I can’t lie.. when the first season of MTVs Real World debuted in ‘91.. I was hooked. I couldn’t get enough of watching those 7 strangers forced to live with each other.. blah blah, you know the rest. It was an interesting and compelling creation - each character purposefully representing a demographic and giving me someone to identify with. It was reality TV : intriguing, exciting, and well.. real. Not real you say? Yeah - they were living in a Soho Loft that none of them could afford and yeah - most of them were unemployed… but it was “Real” because it had never been done before - these different personas were forced to interact with each other and natural cultural clashes ensued. The whole purpose of the project at the time was to provide an unadulterated look into the lives of strangers forced to occupy the same space…similar to that thing we call the corporate world. I dare to invite the notion that the motive of selling advertising dollars was secondary to creating a genuine documentary of real life.
Some 15 years later, I’ve got to surf through 20 channels showing “reality” programming before finding something worthy of my time. From the Survivors, to the American Idols, to the Celebrity Fit Clubs - we’ve been inundated with an endless slew of “Reality” programming. Hey, don’t get me wrong, a little mindless TV here and there never hurt anybody. But to purport that all of these talent shows, social mixes, and popularity contests that we’re currently watching are REAL is just plain wrong.
A friend of mines recently trekked down to Tinseltown to audition for American Idol 6. She sufferred through about 8 hours of LA Heat at the Rose Bowl to give a 1 minute audition for 2 producers. Taking a step back… this girl has real talent and can actually sing… no wait… she can SANNNNNNNG.. if you catch my drift. After giving it all she had for these 2 judges, she was politely told “Thank you for your time” and given the standard response of “give it a shot next year”. I know what you’re saying.. “competition is fierce on that show”…But holdup, the guy before her, straight off the William Hung template (wild, outlandish, and just straight up weird), badly sang “La Bamba” and obtained himself a pass to the second round. Are you for REAL?
Thus continues my gripe with Hollywood. It’s a machine that continues to fabricate an image and then mass market it to an audience that does not see the smoke or mirrors. There’s so much money behind these “real” shows that the producers cannot cast BORING people (Boring meaning normal, having good values, reserved, etc). I’ve watched so many of these shows where a worthy contender has been voted off by the judges for weak reasons. In truth, those people were nixed because they were considered not capable of being ratings-worthy.
It’s funny, but can you really fault the Studios funding these shows? If we, the public, continue to deliver knock out ratings to watch David Hasselhoff judge a talent show, why wouldn’t they continue to pump that crap out. That would be like walking down the street and passing on picking up an unclaimed $100 bill. Hollywood will only go to the well as many times as we let them… but can we really get through a Wednesday night without hearing a Simon Cowell zinger?
