How Reality TV Really Works

David Rupel, author of the article, “How Reality TV Works” begins by talking about his background in not only writing episodes of TV shows, but also his experience in reality TV. He then goes on to talk about the truth about how reality TV actually works. He states that there are 4 rules of reality TV and they are: Planned story vs. followed story, less is definitely more, the rules of storytelling don’t change, and writing is producing.

Planned story vs. followed story talks about how there are two different categories that reality shows can fall into. The first is shows that have very little structure, where everyday events turn into stories such as shows like The Osbournes, The Real World, and Airplane. The second is shows that are heavily formatted, where events are planned before shooting such as shows like Survivor, The Bachelor, and The Amazing Race. The category for shows that have little structure generally take a lot longer to film because one can’t predict when something interesting will happen so shooting over a period of 6 days will cover a single 30 minute episode. When shows are heavily formatted and are planned before shooting, like the second category, generally take a shorter period of time, two to three days to be exact, to create an hour long episode. The second rule, Less is definitely more, talks about how people constantly complain about how edited the show is and that the real story wasn’t being told. He states that the truth is that nobody is interesting all the time, and that he knows this due to his background in reality TV where he watched thousands of hours of raw footage. The third rule, the rules of storytelling do not change, talks about how people tune into a reality TV show expecting that there will be a beginning, middle, and end but this is only an easy task in scripted TV. In reality TV, real people don’t live their lives in scenes, so producers of reality TV must fill in the gaps of stories in people’s lives. He then gives an ethics note stating that reality TV doesn’t make scenes to trick people, not many shows film 24 hours a day so stuff is missed and must be filled in to make it seem complete. The fourth and final rule is writing is producing, and this is simply put that, just like scripted TV, writing and producing go hand in hand.

 The only difference about reality TV is that the characters aren’t played by actors.

After reading the article and seeing all these rules I can say I have a better understanding of how reality TV works and that it is not just scripted and made to look real but be actually fake. Reality TV is something I have always thought of as obviously fake but now I see that it’s only like that to fill missing gaps that couldn’t be caught on camera. Reality TV is a far more intricate process than I think most people know about and it’s no wonder why reality TV is becoming the number one thing watched on television.

 http://www.wga.org/organizesub.aspx?id=1091

Casting Reality TV? It’s Now Difficult To Find Real People

In the article, "Casting Reality TV? It’s Now Difficult To Find Real People", Craig Tomashoff describes the difficulties that modern reality television producers face, when trying to recruit sincere and honest subjects.  In recent years, it has become increasingly hard for producers to find real genuine people to film.  With shows like the "Bachelor" and "Jersey Shore", which have really popularized reality television, more and more people have gone into reality programs with the intent of "showing off" for the camera.  One of the major problems leading to this, is that reality stars who act out and show ridiculous personalities, receive more fame, endorsements, and viewer attention.

 

Tomashoff mentions that it has been nearly twenty years since MTV's "The Real Life" premiered, which is considered to have brought reality TV focused on ordinary people into the mainstream.  Nearly two decades ago, most people were unfamiliar with how reality television worked, and it was much easier for producers to find real people, who would live their normal lives in front of a camera.  In an interview with Lacey Pemberton, a casting director of the "Bachelor", she told Tomashoff, “People have become smarter about these sorts of things, so is it harder to cast? Yes,”.  She went on to say “I want people fresh to the idea of doing this and not so focused on being on television. At the end of the day, I still find it, but do I have to go through more now? I do.”  From this statement, it is apparent that as people have discovered the fame and financial gain that can be made through reality television, many people have felt compelled to exploit this system.

 

Programming executives who, in the past, would travel across the country in search of potential subjects to film, now are approached by talent agencies everywhere.  The Discovery Channel's president, Eileen O’Neill, made a statement in regard to these agencies, basically saying that they have brought some benefits into the industry, accompanied by disadvantages.  She said that the assistance they have gotten from these talent agencies “has both helped and complicated the growth of characters in reality TV.”  With talent agencies involving themselves between television producers and clients, business seems like it is taking a priority over the actual subject of the show.  This makes it even more difficult for reality television producers to keep their cast genuine and real.

 

After reading Tomashoff's article, I personally feel that his perspective on reality television is justified and right for the most part.  The plunge in the quality of reality television seems like it might be largely due to a shift in attitude of both the viewers and the participants.  Viewers have shown that they give more attention towards characters of reality TV with outrageous personalities, and who make controversial choices.  As a result, the participants in reality shows often do questionable things and act out ridiculous personalities, which are far from real.  I believe that the only way for us to have reality television that is genuinely real, is for people to stop encouraging and ignore the participants that act absurdly.

Aristotle, drama and the craft of reality TV

Elizabeth White, author of “Aristotle, drama and the craft of reality TV” claims that Aristotle is the main reasons that reality TV shows exist today. She states that Aristotle found the answer to the question “What makes a play work?” The answer is Character matters, gimmicks and the plot. These essential elements are what it takes to keep the audience engaged and coming back for more. She brings up the show “Survivor” as being the main show to bring all three elements together.

Her first point she brings up is Character matters, a show without problems between characters is like watching paint dry, it’s boring and nobody gets into it. The problems created between characters gives the audience a chance to pick a side or character that they like and cheer for them to win while hoping the other loses. If there were no teams on the game of survivor and everyone was just playing for themselves (even though that’s how it ends up) it wouldn’t be as entertaining to the viewers, you wouldn’t be able to pick out the villains or good guys and root for them throughout. Another example she brings up is the MTV show “Real World” this show is literally pointless without problems between roommates and fights that break out. Every season they are brought to a huge, beautiful house and they always end up trashing the place and some people trying to rip each other’s heads off, and that’s what keeps the viewer’s coming back. More problems, more views in the producers eyes.

Elizabeth’s second point of why reality shows stay alive is gimmicks, “Gimmicks are a necessary evil” says white. A gimmick is a game or challenge that the players are put through in order to move on to the next round. When the players on survivor are put through challenges, which is just another way of getting viewers to watch and stay interested. Another gimmick is telling an emotional story about a certain character just so the audience will feel badly for that character and see how he or she does in the next episodes. However, white does say that too many gimmicks is a bad thing! If there are too many games or loopholes that the characters have to go through it just makes it too complicated to follow and in the end the show loses views, for example the show “The Mole” you probably have never heard of it because it only lasted one season, why so short? The show was filled with games inside of games and the audience couldn’t keep up with it and the ratings went down.

The final point that White makes is Plot, perhaps the most important of them all. The plot of the show at hand is arguably the most important reason viewers keep coming back. Watching a show about people surviving on a tropical island with no interaction with other people besides the ones on the island, and having to use their surroundings to survive is a great way to draw people in. Liz says that “Real people n real time are boring” and she lists the NBA and NFL as examples of being boring. I strongly disagree with that because the amount of people that watch sports on TV such as the NFL and NBA surpasses the number of people that watch reality shows by far. Yes there isn’t much of a plot when it comes to sports but it is still very entertaining and people keep coming back to watch their favorite teams. The producers of these reality shows often create the plot themselves by going through hours and hours of film and cutting out certain pieces to make a story come together to capture the attention of the viewers. These directors are almost like authors themselves except it is a show not a book.

All in all, I do agree with Elizabeth White on certain things such as the three basic elements to a reality TV show and what gets people to keep coming back. Other things such as sports being boring and Aristotle being the genius behind the entire reality TV department I don’t agree with as it is a little farfetched.

Storage Wars Scandal

We have yet another dispute over the reality of reality television. You may or may not be familiar with the popular A&E television show Storage Wars. In this hit “reality” show, optimistic business people bid on the unknown contents of abandoned storage containers with the hopes of making a profit on what they find inside. Sometimes they make a good investment and hit big and sometimes they come up short. As it turns out, the majority of the show including contents of storage units and interviews with characters have been tampered with even though in a press conference the producers denied that they used deceptive tactics in the filming of the show.

Now, the producers of the show are being sued by one of the characters from the first three seasons for being fake. A distraught David Hester claims that since he refused to let the producers “salt” or falsely load his purchased storage containers with interesting finds he seemed less competent than the other business people portrayed on the show. As a result his business suffered and he was forced to close it down.

Hester is arguing that the tactics of Storage Wars violates the Communication Act of 1934, which prohibits “influencing, prearranging, or predetermining outcomes” in “contests of knowledge, skill, or chance,”. This seems like a legitimate claim since the title Storage Wars implies that it is in fact a competition or contest but a judge ruled against a few parts of Hester’s lawsuit because the show is under the protection of the 1^st amendment. “It is not commercial speech, but “expressive free speech” so it has more latitude in what it does and says about itself.”

The show may not have initially been meant for commercial use but the content portrayed by the show includes real business owners and their real businesses.  Even though the main purpose of the show is entertainment, viewers can knowingly and unknowingly form opinions on the people that they see in the show. Since the outcomes and scenes from the show are fake they result in a false portrayal of these business people and unfortunately as Hester claims, bad publicity for him.

Personally, I feel like Hester would have a point if he had said something after the first season but he continued to be a major character on the show for three seasons and only sued A&E after his termination. If the shows portrayal of him was so detrimental to his business then why didn’t he say something immediately?

Is it fair that David Hester’s business had to suffer because of A&E’s quest for high ratings? Do you feel like the law is interpreted properly in this case? Is David Hester to blame for being part of the show for three years and not saying anything until now? Do you think that reality television shows should be able to manipulate their output to such an extent? How fake is too fake? Do you think the laws regarding speech need to be altered to accommodate the changing times?

Full article here: http://www.salon.com/2013/03/13/protecting_reality_tvs_right_to_be_fake/

Does Reality TV Attract Larger-than-life Characters?

The article, “Reality TV attracts, um, larger-than-life characters”, written by Paul Farhi discusses how reality television attracts certain people with “extraordinary” lives. Fahri begins by using three different examples of specific people to prove that reality television is looking for participants that are basically borderline crazy. The first example is about a couple that has previously been on a reality TV series, who had made up a story to get on another television show. The couple had created a horrific story that a runaway balloon had carried their 6-year-old son away. The next story is about a 32-year-old man that had been on two reality television shows, who was suspected of murdering and then dismembering his wife and fleeing the country, later committing suicide. The third story consisted of a couple, who previously appeared on “Real Housewives of D.C.”, who had snuck into a state dinner at the White House, then later bragged about it on Facebook. The author goes on by stating that all three of these stories lead to public attention, getting them all in the spotlight, which is exactly what they wanted.

Farhi goes on by stating that nobody wants to watch a TV show about regular people doing regular things, but would rather watch individuals with ridiculous personalities and individuals who commit outrageous acts. I agree with this because people want entertainment and what provides more entertainment than a TV show starring ridiculous people doing stupid things? Because producers are looking for participants that will provide the most entertainment, a new question is proposed, “How far will producers go in trying to get the best participants who will receive the most ratings and views for the show?” If producers continue to look for these kinds of participants, who knows, maybe murderers will be starring in the next reality television show.

According to Farhi, outrageous behavior is the goal, which, I think, is sadly true. The more outrageous the behavior is, the higher the views and ratings. The author claims that in recent years, reality show participants are chosen from people who are deadbeat dads, who have committed assaults, been tax cheats, appeared in porn films, etc. This goes to show what kind of people producers are looking for to star in their reality show. To me, it’s almost as if they are being rewarded attention for committing crimes and breaking laws.

The article later states that it’s not all the producers’ fault for this and that they aren’t the only ones who need to step up. Fahri says that advertisers could step up by choosing not to sponsor the show and that the audience, the viewers, could also just stop watching and giving the shows more attention.

All in all, I think that reality shows are attracting the wrong kind of people. People with psychological disorders who commit crimes don’t need to be and shouldn’t be in the spotlight. The article states, “Appearing on a reality television show can distort even the most balanced individual’s self-image and self-esteem.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/11/30/AR2009113004267_2.html?sid=ST2009113003525

Producers Sometimes Distort Reality and Undermine the Value of Reality TV

      Andy Dehnart, author of the article, "Producers Sometimes Distort Reality and Undermine the Value of Reality TV" dives right in to the controversy behind reality television, if what is being categorized as reality TV is real or not, and the rules and regulations in creating a "reality" television show. In the beginning of his article, Denhart creates a strong start with an appeal to ethos in that he has claims from former participants on HGTV's hit show House Hunters, with individuals claiming that most of their episodes have been staged or edited to vary from their actual experiences. Which right away allowed an interesting to hook to get readers interested, and following that he dives into everything you need to know about reality TV. 

     

      Denhart begins to define what reality television actual is, "Labeling a television show as "reality TV" represents a contract with the audience that the program has consequence to its real-life cast members." He then begins to give a list of shows that do qualify as real reality TV such as Deadliest Catch, and Whale Wars. He also throws in a key example on how Chef Gordon Ramsay's show Kitchen Nightmares, which is run by two different TV companies in two different countries, vary quite drastically proving to the audience that each director or television channel has a big impact on reality TV. "Both capture a reality: Gordon Ramsay helping troubled restaurant owners, yelling at them, and fixing their problems. But on the Fox edition, Ramsay works much harder to create conflict, and so do the editors; the show's credits note that footage may appear out of order, and that's often used to construct reactions or moments that may never have occurred." 

     One huge point that Denhart makes is that it is not worth it for some of the strenuous work that reality producers have to fake in order to make people believe that their show is still real; and to this I will have to agree as well. Why waste such a time trying to fake in order to keep viewers attached? Personally I find the entertainment in reality TV is the actual part of reality. Seeing what real life individuals have to go through or what is actually going on in their lives. I get slightly irritated when i can tell that scenes are staged or when claimers like the individuals on House Hunters come out and say this is not really what happened. Then that is not the point of reality television plain and simple. If producers have to constantly stage scenes in reality television than their show was not interesting enough to even begin to make a reality show about it.

    A show that I personally just recently watched was a show on the discovery channel claiming that they have found evidence that real life mermaids actually exists. This show has had a few episodes every year or so that they use to tie together to make it seem like this is real. I am not going to lie the show and everything about it was interesting. They had great pieces of evidence, scientists and ex-navy seals explaining why the government is hiding the proof of mermaids from the world, and all sorts of other pieces to really make people believe it is real. After watching this show i had such a determination to find out the truth. After reading articles on Google from cast members of it claiming they are not actually scientists or ex-navy seals, and also explaining that this reality TV program is just a big lie for views. Yes I know it is kind of dumb to believe in such a topic about mermaids anyways but that is not the point. The point is what Denhart said about reality TV and this is not at all. It is just another staged program falsely leading people to believe it is real. 

     With reality TV being such controversy now a days, it is hard to determine what is real and what is not. I believe that producers and major TV corporations don’t understand that some people just want to watch what happens in other people’s lives just like them, plain and simple. Reality television would be a lot better without the falseness and fraud inputted by the producers. 

Reality Television Benefits Society More than Scripted Television Does

The article Reality Television Benefits Society More than Scripted Television Does discusses the controversy surrounding the supposed social value that reality television (TV) has over scripted TV. This article raises the question of whether this claim is actually well-supported, and more importantly, whether this argument even matters.

Hirschorn states that reality TV contains the best factors of scripted TV and documentaries, without the downsides of both.

He claims that scripted TV is not realistic, and does not contain the "emotional truths" that reality TV contains, which are derived from the truths of real life. However, this claim is opposed by the actuality that most people view television for entertainment, not to gain some sort of moral or emotional guidance.

Additionally, he states that documentaries are not objective, since they are designed to support a certain view, while reality TV is objective. This is another misconception, as producers of reality television programs influence what portions of the actors' lives make it into the show, and to an extent, producers influence the contents of the show by manipulating the situations that actors are placed into, in order to make more interesting shows. This is hardly objective.

The cost difference between producing reality and scripted TV is a point that Hirschorn uses to point out the benefits of reality TV. Reality TV has much lower production costs than scripted television programming, so networks are able to allocate the saved money to better fund scripted programming.

One of the main reasons he believes that reality television is better than scripted television is the content: reality TV discusses sensitive real-world subjects. For example, shows such as Real Housewives provide insight into the upsetting actualities of the seemingly perfect upper middle class. The families also face similar issues as other classes. This does prove to be beneficial to society, but it still goes beyond the main point of reality television: entertainment.

Hirschorn states, "The best moments found on reality TV are unscriptable, or beyond the grasp of most scriptwriters." He attempts to show the positives of reality TV compared to other forms of television, as well as reality TV's supposed moral superiority, by stating that it is the only form that truly connects with viewers actual lives. However, this disregards the fact that producers of the reality TV shows specifically select which content to air, in order to attract more viewers attention. Although they may not be scripted, they are still not exactly representative of real life.

Although reality TV may provide societal benefits through its discussion or real-world issues, that is not the main reason they are so popular. The entertainment value of reality television has led to the skyrocket in viewership. It is up to the viewers to decide what they watch, and if they choose to view reality television, so be it.

Ultimately, producers create reality television in order to attract more viewers, and to make more money, not for any sort of moral guidance for viewers. Therefore, the issue of whether reality television is beneficial to society is a pointless issue.