Vulture’s analysis of the market worth of actors and actresses have always been interesting, and I thought the column’s analysis of Zac Efron is particularly worth reading. It’s not because I have any particular investment in that particular young man’s career—at least Romeo+Juliet had some really cracking performances in it, and I don’t think my bewilderment at the corniness and stiffness of High School Musical franchise stems only from my confusion about what Kids These Days like—but because Efron’s in that odd stage where teen stars, and hell, all of us, try to construct a personality.

So far, his tools seem to be allowing news reports that he spent some time and money at a strip club, and reports that he’s working on some more substantive projects, including ones where he takes supporting roles, rather than leading ones. But louche behavior doesn’t constitute a personality. You need to have a reason to do it. If Efron’s going to strip joints because he’s bored with Vanessa Hudgens, or going because she finds it titillating that he goes to strip clubs, or because that’s where young Hollywood comes to do deals these days, those things are interesting. The fact of him having a night out with the boys is not.

Efron’s been acting relatively regularly since he was fifteen. If he wants a personality, perhaps he should go  out and have some actual experiences, like going to college, or having a gap year and traveling. He could take a leaf from Julia Stiles’ path. Even if a second stab at acting doesn’t work out for her, she’s going to have a life, and a self, to fall back on.

I understand why stars want to make guest appearances on television shows, and I understand why television show runners like to have them on. If you’re going to have your characters encounter new people as they go about their lives, wacky or serious, trite or momentous, those new people they meet might as well be a draw on their own. And there are some cases where the famous person cast for the job might also be the best person for it. If you need someone to play a super-flamboyant friend of the gay couple on Modern Family, Nathan Lane really is quite the man for the gig.

But the risk of someone being distracting in such a role, of the audience turning in for the mere oddness of seeing someone very familiar in unfamiliar circumstances, of worlds colliding. And those guest spots? Those could have been work for someone who actually needs it for financial reasons, for reasons of keeping a threadbare career extant, rather than to tweak a career that’s earned its owner millions of dollars.

Man, is this a busy pre-vacation week! First up this morning, Morning Edition aired the episode I taped a while back about Real Housewives of Washington, DC, and I posted an interview I did with one of the stars. It’s absolutely fascinating seeing the gap between how these women are cut and portrayed on screen, and what it’s like to talk to them in person.

Then, yesterday at The Atlantic, I did some musing on the severity of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (I think it’s hilarious that Larsson’s got everyone reading this insanely anti-capitalist book), and wrote about the modernization of Scouting in the U.S. at Ta-Nehisi’s spot.

And as a treat for those of you who made the Song of Fire and Ice discussion here so insanely awesome, there’s a huge post about world-building up there and a great discussion going, with some regular commenters here popping up.