Reality TV Links - Lifecycle of a Reality Show
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Reality TV Links - Lifecycle of a Reality Show
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Welcome to RealityTVLinks.com! A Directory to Reality TV on the web. Lifecycle of a Reality Show 1/14/03 1. Networks, concerned about the cost of talent, try to find strike-proof, lower cost, alternative programming. The younger audience loves it; they grew up on The Real World. 2. Hearing this, some people hang out and decide upon a set of potentially humiliating stupid people tricks that might interest a national audience. 3. The people hanging out pitch the idea to the network. If it’s a go, the network rushes the producers to complete the first iteration and beat the other networks to the punch. 4. The producers become frantic to meet the production deadlines. They send scouts to Melrose Avenue to find “The Price Is Right” rejects with a burning desire to win something, anything, on television. Once the tourist is convinced, a pair of airplane! tickets are waiting for the very next day to get to the set. This method ignores necessary background screening such as criminal, mental health, and dependents. However, it gets the show cast. If the Melrose Avenue method doesn’t work, producers enlist their own personal friends and acquaintances. 5. If it is a talent show, producers attempt to find a ringer without breaking the stated game rules. If it is a sit around all day and watch people squirm show, the staff tries to find people who like to get naked in front of cameras. Neurotics, alcoholics, smokers, and other people who have poor judgment when tempted are courted for the program; they make for good television. Casting agents press the producers to give their star wannabes face time on camera. 6. Contestants sign a 100+-page agreement that gives producers complete control over the show content and the use of all personal images.&n! bsp; The network legally has the right to manipulate the game for ratings, if it wants, and even choose the winner. 7. The show is filmed or taped. Since the producers don’t yet know their target audience, they try to get cheesecake footage for a male audience and soap opera story lines for potential female viewers. As the show airs, the episodes are edited toward that target audience. 8. If the show is a hit, the network tries to find extra time during sweeps to do extra hours about the show—unshown footage, recaps, contestants tell all, etc. This delays the end of the game to build the final night’s audience. 9. Message boards begin praising the people who seem most like primetime or daytime heroes and heroines, and criticizing those with any flaw whose actions don’t fit a typically scripted storyline. In dating shows, the audience ignores human chemistry and roots for the soapiest contestant.! Producers try to keep the people with soapy potential from being eliminated (evicted, voted off, chosen to go, the mole's next victim, etc.--e.g. Bob the comedian on The Bachelorette). 10. Individuals, such as feminists, people against public cruelty, or those who find fault with the program’s method of determining the winner, protest against the show through Email and call outs to local newspapers. They try to create new buzz words such as “wedding porn” and compare viewing the program to “watching a train wreck.” Though these groups have valid arguments, they are ignored if the program has good ratings. 11. The network is surprised by the large audience for the finale and orders two more iterations of the series. 12. Producers and network brass, trying not to fix something they think isn’t broken, do the second iteration exactly like the first. Episode by episode, everything occurs at t! he same moment in the series in the same spot with the same background. The audience watches but is growing bored. Numbers fall. Changes are made for iteration number three. 13. If numbers don’t fall, network brass tries to make crossovers of the reality “stars” to scripted programs with actors. The reality stars are awful and aren’t used again. 14. When the audience tanks and refuses to follow real people in that same scenario yet another time, the network tries a celebrity version. That works for awhile, but again, the concept and lack of scripting makes it old. There are only so many ways people can react in the same situation without acting classes and good scripts. 15. The show is cancelled; sometimes syndicators try to create a daytime version that doesn’t last long. 16. The reality show contestants are forgotten. The network goes out of the! ir way to ignore them. Some contestants do outrageous things in public to get attention and stay in the public eye. The best of these people get cast for yet another reality show. 17. Some guys sitting around a room come up with more stupid human tricks to pitch to a network looking for a low cost alternative to professionally scripted, acted programming.
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