At one end of the spectrum are those who scream: “Take me, take me!”, prostrating themselves (not always metaphorically) before anyone who’ll have them and desperately seizing any opportunity to get their name in the papers. Warning signs that someone has chosen this path include writing a warts’n’all autobiography at an early age (Katie Price, Wayne Rooney, Geri Halliwell) and letting your public get close to you via the medium of smell by launching a “ signature fragrance”. Ronan Keating’s Believe, the library of smells emanating from J.Lo, Jade Goody’s Shh... — they’re a cry for our love as well as our money.

Then there are those (mantra: “Take me seriously”) who refer to the day job as “my art”, go to extreme lengths to avoid vulgar publicity and sign up for earnest biopics (Sienna as Edie Sedgwick, Gwynnie as Sylvia Plath). Becoming a charity ambassador is the classic sign here: take Ewan McGregor, who has his Unicef work in Africa. He has the talent plus It factor that make him a star, and eyes that put a girl in mind of a tropical lagoon, although his approach to press and facial hair lately has been: “Make me look as dull and ugly and serious as possible.” Clearly, he made a decision. “If you chase fame, you’re just going to end up miserable and unhappy,” he told Playboy magazine. And yet, while he may not have Eau de Ewan to peddle, he still gets paid by the BBC, which was happy to film this famous man’s interminable motorbike-trip jolly with his best friend.

His friend Nicole Kidman recently gave a rash of interviews about her work as a UN goodwill ambassador to India. Finding out what is in her make-up bag is somewhat harder.

Post Tom, Kidman has turned her wan, po-faced brand of suffering into an art form, and it shows no sign of abating now she’s married. She recently attacked Angelina Jolie for cashing in on charity work. “It's not like Angelina is any better than a nurse working in a hospital, but she’s getting the publicity for her contribution.” An eloquent summation of the “take me seriously” tribe from one who clearly knows.

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