Marinated in media

I've just read a feature article on Chris Evans in The Guardian, and not for the first time find myself wondering if people who excel in the media start out being decent human beings and are corrupted by it, or if they're like that from the start and it explains why they do well in that murky pool? Evans is so obviously in love with himself, you want to hit him with an anvil. And then I found myself thinking of one Nicky Campbell, to whose Radio Five Live show I used to make a contribution (that makes it sound like I was giving them money, which I wasn't; they were giving it to me). On the air and more so off it,Nicky was like Evans Lite - half-way up his own bum in admiration of himself and astonished if all hands didn't respond with similarly dizzy admiration. There are local examples of this phenomenon among our local media personalities but I'll avoid legal action and maybe a thumping by not naming names. It's perhaps got to do with the effort that projecting a particular public persona requires. After a while the projector begins n to grow into a parody of him/herself, until all that's left is a sort of rattling shell of a man or woman. Mind you, I say this as someone who's dabbled in the shallows of the media world for some 30 years now, so I may be mildly infected myself...