Reality TV: A New Beginning for Television

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Reality TV A New Beginning for Television


“Reality Television.” That has become such a widely known phrase in America in the past few years. People are going crazy for this “new” wave of television programming known as “reality TV.” What most people don’t realize is that reality television has actually been around for many years and it is an important part of our popular culture. The oldest “reality” show is Candid Camera and it dates back to 148. It is considered reality because it catches “people in the act of being themselves” (Rowen). In 17 another type of reality show came about that is similar to many of the reality shows that we see today; it was a type of “Family drama.” The show’s name was An American Family; and, it was an inspiration for today’s Real World. Crime reality shows, such as Cops and America’s Most Wanted have also been popular for quite a while (since the mid to late 80’s). There was actually a crime reality show that was aired over 0 years ago named Wanted that was similar to America’s Most Wanted (Rowen). Today, we have a completely new wave of reality television shows (too many to name) and they are beginning to “take over” our television sets. Each wave of reality television has proved to be successful both with viewers and networks; and, the genre is now here to stay.


Candid Camera was the first ever example of a reality show; known as the granddaddy of reality shows. This show is considered reality because it catches non-actors in real life situations. It is one of the longest running and most successful programs in the history of broadcasting. It began in 147 as a radio show called Candid Microphone that was hosted by Allen Funt, the creator. It appeared on television in 148 and was extremely successful from 160 to 167. Candid Camera became popular again between 17 and 000 after Peter Funt, son of Allen Funt and his co host Dina Eastwood started up the show again in 187 (this is right after Allen Funt’s death). The show captures the reactions of ordinary people in extraordinary and sometimes even bizarre situations when they suddenly find that they are on Candid Camera (PAX).


Many believe that current reality television has its roots in 17 with a documentary on CBS entitled An American Family. For 1 weeks many Americans were glued to their TV screens to watch this new intriguing documentary series. Why? Because it was real people that had their real lives taped for all of America to see. The Loud Family � Bill and Pat Loud, their three sons and two daughters � let producer, Craig Gilbert from CBS shoot 00 hours of footage from inside their home and inside their lives (Rowen). Out of the 00 hours shot, only 1 of those made it to national television. Viewers apparently enjoyed being in the lives of this family because their were amazingly 10 million viewers (and that was a lot for a single show on PBS during the 70’s). Viewers tuned in to see the marital breakup of Bill and Pat Loud and, in another episode their son announced on national television that he was gay. Although the Loud’s claimed that these few episodes misrepresented their family, the television viewer’s loved it (Rowen).


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An American Family was an inspiration for MTV’s The Real World, which is now in it’s eleventh season. MTV throws seven complete strangers in a house and records them 4 hours a day to show how they interact with one another. The Real World displays every aspect of human interaction and that is why most viewers tune in. Emotions rumble in every single episode of The Real World. On this show you see gay couples form, straight couples form, a lesbian walking around naked, people fighting…and it’s all real people in real situations that are really happening. Where else do we get to see stuff like that? Ever since The Real World first aired, it has been an extremely popular show for MTV. Other shows, such as Road Rules (that is a spin-off of The Real World), have also been successful for MTV (Kelleher).


During the late 80’s to early 0’s another wave of reality television hit the United States; this time it was reality crime shows. Major networks such as ABC, CBS, and NBC were all going through hard times because of the rising programming costs and the declining audiences for prime time television. Prime time ratings dropped from 6. million in 175 to .7 million in 10 (Fishman 65). All of the networks realized that they must reduce program costs in some way, so they began making reality crime shows. Reality crime shows average $150,000 to 50,000 per week to produce; whereas, shows such as ABC’s Roseanne have an estimated cost of $ million to million an episode (Fishman 67). Many networks soon realized that crime reality shows would bring them many advantages. Obviously the lost cost is an advantage along with the fact that people like the shows. Another advantage is the fact that programs such as Cops are filmed without dates and episodes can be shown again after a couple of seasons (Fishman 68). The fact that networks were doing so well with these ‘crime reality shows’ caused more and more of them to start popping up; this was heaven for television networks.


Crime reality shows have also proved to be pretty popular with television viewers. Statistics from a 1 Nielsen Media Research report show that crime reality programs had average household ratings that were comparable to major prime time news shows such as CBS Eve News and NBC’s Dateline. Household ratings are based on a percentage of households viewing a certain program out of the total number of households with televisions. Unsolved Mysteries was the highest rated crime TV show in 1 with a household rating of 14.4; this is comparable to ABC’s 0/0 with a rating of 1.8 (Fishman 6). During 1 the most popular network television shows had household ratings of 17.5 to . The highest of these were Seinfeld and Home Improvement. The lowest rated were ranging from .5 to 5. These statistics show that Unsolved Mysteries was doing pretty well. The other crime reality shows had an average of a .0 household rating, which wasn’t real well but since the shows were cheaply made, it made up for the lower ratings. Reality crime shows have survived for 15 years and they are still popular now (Fishman 6). The new wave of reality television has also brought with it many new crime reality shows, so it looks like they are here to stay.


Today we have a completely new wave of reality television, which consists of a mixture of various types of reality shows ranging from game shows, crime shows, dating shows, and reward shows. The most popular of these are Who Wants to Be A Millionaire, Survivor, Big Brother, Fear Factor, MTV’s The Real World, and Temptation Island. These are all considered reality shows because they feature non-actors in unrehearsed situations (Reiss 5). Every major television network has at least one reality show. They are great for the networks because most of them have been extremely successful, but they are still cheaply made. Networks don’t have to throw out millions in salary for the cast � they simply offer a $1,000,000 reward (and everyone wants a chance at that). Since the people on the show don’t have scripts, they don’t have to have writers, so networks are saving money in that aspect too. Reality television is something that every television network has always dreamed of. Reality shows don’t just save money; they also bring in a lot of money. In a little more than 18 months, Who Wants to Be A Millionaire brought in almost $1 billion; and, the spot for a commercial during Survivor Africa averaged $445,000 (Leopold). The major reason that reality television is popular with television networks is because it is so popular with the television viewers.


Reality television shows are becoming very important for major networks to have because they are bringing in outrageous ratings. The biggest factor that ever causes their ratings to decline is that there are so many choices of reality shows for people to watch. Robert Thompson, director of the Center for the Study of Popular Television at Syracuse University states, “Once you have three or four choices, then you’re going to begin to dilute the audience, and so you’re going to automatically have sort of a decline” (Hatcher). All of the major reality shows are now running alongside with the most popular sitcoms such as Seinfeld. Since Survivor began, it has had an average household rating of 17.4, which is extremely good; and, Temptation Island was Fox’s highest rated series in it’s first season. Almost half (45%) of the American population tunes in to reality TV according to Nielsen Media Research. The finale of Survivor I brought in an amazing 51.7 million viewers. Reality television shows also bring in impressive percentages of the age groups most desired by advertisers, which is 18-4 year old viewers. An American Demographic/Bruskin survey shows that 70 percent of the 18-4 year olds surveyed watch reality television and 57 percent of the 5-4 year olds watch reality television. In fact 44 percent of the 18-4 year olds surveyed say that they would rather watch real people than scripted characters (Gardyn). People are absolutely going crazy for reality TV.


So, why is reality TV becoming so popular now when it has actually been around for many years? According to an E-poll on-line survey conducted in Encino, California, the number one reason that people watch is for the excitement of who will win or be eliminated from the show. The number two reason is to see people face challenging situations; and, the number three reason is so that they can imagine how they would perform in similar situations. Reasons vary among different age groups; for example, 4 percent of the 18-4 year old viewers like to see conflict among contestants and 41 percent of the 5-54 year old viewers would rather see the strategies that the contestants use. The E-poll survey also found that men are more likely to tune in to see the attractive people and women would rather tune in to guess the outcomes (Gardyn). Another survey conducted by Psychology Today found that people like reality shows because it allows them to fantasize about gaining status through automatic fame. They also found that people like to see unscripted dramatic situations and like to think that maybe next time the winner could be them. The shows act as a sort of self-esteem booster (Reiss).


Reality TV is the best thing that all of the major television networks have going for them at this point in time. They have rose to become some of the most popular shows on TV; even if you don’t watch them, they are becoming hard to avoid. No matter where you look newspapers, magazines, or the Internet there is always something available about reality television. Shows such as Survivor and Who Wants to Be A Millionaire have CD Rom games that are becoming extremely popular; and, Who Wants to Be A Millionaire even has an attraction at Disney World now. Survivor and Big Brother even have websites that you have to pay for where you can see what the contestants are doing 4 hours a day. Some of the shows even have their own clothing line. The fame that reality shows have now and the fact that they have been around for a few years now tells that reality shows have laid a foundation on America’s television sets. As Robert Thompson, director of Syracuse University’s Center for the study of Popular Television says, “…get used to these newcomers on the box…it will be as much a part of your TV as John Wayne shooting at bad guys on late night movies” (Leopold).


REFERENCES


Fishman, Mark, and Gray Cavender, eds. Entertaining Crime Television Reality Programs. New York. Aldine De Gruyter. 18.


Gardyn, Rebecca. “The Tribe has Spoken.” American Demographics Sep. 001 4-40. 15 March, 00. http//proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?Did=0000000801860&Fmt=4&Deli=1&Mtd=1&Idx=1&Sid=&RQT=0.


Hatcher, Thurston. “Survivor no longer the office cooler ruler.” CNN News. 5 March 00. http//cnn.com/00/SHOWBIZ/TV/01/10/reality.survivor/index.html


Kelleher, Terry. “The Real World (TV Program).” People. Feb. 00 6. 10 April 00. http//mariner.gsu.edu/cgibin/door/ultimate.cgi?userid=galileo&dbs=door&action=results&recno=7&numrecs=10&format=default


Leopold, Todd. “How much ‘reality’ TV can we survive?.” CNN News. 5 March 00. http//www.cnn.com/001/SHOWBIZ/TV/05/01/reality.tv/index.html.


PAX Share the Wonder. 00. Candid Camera. 8 March 00. http//www.pax.tv/shows/camera/


Reiss, Steven and James Wiltz. “Why America Loves Reality TV.” Psychology Today Sep/Oct 001 5-54. 0 March 00. http//proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?Did=0000000771878&Fmt=4&Deli=1&Mtd=1&Idx=1&Sid=1&RQT=0.


Rowen, Beth. “History of Reality TV.” Learning Networks. 0 March 00. http//ln.infoplease.com/applets/citethispage.php?dir=spot&passpage=/spot/realitytv1.phtml&referer=http%A//ln.infoplease.com/spot/realitytv1.html&title=Reality%0TV%0Takes%0Hold.


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