Gwen and Blake May Be Dating (but they aren't Reality TV stars)

According to the gossip press (Lainey, dlisted, Celebitchy) Gwen Stefani and Blake Shelton from The Voice are dating. This would be more exciting if the selfsame people hadn't predicted in advance of Stefani joining The Voice, that NBC's PR department would hint at a potential love match between the two to boost ratings. So maybe they are and maybe they aren't, but the idea is appealing (if somewhat reminiscent of the last season of Nashville - I know, I surprise myself too.)

All that being said, the are-they-or-aren't-they dating bit is the only way in which The Voice is Reality. And the truth is that, while I have a passing interest in Blake and Gwen (I was once a twenty-something at a No Doubt show with 13-year olds, but I digress...), I have shamelessly seized upon this gossip factoid to raise a pet peeve of mine, which is, despite the mainstream media's claims to the contrary, The Voice, American Idol, and Dancing With the Stars are not Reality TV shows.

But, real people!  But, prize! Like, like, Survivor!

Wrong.

Survivor and The Voice are as different as honey badgers and honey bees. Survivor is Competition Reality. The Voice is a talent show.  Shows like The Voice (and Dancing with the Stars and Idol) are, as Sam Brenton and Reuben Cohen put it, "no more than an old television formula - the audition/variety show - repackaged with turn-of-the-century glitz." (And as addictive as popcorn.)

Competition Shows are social experiments, and have their roots in programming like Candid Camera. They take a "regular Joe/Joan," place them in a foreign situation, and see what happens. In the case of Competition shows this means contestants are isolated from their loved ones, housed (or put on an island) with strangers (usually cast to rub them the wrong way), and have their cell phones and computers taken away. To all intents and purposes they are prisoners of production. (On Dancing, by contrast, contestants come and go at will and on The Voice are even united with their families.) The isolation and imprisonment on Competition Shows places an additional burden on the contestants (beyond the burden of simply attempting to win).

The shows also have tight shooting schedules, so contestants work crazy hours (sometimes up to 22 hours a day), with the winner sometimes being not necessarily the best Survivor or House Guest or Chef but, rather, the person up to the rigors of production. The grind of the process basically reveals who these characters become when they have their backs against the wall (and they can't boo-hoo to their mommies).

So while the person (whether they be from Team Blake or Team Gwen) who wins The Voice may be the best singer/performer, the winner of Top Chef is not only the best chef, but the best chef able to perform 24 hours a day, while living with assholes, and having no recourse to familial support. See the difference?

So come on, Blakani, throw down or you ain't real.

Speaking Up for the Kardashian (crazy, I know)

It is a testament to the ubiquity of Kardashian Klan that my seventy-something father-in-law, who doesn't watch television "because it's shit," has recently (and somewhat horrifyingly) emerged as an expert on Kim. And while I would rather stab myself repeatedly in the head with a dull fork than watch their show, there's a shitton of Klan facts clotting up my brain. For one thing I know that they are called the Klan.

For another I know that matriarch Kris Jenner whores out her family relentlessly (literally, in the case of Kim's exquisitely produced sex tape whose release spurned the Keeping Up With the Kardashians juggernaut); that Michael K at Dlisted has tagged her Pimp Mama K (PMK) and Satan's Homegirl, labels that have caught fire across the inter webs; that her other nickname is "a source" in multitudinous TMZ and E! articles about the family. 

I know that Kim married some dude named Kris Humphries (dumping him immediately thereafter) seemingly solely to provoke the ratings bonanza that was their televised wedding.  

I know that she has since married Kanye West. 

Finally, I know that Khloe Kardashian was married to Lamar Odom (I don't follow basketball, so this is the only way I know of him) and that he was struggling with an addiction that many seem to attribute to his involvement with the Klan. 

This is a family born for the side eye.

And yet, I find myself surprisingly inclined to defend them amidst the vitriol that Odom's recent OD has unleashed. The moment commentators became aware that Khloe and Kris had gone to his Vegas hospital, folks seized their pitchforks. Apparently, it was impossible to believe that Lamar's almost ex-wife and her mother might legitimately want to be by his bedside. Or that her older sister might later join them to show support. 

Accusations that they had taken cameras from KUWTK along with them to the hospital were soon disproven. And commentators even begrudgingly conceded that maybe the K Klan's concern about Odom might be valid. However, they warned, only time will tell how genuine that concern might be: if the OD storyline is covered on the show, that will prove that PMK, Kim and Khloe really are just in it for the bucks!

Well, why wouldn't/shouldn't it be covered in the show? ::Ducks for cover::

There are those (many in this industry) who will say, look, Odom signed a release, he's fair game. I won't even go there. (I strongly question whether people truly understand what signing a release means when you are dealing with the likes of us, but that's a conversation for another post). Rather, I need to point out that KUWTK is a Docu-Soap, and on a Docu-Soap the participants' lives are the show. If this were about Jeff Probst and Survivor, we would not be having this conversation. His off-camera life would be irrelevant.

KUWTK, however, is about the K family, a family that is extremely present in both the tabloid and mainstream press. Odom isn't some random guy who Khloe happens to have sunk her claws into; this is the woman's almost ex-husband, and she happens to have the legal responsibility to determine his medical care. So, not covering the overdose would be glaring. 

How are they (the producers or the cast) supposed to continue shooting a show about this family without addressing the fact that the ex of one of them almost died? And, as much as you might hate the K Klan, surely you acknowledge that Khloe has the right to represent/discuss her own life. And if Odom doesn't want to appear, or his family dislikes how he's portrayed, a mere threat of a lawsuit generally convinces producers to remove offending material (just ask the cast and producers of Love and Hip Hop). 

Which doesn't mean I think this is all kittens and rainbows. Do I think that producers will want this material covered because of the potential ratings boost? Of course. As individuals, they may or may not care for Odom (likely they do: it happens when you're shooting with someone), but they will also want to include this kind of material because it benefits a show with declining numbers. PMK, in turn, is equally invested in seeing the material on the air, and for the same reason. But none of this proves or disproves that Khloe has genuine feeling for her ex. 

I can't speak to the state of Khloe Kardashian's soul. Or to whether Pimp Mama Kris has one. Either way, the scales won't be tipped for me if his OD is included in the show. And I do think that covering a character forced to confront the potential death of a loved one, is something that, as a producer, I would want to do. And I believe (in this one instance!) that doing so is completely ethical. 

#kimkardashian #kuwtk #kardashians #khloekardashian #prayforlamarodom #lamarodom

Human Resouces

Pivot's Human Resources has just debuted it's second season. To date the show has received largely (deserved) glowing reviews.  However, the degree to which HR is scripted seems to be the major, and frankly unimportant, issue for the reviewers.  USA Today writes:

Though rooted in reality, it's obvious that parts of Human Resources are scripted and planned, but the show doesn't attempt to hide that. 

Meanwhile, Really Late Review is less certain that the show is scripted, saying:

The fact that I couldn’t tell whether the show was real or not was clever in my opinion. Many shows are too obvious in what style they are (sitcoms feature same, staple humor and situations, while reality shows put people in extreme situations for attention seeking purposes), so I appreciated how the show had me guessing from the beginning.

And the Grey Lady herself concludes its positive review with yet another reflection on how "real" the show is:

Human Resources shows what happens when you put people on screen who have grown up with video cameras. Everyone’s comfortable, no one seems to be performing for the camera. 

Basically these reviewers would have it that a show rises or falls either on how real it is, or how craftily it addresses the fact that it isn't.  While this simplistic obsession may have been excusable back in, I don't know, 1995/6 when The Real World first broke, after over twenty-five years the time has come for a modicum more insight into the Reality genre.  And we may as well start by discussing the primary (and most flawed) assumption: that Reality is some kind of homogenous category.  It is not.  Rather it is a variety of genres (Docu-Soap, Competition, Follow Doc) that share only the fact that the participants in the show are real people playing themselves.  

Thus a review will contain comparisons between shows as diverse as Survivor (which is a Competition Reality) and Real Housewives of Atlanta (a Docu Soap) as though such comparisons were viable or even fruitful. In fact, there are as many different genres of Reality as there are of narrative, and no self-respecting reviewer of the latter would compare Film Noire to a Romantic Comedy (or even compare a Romantic Comedy, like 13 Going on 30, to a Western spoof like Blazing Saddles).  I'm trying to bring a more nuanced--read: NUANCED--insider's approach to Reality; starting with this review.

Set in a start-up recycling business, TerraCycle, and following owner Tom Szaky and his band of quirky scientists, designers and sales agents, HR has its antecedents in shows like Small Town Security (AMC - and also produced by many of the same people at Left/Right), Duck Dynasty (A&E), even The Osbournes (MTV): half hour shows that promote humor over drama.  Called Reality Sitcoms within the industry, these shows can be extremely scripted, like Duck Dynasty in which "real" people are thrown into absurd situations, or borderline Follow Docs like Small Town Security or The Osbournes.  

Now, I don't work on the show and while (full disclosure) I know and respect many of the main players behind the scenes I have no idea how scripted the show actually is.  Given my experience in Reality, however, I would say: somewhat. We have limited shooting schedules so chances are some scenes need to be scheduled and don't just fortuitously happen.  But whether the show is knowingly scripted (as USA suggests) or benefits from a great cast (as The Times asserts) is not of great interest to me. 

What makes Human Resources sui generis (and a pleasure to watch) is that it steers clear of either produced or happenstance conflict (sometimes we do actually luck into screaming fights between cast members).  Instead, it illustrates the small adjustments that are far more common in everyday life. Like, for example, the difficulty a quirky new Canadian employee Tony, encounters while adjusting to the zany environment of TerraCycle (the B Story for this episode); or how Dan and Randi manage to land (with the assistance of the team) a mid-level contract (an A Story that steers clear of the usual over-the-top Reality stakes e.g. "If we don't land this contract, the whole business is gonna go down the shitter," or what you will).  Along the way the viewer also gets some take-away about the recycling business, from TerraCycle's sometimes hilarious science team, that feels fun rather than forced.  

These are the smaller conflicts those of us who live in the everyday world can relate to, and the kind of conflict that is under-explored in Reality for exactly that reason. Those of us in the industry have long complained about the usually broadcaster-mandated fake drama/stakes that we are forced to implement in most of our shows.  This commitment to over-the-top "stakes" ultimately becomes a parody of itself in shows like the now-canceled Kimora: Life in the Fab Lane, where every single task undertaken by Ms. Simmons' long-suffering team is a matter of life or death.   


In addition to having a pretty unique show in HR, Pivot has a pretty clever and unusual ad campaign.  Basically, it wants to appeal to viewers who either don't watch Reality or, more likely, watch Reality and feel humiliated for doing so. Hence, the tagline for Human Resources is  "Takes the trash out of TV one day at a time" (which, I assume, references trashy TV like Housewives and Love and Hip Hop in addition to the recycling business TerraCycle engages in.  And if you missed that obvious diss of all Reality, Belisa Balaban EVP of Original Programming for Pivot makes it even clearer, "Human Resources is an unexpected blend of classic workplace comedy within the structure of a process-driven Science show.  It is distinctive and delightful, and it's a reality show you can feel good about watching*."  

*And also, I strongly suspect, about producing. 

You just can't say that for most shows.  We really could use a lot more Human Resources out there.  

Human Resources screens on Pivot on Fridays at 10 pm ET/PT

UnREAL: Episode 7

Episode 7 of UnREAL deals with the fallout from cast member Mary's on-set suicide. The story line initially bugged me because it didn't seem believable. The only suicide I could recall was that of Sinisa Savija, who appeared on the first version of Survivor, a Swedish show called Expedition Robinson. His suicide provoked such a scandal that the network almost canned the series (as the Survive! format was launched with this show, one might well wonder how it might have fared after that).

However, as I discovered when Googling “suicide” and “Reality TV”, the words appear in close proximity with alarming frequency. There's even this handy-dandy slide show of reality cast members who have died, and a fair number of them killed themselves. You may note that Kitchen Nightmares has been particularly lethal, clocking 2 suicides; Russell Armstrong, a member of the Real Housewives of Beverly Hills cast, killed himself after fearing how he was to be represented in an upcoming season of the show; not mentioned on this list is the suicide of Kellie Williams a participant on Extreme Makeover.

It is this final suicide that most closely resembles what happened on UnREAL, where there is little doubt that some combination of Rachel and Shia -- both Field Producers -- were responsible for Mary's suicide. Basically, Kellie Williams' sister Deleese was selected to appear on Extreme Makeover as a plastic surgery candidate. As part of the show, Kellie was interviewed about her sister's looks. According to family members during that interview producers “goaded” Kellie into saying negative things about Deleese's appearance, things that Deleese overheard. As it turns out Deleese's surgery was canceled at the last minute (her recovery time apparently “wouldn’t fit the show's schedule”), exacerbating the issue between the sisters. Because now Deleese knew her sister considered her ugly, and she couldn't even have the corrective surgery to address it. Four months later Kellie, overcome with anguish, committed suicide. The family filed a lawsuit holding the Producers culpable.

The Extreme Makeover suicide is exceptional, however. Reality-related suicides generally seem to occur after the show has aired, and this isn’t a coincidence. Field Producers—while wily (and often evil)—can seldom rise to the level of unabated cruelty practiced by Post Producers. To clarify: when a show is shooting it is usually in the edit at the same time. So there are producers shooting in the field (Field Producers), and producers in Post (Post Producers) working with editors to craft the story. While Field Producers see cast members as human beings (and require the good will of casts to perform their jobs), Post Producers tend to view cast members as characters in a script they're writing. Their intent isn't to represent people accurately but, rather, to present the most compelling version of a person (even if that version is less than desirable to the actual person). If the cut reflects the reality, great, if it doesn't reflect the reality, they don't care (much). They just want to get their fucking cut past the network, and they will do whatever it takes to make that happen. If Kellie Williams was upset with how her sister reacted to her words in an interview, god knows how she would have reacted if Post had gotten their claws on it.

There is no overstating the havoc that can be wrought on an individual by an adept Post Producer. And cast members aren't the only ones whose characters are impacted in this process. Because in the process of coldly transforming people into often inaccurate, or at least incomplete archetypes, Post Producers are themselves transformed.  Spend enough time in Post crafting people's words against them and creating conflict out of whole cloth and even the nicest and most well-meaning among us can devolve into arrogance. After all, we are godlike, creator of worlds. And with such arrogance comes a loss of empathy for the real people whose real lives we impact.  Because, whereas Rachel and Shia have literal blood on their hands and are plagued by the awareness of their sins, a Post Producer kills from afar and without consequence.   

Long story short: Post Producers need to occasionally get the fuck out of their chairs and head into the morass that is Production, lest they lose their souls entirely.

UnREAL: Episode 4

Episode 4 of UnREAL ::SPOILERS AHEAD:: heads into new territory with Rachel committing to both a better wardrobe (yay) and her job.  Also, instead of spending her time fucking over cast members (in every way ever done on any Reality show ever), on this episode Rachel tackles nothing more sexy than set decoration. Turning some shitty location—in this case bachelor Adam’s vineyard—into something presentable both to the damsels he’s courting and the discerning home audience… now, that’s real. It is far more common (and infuriating) for Producers to spend time dressing up a location than taking down the cast.

The fact is, Producers don't have to waste time manipulating blowups and breakdowns on Competition Reality (into which genre UnREAL’s Everlasting would fall); the production model does it for us. You see, a Competition Reality set is a prison and the cast the prisoners.  This scenario alone is far more effective at lighting fuses and pulling triggers than we ever could be.  

Say, for instance, you’ve been cast in The Bachelor.  Now, just getting to this point has been a full-time job, involving detailed applications, shooting, editing and submitting a casting reel, taking a screen test, and consenting to a psych eval.  By the time you made it onto the show you’d committed so much unpaid labor to achieving your goal that you were in it for the long haul (more about this later).  After all, you’re well on your way to winning a millionaire’s hand in marriage!

Farewell to small town fetters: your shitty apartment; your family (who, let's face it, never quite got you); and your Yorkie named Boo, and Hello to your handsome future husband; a made-for-TV mansion; and 20 or so other bitches cast specifically to piss you off.  You blithely surrender your phone, computer, ID, credit cards, and money upon coming into our custody (that's the actual term), effectively severing all contact with the outside world and—literally—shedding your identity.  For the next six weeks (give or take) we decide where you live, and when or if you can eat, sleep or take a shit.  

For the next six weeks you are constantly observed by cameras, fellow cast members, Producers, or Cast Wranglers (who live with and monitor the cast).  Privacy exists solely in the toilet (provided we've given you permission to go) but even there, if you leave your mic pack on, we can hear you weeping.  And weep you might.  Whereas on a show like Housewives we may shoot 12 hour days, on Competition we can shoot anywhere up to 24 hours a day.  The niceties of a meal break every 6 hours doesn't apply, especially when you're shooting 12 episodes in six weeks.  

A typical day begins at 6 am when we arrive to shoot house reality.  By 8 you're lined up to learn about the day's challenge.  The challenge is shot from 10 am to noon.  You learn if you're a winner/loser from 1 pm to 2, then it's on to the next challenge and so on for 14 physically and emotionally grueling hours (because who actually revels in being literally judged on a daily basis).  After that it’s back to the cast house to shoot more reality.  And then to bed?  You wish.  Nights are when we often have to shove in interviews, which accounts for most of the explosive shit that comes out of people's mouths.  Who can blame you?  By day three you're pretty much delirious/belligerent constantly.

Consider who you'd become if you were confined for 24 hours a day with people deliberately cast to rub you wrong; if you slept on average 4 hours a night; if you were away from anyone who gave two shits about you; if you worked all day every day and every other night were liquored up and lined up to be judged by some douchebag with roses.  Would you lose your mind?  Become a Bitch?  Whimper like a Whiner?  Display emotions that can be interpreted as Needy?  Congratulations: you've just become The Bitch, Whiner or Needy Nelly of the season. (We don't do subtlety on Reality TV).

Once you wake up to the – ahem – reality of your situation, why do you choose to stay? (And stay you will, like nearly every other prisoner without whom the networks would have no ratings.) There’s that time you spent getting here in the first place, when your family said you were nuts to try and your friends suggested you should just stick to your career… There’s that Appearance Release you signed, too. Don’t you have to legally compete until you are eliminated, no matter how unhappy you may be? (Um, no, but don’t let us disabuse you of that misconception.)   Finally, and most disturbingly, you will stay because doing what you’re told becomes a habit.  You accept the role of prisoner.  (In fact, Jan de Bont, one of the creators of Big Brother cites the Stanford Prison Experiment as inspiration for that show.)  

The question, though, is not only why you accept your role as prisoner. Rather, it is why we Producers so readily accept our role as your guards.  Oh, and also, where can I get my hands on that leather Rachel’s wearing? 

#UnREALLifetime #BachelorABC #Survivor_Tweet #CBSBigBrother #bbUK #AmazingRace_CBS #CompetitionReality #RealityTV