through a chain of acquaintances that has no more than five intermediaries

<span class="mw-page-title-main">SixDegrees.org</span> Charity led by actor, musician, and philanthropist Kevin Bacon

SixDegrees.org is a charity led by actor, musician, and philanthropist Kevin Bacon. Launched on January 18, 2007, the organization builds on the popularity of the "small world phenomenon" by enabling people to become "celebrities for their own causes" by donating to or raising money for any charity in the United States. In March 2014, the organization celebrated the 20th anniversary of the Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon game by announcing plans to connect local changemakers with recognized celebrities through "drop-ins" and "shout-outs". Grassroots causes can submit events directly through the site and celebrities can contact the organization for help finding a cause anywhere in the world.

Gunpowder, Treason & Plot is a 2004 BBC miniseries based upon the lives of Mary, Queen of Scots and her son James VI of Scotland. Written by Jimmy McGovern, the series tells the story behind the Gunpowder Plot in two parts, each centred on one of the respective monarchs. The first film dramatizes the relationship between Mary and her third husband, James Hepburn, 4th Earl of Bothwell. Scottish actor Robert Carlyle stars as James VI in the second part, which concentrates on the Gunpowder Plot, planned by Guy Fawkes, to blow up the Houses of Parliament in order to rid the nation of a Protestant monarch.

In mathematics and social science, a collaboration graph is a graph modeling some social network where the vertices represent participants of that network and where two distinct participants are joined by an edge whenever there is a collaborative relationship between them of a particular kind. Collaboration graphs are used to measure the closeness of collaborative relationships between the participants of the network.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">James McAvoy</span> Scottish actor (born 1979)

James McAvoy is a Scottish actor. He made his acting debut as a teen in The Near Room (1995) and appeared mostly on television until 2003, when his feature film career began. His notable television work include the thriller State of Play (2003), the science fiction miniseries Frank Herbert's Children of Dune (2003), and the drama series Shameless (2004–2005).

<i>X-Men: First Class</i> 2011 film by Matthew Vaughn

X-Men: First Class is a 2011 superhero film based on the X-Men characters appearing in Marvel Comics. It is the fourth mainline installment in the X-Men film series and the fifth installment overall. It was directed by Matthew Vaughn and produced by Bryan Singer, and stars James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Rose Byrne, Jennifer Lawrence, January Jones, Oliver Platt, and Kevin Bacon. At the time of its release, it was intended to be a franchise reboot and contradicted the events of previous films; however, the follow-up film X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014) retconned First Class into a prequel to X-Men (2000). First Class is set primarily in 1962 during the Cuban Missile Crisis, and focuses on the relationship between Charles Xavier and Erik Lehnsherr / Magneto, and the origin of their groups—the X-Men and the Brotherhood of Mutants, respectively, as they deal with the Hellfire Club led by Sebastian Shaw, a mutant supremacist bent on enacting nuclear war.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Six degrees of separation</span> Concept of social inter-connectedness of all people

Six degrees of separation is the idea that all people are six or fewer social connections away from each other. As a result, a chain of "friend of a friend" statements can be made to connect any two people in a maximum of six steps. It is also known as the six handshakes rule.

Demetri Goritsas is an American actor. He is best known for his roles as Ethan in the Sky One television series Baddiel's Syndrome and Max Cain in the psychological thriller television series Modus.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Magneto (film character)</span> Fictional character of 2000-19 X-Men film series

Erik Lehnsherr, also known as Magneto, is a character primarily portrayed by Ian McKellen and Michael Fassbender in 20th Century Fox's X-Men film series. Based on the Marvel Comics character of the same name, he has appeared in eight installments of the franchise. McKellen played Magneto in the original trilogy films X-Men (2000), X2 (2003) and X-Men: The Last Stand (2006), in addition to making a cameo in The Wolverine (2013); while Fassbender portrayed a younger version of the character in the prequel films X-Men: First Class (2011), X-Men: Apocalypse (2016) and Dark Phoenix (2019). Both actors' iterations appeared in different time periods in X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014).

References

  1. ↑ "Kevin Bacon's best friend definitely wants to murder him in exclusive trailer for his new podcast". EW.com. Retrieved May 1, 2020.
  2. ↑ Teotonio, Isabel (September 13, 2012). "Google adds Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon to search engine". Toronto Star. Retrieved January 31, 2018.
  3. ↑ Ruthven, Alexander (April 7, 1994). "Kevin Bacon is the Center of the Universe". Newsgroup:  rec.arts.movies . Retrieved July 19, 2009– via Google groups.
  4. ↑ "6 Degrees of Kevin Bacon: A Social Phenomenon Turns 20 (Full Session) | Interactive 2014 | SXSW". YouTube. Retrieved June 28, 2021.
  5. ↑ "The exact history of 'Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon'". NZ Herald. August 31, 2019. Retrieved June 28, 2021.
  6. 1 2 Fass, Craig; Turtle, Brian; Ginelli, Mike (1996). Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon. New York: Plume. ISBN   978-0-452-27844-8.
  7. ↑ Gasser, Mike; McNulty, Kevin; Turtle, Brian. "About Us". Endless Games. Retrieved June 12, 2021. Founded by industry veterans Mike Gasser, Kevin McNulty and game inventor Brian Turtle, Endless Games specializes in games that offer classic entertainment and hours of fun at affordable prices. The three have an uncanny ability for discovering and developing hit games, having been a part in past successes Trivial Pursuit, Pictionary and Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon.
  8. ↑ Cartoon Network - March 1-13, 1995 Commercials, ID's & Interstitlals (Television production). Cartoon Network. March 1995. Retrieved December 21, 2020.
  9. ↑ "We Married Margo". J.D. Shapiro's Official Website.
  10. ↑ Will and Grace, Season 5 episode 2 "Bacon and Eggs"
  11. ↑ "The Onion, Volume 38, Issue 40". theonion.com. Retrieved May 26, 2013.
  12. ↑ "References Made During Scream 2". Still Screaming.
  13. ↑ "'The Following' Cancelled By Fox". Deadline. May 8, 2015.
  14. ↑ Roush, Matt. "Worth Watching: Super Bowl Mania (Also Kitten and Puppy Bowls), 31 Days of Oscar on TCM, A Case of 'Poisoned Love'". TV Insider. Retrieved June 12, 2021.
  15. ↑ "The Human Family Tree". National Geographic Channel. Archived from the original on July 11, 2009.
  16. ↑ "VISA CHECK CARD The Six Degrees Of Kevin Bacon". YouTube. Archived from the original on December 11, 2021. Retrieved September 4, 2017.
  17. ↑ "EE debuts multi-million pound marketing launch campaign starring Kevin Bacon". The Lovemarks Company, Saatchi & Saatchi London. Retrieved November 5, 2012.
  18. ↑ "I know a guy who knows a guy who knows a guy who knows a guy / Who knows a guy who knows Kevin Bacon". Genius.
  19. ↑ "Word; they be chasin' heaven like Jason Nevin / But there's more degrees of separation than Kevin Bacon". Genius.
  20. ↑ Stromberg, Joseph (February 18, 2013). "Any Two Pages on the Web Are Connected By 19 Clicks or Less". Smithsonian . Retrieved March 22, 2013.
  21. ↑ Albert-László Barabási (February 18, 2013). "Discussion: Network science". Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society . 371 (1987): 20120375. doi: 10.1098/rsta.2012.0375 . PMID   23419844.
  22. ↑ "Andy Gotts' Degrees Exhibition". Clooney Studio. Archived from the original on October 13, 2007.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.