A brief history (probably things you already know, so feel free to skip): Reality tv arguably started for this country in 1992 with MTV's The Real World which was a relatively groundbreaking concept of putting seven people into a house with no objective and filming it. To be honest, the first season of The Real World was pretty uninteresting to watch. This is probably because the first cast was relatively, well, real...Kind of, so there wasn't much to it. It was normal people with normal jobs living together in New York. Then MTV changed it up. They figured out that they should put 7 opposing and extreme personalities together in a house to see what happens. Then it started getting interesting. Then in 1994 the world was introduced to Puck. Puck was easily the rudest, most foul, most disgusting, and least socially inept individual that has ever appeared on the show. And the audience loved him. Now 16 years from it's original inception, The Real World is still running strong. But as many people know, that which is hot on MTV does not necessarily translate to the rest of the world, and reality tv didn't really take off. But the new millennium would bring about a new television show that would captivate this country. I am speaking of course of Survivor. It was a brilliantly simple concept. Take 16 people to a deserted island, taunt them with games for immunity and other rewards, and at the end of each episode all players cast a vote for whoever they feel should be booted for the island, highest number of votes gets kicked off, and the last player remaining wins a million dollars. This show absolutely took over the television. Since the inception of survivor, countless reality shows were born including Big Brother, The Bachelor, The Bachlorette, Joe Millionaire, The Surreal Life, Flavor of Love, Rock of Love, A Shot at Love, Project Runway, I Love New York, The Amazing Race, America's Next Top Model, and the list goes on and on and on. All of which being based around "real people" being put together in close proximity and competing for something through a series of eliminations while being filmed all the while.
I know what you are thinking: "But isn't reality television really lots of regular people placed in this strange environment rather than one normal person and lots of strange people?" Well to answer that, watch a reality television program and tell me if anyone is "normal." Anyone cast in a reality television show is purposely abnormal, yet abnormal in different ways, it is like having Jedi knights, fraggles, senators, Gary Coleman, and fans of Journey all thrown together into a cosmic blender and poured into a house, RV, desert island, cruise ship, or any other setting of choice. This is in hopes to enhance 1) possible clashing of personalities and 2) the hopes that two or more of these nutbars will have sex all in the name of captivating the audience. This abnormality is no secret. Each person on the show recognizes everyone as being abnormal except for one person: him or her self. Hence, each reality show is a view of a set of individuals living in a bizarre environment with bizarre people rather than a group of "normal" people interacting in a bizarre environment.
Anyone who has ever read The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test should grasp this concept relatively easily. Early in the reading, i was struck by the concept of the "movie" that the merry pranksters were making. The long and the short of it is this: a group of people travelled across the country in a van with a lot of LSD. They documented the journey with a video camera. They then decided that that which exists through the lens of the camera is a microcosm of the universe at large i.e. mankind exists as a series of movies. Each individual is the star of their own movie and when two or more people interact, there exists conflict over who's movie takes precedence. In other words, if you and I interacted, would you be a part of my movie, or would I be a part of yours? Aparently if you eat acid you will understand. Of course the answer to the question lies in whoever dominates the story such that the focus is on them. The idea then was to constantly be in control of one's own movie as well as the greater movie. This is why one of my favorite self-motivating quotes is "it's my movie." Keep in mind, I am by no means a literature scholar, and I may have missed the boat on this concept completely, but that description is a bit of what I got out of the book, and I am happy with it. Afterall, this is my movie.
This then goes back to reality television as a more concrete example of Ken Kesey and company's conceptual idea because not only is it a bunch of wackos trying to dominate eachother, but there is actual film rolling all the while. Who dominates the world of a reality television program? It is in that struggle that reality television succeeds. Is season 1 and 2 of The Flavor of Love Flava Flav's movie, or does it become New York's? I would render a guess that it was intended to be that of Flav's but New York was so dominant that she partially took over and for brief moments, it became her movie. Therefore it is no surprise that MTV gave her her own reality show. But Flavor of Love wasn't really about the struggle between Flav and New York, it was between New York and several other women with Flav being the final prize. Several individual women compete to make their movie dominate, and as time goes on and women are eliminated from competition, their movie's end, and the woman who dominates the entirety of the movie, or prove to be fittest to survive in the twisted Darwinian sense, wins. All elimination based reality television works this way. It is a battle of the titans, Sharks versus jets, Montagues versus Capulets, Bears versus Packers, except there aren't teams (ok sometimes there are), so it is more like Marty McFly versus 1955, or Bob Dylan versus the Newport folk festival.
Non-elimination reality television, like The Real World, is a little different. It is suspenseful due to the lack of elimination, but often times it is more interesting to watch. It is amazing what happens when you take 7 attracting twenty-somethings, stick them in a house loaded with booze, and take away all jobs or ambitions. The lack of a common goal just seems to make them want to either engage in passionate violence or passionate sex, and how could that not be a recipe for good television? As long as you are able to exist in a fantasy world with bizarre strangers without doing something that would require you to be booted off the show by your fellow bizarros or the show's producers, you are golden, oh and apparently you and the rest of your housemates have to get naked and make out in the hottub at least once every season. The Real World scenerio is more closely resembling the Gilligan's Island scenerio where the only goal is to survive. Oh and one more thing, anyone who appears on a reality show of anykind has to become an amateur psychologist and have no problem talking about your own other people's feelings ad nauseum at the drop of a hat.
There is one last phenomenon as far as reality television goes, and it is that of the reality television star. Take the case of Coral Smith. Coral was a cast member on The Real World in 2001. She was such a strong and dominant character that she has since achieved minor fame as a reality tv star by appearing in MTV spinoffs like The Gaunlet for the next 7 years. Coral has litterally made a career out of appearing on television as herself because she dominates the movie and stirs up enough drama and controversy that it keeps the shows going and makes them interesting. A number of people have done this both from the Real World and Road Rules as well as elimination based reality television. Some names you might recognize (if not, consider yourself a better person for it): The afformentioned Coral (The Real World, The Gauntlet) New York (Flavor of Love, I Love New York), Mr. Boston (I Love New York, I Love Money), , CT (The Real World, The Gauntlet), Lacey (Rock of Love 1 and 2), Domenico (A Shot at Love, That's Amore), Johnny Fairplay (survivor, I Love the New Millenium), and the list goes on. These people have "played themselves," and have achieved some bizarre level of fame for it proving to us all that from time to time actual people are equally or more captivating than fictional characters. The downside? For the rest of your life you are branded as "that guy/girl from that show."
I quote Seth Cohen of The OC (that's right, I am quoting the OC, a blog for a later day) when I say "why watch the angsts of fictional characters when you can watch real people in contrived situations?" turns out who ever writes the fictional narrative of Seth Cohen managed to nail the concept of why I love reality tv on the head. Maybe my reasoning is flawed, maybe I am a total loser to love all of these shows, and maybe I am wasting my time and energy, but who cares, Like I said, it's my movie.
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