MFHTDWF #10

Principle: Don’t kill anybody.

While it is both fascinating and terrifying to hear that someone has murdered another person – particularly that someone you “know” has murdered another person – famous people who have killed other people, with the exception of gansta rappers (who earn more street cred for having killed someone else) and serial killers (who become famous by means of their killing), cease fascinating and terrifying their audience once the trial begins.

Courtroom trials are boring. In fact, they are so boring that the only thing worth going to court over is sex. (See MFHTDWF #11.) A murder trial may be the most yawn-worthy of all trials, since it’s long and involves a lot of boring details.

If you are a gangsta rapper with the bad fortune of having been put on trial before you could fake your own death, thus precipitating a popularity unrivalled by the living, you should follow the principles of MFHTDWF #11, using an alibi that is suspiciously thin, explicitly sexual, or both (though it is best to be able to prove you are participating in the sexual exploits you claim to be participating in). If you are a serial killer, you should confess immediately in order to get as much fame as you can. Serial killers in jail are more fascinating and terrifying than serial killers on the loose – escaped or free serial killers are only terrifying and infamous rather than famous.

On the whole, however, it’s important to avoid even appearing to have killed anyone, which is the best way to avoid being associated with a boring trial that will invariably leave you either in jail (and out of the public eye and so less famous) or free but still a killer in the public eye.

Famous people who follow this principle: Three of the Baldwin brothers, including Alec, Britney Spears, Yanni

Famous people who are exceptions to this principle: Tupac, John Wayne Gacy

Famous people who fail at this principle: O.J. Simpson