Just a Thought about Reality Shows

Go read Dave's post "Fallacies" if you haven't yet, it's much more weighty than this academic observation I've made:

Reality shows take place in the past.

Almost all of other storytelling formats - fictional TV, movies, novels, plays, even some documentaries - take place in the "literary present." Because fiction is made up and never actually happened, it "is happening" whenever you watch/read it - even if the setting is historical.

Reality shows, however - the kind that simply follow (and impose through judicious editing a narratife structure upon) the lives of various interesting individuals and pseudo-celebrities - can not take place entirely within the "literary present." Why? Because the lives of these real people continued after the show was finished being filming, and still continue to this day (or at least until their death). There is, in other words, story outside of the "story." A reality show, in this sense, is much more like, say, a show on the History Channel - a narrative imposed on the past - than it is like a scripted drama.

Sure, reality show producers enforce a code of silence on their subjects and crews to prevent the viewers from learning about the intervening history, but no matter what they do - particularly in the case of public figures who we are already aware of (like Marion Barry) - those peoples' lives continued after filming was done.

News programs, by contrast, take place in the actual present (excepting a trivial reporting delay). Documentaries either fall into the review-of-the-past type and are thus similar to reality shows as mentioned, or are stories imposed on random subjects in a version of "literary present." (Like the Earth series.)

However, unlike history shows, reality shows seem claim to be "literary present" because of the way they are shown; and unlike documentaries that are current but become dated, reality shows were dated from the very moment they aired.

(Note that this does not apply to some genres of reality shows, mainly contest-type ones like Top Chef, which, like game shows, take the contest [with its clear beginning-and-end] as their subject; since the contest ends with the show, it doesn't have the same issue with meta-show continuing lives as, say, Real World or The Osbournes.)

There has always been, for me, a slightly uncanny or awkward feeling to watching person-based reality shows, and I think this is something to do with it.

Some literary theory ruminations for your Friday morning!

The End of an Affair, or How I Became Disillusioned with My Favorite TV Show

What do Charlie Bartlett, the Lifetime Movie Network, Juno, Jay and Silent Bob, the national tour of Spring Awakening and the musical stylings of Aubrey “Drake” Graham and Cassie Steele have in common?

If you said Degrassi: the Next Generation, then you are correct. If you somehow made some other unrelated connection, then I mean, congratulations.

I am a bit too young to have been a fan of the show the first time around in the 80s, but I have followed the reincarnation with increasing emotional investment since 2000. I own almost every single season since 2000, and I have seen most of those episodes a countless number of times. I know the actors' names and histories, and am suddenly much more interested in whatever media I happen to catch one. I gained a good friend and roommate through Degrassi: upon his first visit to look at our spare room, he casually noticed my six seasons proudly displayed on the mantle and said, "You guys watch Degrassi, too?" and that's all it took. He was in. Because I am, in a word, obsessed.

So it is with relative authority that I feel I can speak on the subject of its demise.

The thing that I love(d) about Degrassi is that, given its cheesiness, its overt drama, its often (but not always) terrible acting, there is always a real, pressing issue rooted in each episode. Degrassi addresses subject matter most television shows with a pre-teen target audience would not touch with a ten-foot pole: drugs, violence, sexuality, abuse, illness, religion, hormones. There are very few clear-cut answers and not every storyline ends happily, though some do (and others are just hilarious.) Regardless, there is always some forbidden door opened, some pandora's box unleashed, allowing viewers to confront, at least in a third party way, some of the most pressing, least talked-about issues that face teenagers today.

Or I suppose I should say there was.

Because the past several seasons of Degrassi, or what one may call the Weird Half Generation Now That Everyone Interesting Has Left the Show, have been crap. Complete and utter crap. One may as well be watching Hannah Montana or The Hills for all the social mores they have tackled. I am not the only die-hard who has noticed this, and it shows in the numbers: from 2002-2004 it was the top-rated Canadian drama for teens and adults in several age ranges covering 13 to 54. In 2006 it was the highest rated digital cable series in the US. Then in 2008, season 7, also known as the last season that meant anything to me, started losing its fanbase. Viewer numbers dropped and kept dropping throughout that season and the following two. (Note: most of my information I get from Wikipedia but you can double check it if you really feel the need.)

The first two episodes of season 7 dealt with date rape, the use of roofies in particular, and they held much potential to spark conversation on a subject so taboo the American television station refused to air it at first. (This is not the first time that station refused to air controversial material; the third season contains several episodes not seen by American audiences until the season was released on DVD, about a fourteen year old who chooses to have an abortion after consensual unprotected sex.)

However, instead of accurately portraying the effects of rufilin to educate and open up the subject to an extremely young, ill-informed demographic, the show's producers (or whoever) chose to go The Hangover route and used the drug as a throw-away plot point. The actress, Shenae Grimes, was lauded for her portrayal of a physically and emotionally wrought young woman trying to keep her terrible secret to herself, which is redeemable, certainly, and does in some way address this awful subject, but it was not at all accurate or educational on the matter of the extremely dangerous (especially so since no one seems to know what its real effects are) drug referenced. Season 7 was also nominated for a GLAAD Media Award for Best Drama Series, which is always good. But just not good enough.

Because even by the end of season 7 the plot had become like an absurd mix of Saved by the Bell and Passions. Record label contracts, stem cell research and modeling replaced the plain old everyday unresolved teen drama that made me love this show so much.

Season 7 also saw the end of silly throwaway references to an unseen character I had grown to know and love with the introduction of Holly J, sister of oft-referenced-but-never-actually-seen Heather Sinclair. Heather Sinclair was like the bigfoot of Degrassi, sometimes allowing us a glimpse of her elbow or her nose at the edge of the screen. Once we saw her whole back. More often she was simply mentioned in passing, and never with a positive note. She was just That Girl Everyone Passively Hates; you know the one. And the sly introduction of her inherently evil sister made her a specific character, immediately and permanently ruining all the fun.

The other greatest-thing-about-Degrassi-that-no-one-else-had, besides its accuracy at pinpointing teenage social issues, was its accuracy at portraying the look of real teenagers. The actors were cast within a year or two of their characters' ages, pimples be damned (and largely unmakeuped), and each actor was given a wardrobe that varied and changed with his or her respective character's socioeconomic status and homelife. One of the characters literally wore the same dirty hoodie for three seasons in a row, because that's what kids do. They have acne and don't always know how to deal with their hair and they find one clothing article that they love and they never leave it.

But here we are again in the awful present, and the past two seasons have been full-to-bursting with professional makeup and perfect coifs and designer clothes. It's like suddenly the producers realized it was a popular show, gave it a budget with a capital B, and, oh, fired everyone that ever made it awesome. Or hypnotized them. Or full-on body snatched them, I don't know.

I don't watch The Hills because I don't care about spoiled teenagers with designer nails who are treated like CEOs. Degrassi was great because it was interesting, and ground-breaking, and, despite the sometimes cheesy script, it rang true. I knew these kids because I went to junior high and high school with these kids. They were confused, and rash, and hormonal, and they did stupid things to their hair. They were funny without meaning to be, and, every once in awhile, funny on purpose. They thought they were adults but they very definitely weren't.

Without those true things, those reflective "I get that" moments, Degrassi: the Next Generation is just one more trash program about two-dimensional adolescents clogging up the airways. Degrassi needs to, in the immortal words of GOB Bluth: shape up or ship up. My advice is for the show to take off the polish, go back to its ridiculous-enough roots, STOP GIVING ITS CHARACTERS MODELING CONTRACTS, or just get off the air. For a disgruntled fan I know I've given a lot of time and energy to this show post-heyday, but now I've finally said my piece.

Maybe now I can rest.

The Meeting of Art and Commerce

There was an article in today's NY Times about the head of programming at NBC. The article itself is mildly interesting, although the actual title of the article should have probably been - "Huge asshole, now a slightly smaller asshole, and probably will soon be an unemployed asshole." But the really interesting thing was the attached chart showing all the shows that had come and gone during his tenure. Some of these shows, you just have to wonder. My Dad is Better Than Your Dad? Superstars of Dance? I realize the stations are obliged to fill air time, but isn't there something just slightly better they could have chosen instead of these shows?

The chart demonstrates where we are right now as far as largely commercial forms of art are concerned. Movies and television are in a very strange spot. I don't doubt for a second that execs already know that gimmicky reality shows or endless sequels of sequels will eventually stop paying dividends. For right now, though, these things remain relatively safe bets. And yet you can flip over to HBO and Showtime or go to a Landmark Theater and quality still exists.

Shows like West Wing and Seinfeld were as good as anything HBO has ever shown, even without any nudity or swearing. But with each season that features a Knight Rider remake and a Howie Mandel spinoff, NBC and the others in the big four become further removed from creative, innovative, quality shows.

Now as for how Ben Silverman can be a better exec, he could clearly learn a lot from watching his equivalent on 30 Rock, Jack Donaghy. If he were in this situation, Jack would be smart enough separate his microwave oven division from the the programming division once and for all, and focus his efforts into microwaves instead of fickle TV stars. Okay, he'd probably just order up another season of MILF Island, but I can dream, right?

Correct Drama

Daniel's recent post about the visceral suck that is Heroes after season 1 and the awesomeness of Friday Night Lights (the way I reference NBC shows, I should be drinking a McFlurry at Applebee's right now) got me thinking about long-form tv drama's in general. I've been pondering what makes the big-arc dramas (not Law & Order et all) worthwhile, and I've got a few thoughts for the writers and show runners.

First, know as much of the scope and arc of the show as humanly possible.

The Wire is the ultimate example of this. Five seasons, each built around a different theme but integrating a core of characters into it. David Simon build it like a novel, or a series of novels, and having George Pelecanos writing for it only helped things more.

Then on the other scale there's a show like Lost. At some point during the run, the folks on Lost knew how things were all gonna end, but I really question if the end, whatever it will be, was known from the beginning. And then a show like Heroes will limp through until it gets canceled.

A really interesting test of this point will be Mad Men. Where will it stop, and what is the proper end year: 1965, 1969, 1963? As a show about the evolution of an ad agency at the tail end of the '50s, it'll be really interesting to see where the cutoff is.

Second, be true to your characters.

I will mention Buffy, because despite being an overall fantastic series, it had a lot of obvious issues with this aspect. The biggest problem was Buffy's sister, Dawn. Dawn speaks to both of my pieces of advice. Her existence is a gaping plot hole, and the integration of such a close character midway through the show always felt off.

Also, many will disagree with me, but the prevalence of Spike in the later seasons spoke of desperation. For the first half of the series, Spike was a badass. Sure he had a lady, Drusilla, but in most episodes, he'd come in, kick up some trouble and head back out for a while. As a regular cast member, he devolved into a sad lonely vampire trying to take advantage of Buffy.

And then there's Willow. What can I say? She changed from the smart, sassy girl next door to an evil lesbian witch from hell. It just doesn't parse, now does it?


I think that these two things take care of the majority of problems with long-form dramas, and the non-Network shows seem to thrive because their creators have tended to be so dominant over these two aspects

Patrick McGoohan - TV's Great Intellectual

I was saddened to find out that Patrick McGoohan passed away earlier this month. Although he had a wide ranging acting career his greatest work was The Prisoner, a tv show he created and starred in during the late '60s. Without going all fanboy, I will just say that it is ostensibly a spy show in the way Kid A is ostensibly a rock album. It only lasted a season and it's easy enough to track down the DVDs, which I would highly recommend everyone do. It stands as one of the high points of art - a strangely perfect crystalline entity.

Rather than recounting too much of the story and spoiling the fun, I will just reminisce a bit. In high school, myself and a number of friends befriended a supportive teacher and would user her class as our base of operations during lunch. We would often watch episodes of the Prisoner.

Years later, during my semester in London, I did a weekend trip to Wales and visited the actual village, Portmeirion, that was the actual location where the show was filmed. I admit to being a bit underwhelmed at the time, something that probably happens a lot when you encounter cinematically created worlds in real life, but it was still a place I never thought I'd actually visit.

Cultural Sabaticals

Some things have become so ingrained in our culture that they've become multimedia muzak. Take for example Shakespeare, The Simpsons and The Beatles. I love all of these things, but the level of saturation for each of these is such that we need a break. I've had this idea for a while of a cultural sabbatical. Bill Drummond the greatest conceptual artist in the history of popular music (I'm dead serious) had proposed something similar with No Music Day, but this would be for a year.

Imagine a year without Midsummer Nights Dream, or Simpsons references or Hey Jude. Shakespeare in the Park and Shakespeare Theatre would have to change things up for a year, Michael Jackson would stop licensing the Beatles to bad commercials for a year. I think it would be quite refreshing and we would appreciate all of these things that much more when the year came to a close. Then the next year we could have a Rolling Stones break, or Prince, or Madonna.

Sports Night . . .

Thanks to Adam for the reminder, as Sports Night is being reissued again. (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/23/arts/television/23sand.html?_r=1&ref=homevideo)

I could go on and on for a while about this show, and it's relations to Aaron Sorkin's other work, and it's failings, and it would probably be a rehash of a number of conversations I have had with Jason, but I'll just enumerate a few random thoughts. (If you want a synopsis, wiki it.)

* The show had one of the worst soundtracks and one of the most painful laugh tracks of any TV show that I have ever watched. The laugh track has been discussed to death over the years, since the network essentially forced it on Sorkin, but it remains quite jarring to hear it after not watching the show in a long time. The soundtrack though, by "Snuffy" Smith or whatever his name is, is one of the worst uses of the electric guitar in the history of recorded sound. It's quite bad. And yet he's done the soundtrack for West Wing (grand but tasteful) and Friday Night Lights (I know they use Explosions in the Sky for much of their music, but points to him for his contributions not being distractingly, stylistic different from EITS's work). The mark of good art is "Show Don't Tell" and in this case his music was the Anti-Wire (yes, I just compared a TV soundtrack to a TV show). Instead of letting viewers have an opinion, they were beaten over the head about what to feel.

* I really like the second half of the second season and I think this is a divisive point. To not give away too much, most of the characters in the show settled into a very comfy stasis pretty early on in the show, and only really when Sorkin ditched the show to start working on West Wing did the characters start becoming untethered. And although things sort of rehardened back to normal toward the very end, I still think this bit of spice made this part of the series the most enjoyable.

* Things that seemed fresh in Sports Night lose a bit each time around. It's fun to imagine how much the reshuffling of art would have an effect on it's commercial failure or success (I could and perhaps will rant about what would/could have happened had Trent Reznor just put out something like The Slip or With Teeth in 1998 or so). What if Studio 60 had come first, would it have made it longer, would Sports Night then seem like a retreat? I don't think Studio 60 was a bad show, but certain things that were done in Sports Night and West Wing were recycled or mutated or shoehorned into Studio 60, and they tend to lose the emotional impact the umpteenth time around.