We've peaked behind the dishonest, dangerous, and downright filthy curtain of reality TV before. But almost everything focuses on the star-victims of reality shows -- have you ever wondered what it's like behind that camera? Cracked sat down with a man responsible for filming numerous reality shows and, on the condition of anonymity, he put some of the "real" back in "reality television."
#4. Shows May Not Be Totally Faked ... But They Are Manipulated
EGA Productions
One of the people I shoot is an outdoorsy guy who will hunt and trap just about anything. The producers wanted to get a montage of all his wacky catches, naturally. But he did most of his trapping at night (so other animals wouldn't eat his catches), and filming at night is basically impossible without bringing a truckload of lighting and night vision equipment. Tramping out into the bush with all that gear would've scared off any potential prey.
So we compromised between outright fakery and authenticity by re-enacting the scenes during daylight hours. We ordered dozens of frozen woodland critters (he didn't want to waste his), and sent out whoever screwed up the director's latte that day to stick them in traps at the asscrack of dawn. Then we filmed him checking his traps in the morning like that's just how he did it.
Raphye Alexius/Image Source/Getty Images
"There's just a Beanie Baby in that one."
"We'll CG it in post!"
Most reality shows liberally mix the live stuff with re-enacted bits. The trouble is that there's a fine line between re-enactment and outright lying. Operation Repo peed all over that line when they filmed an episode in which one of their repo crews got chased by a shotgun-wielding psychopath ...
EGA Productions
... only to have an eagle-eyed viewer spot that this apparently unhinged gun nut's property was actually just a set, also used for an episode of Jackass:
Paramount Pictures
No death threats, even though this time it'd be absolutely deserved.
We also leave a lot of gold on the cutting room floor whenever it's at odds with how our producers want someone's "character" to develop. We had one cast member spend two straight nights in a vet's office, waiting to see if his dog was going to live through a terrible illness. That's gripping, personal stuff. But the show had built him up as this cold, emotionless person, so we couldn't show him crying after that. We wound up cutting that whole bit because it humanized a human too much.
Tashi-Delek/iStock/Getty Images
"The director wants you to call him a bad dog and show him clips of Old Yeller."
#3. The People In Charge Seem To Hate The Cast Members
NBCUniversal Television Distribution
There was one guy -- we'll call him Jed -- who wouldn't stand for any manipulation. He was critical of the show because, unlike most people who live off of beaver meat in woodland shacks, he's more photogenic than the Unabomber. At one point, the producers wanted him to have this dramatic arc where he was on the verge of losing his cabin and he just straight-up told them no. He wouldn't submit to having an "arc" about anything he hadn't experienced.
JohnCarnemolla/iStock/Getty Images
"How about now?"
Jed turned out to be the most popular person on the show because he was so genuine. Everyone else tried to act, to some extent, and he was just himself in front of a camera. There is usually one guy like that on every reality show, and they often turn out to be fan favorites for everyone but the producers.
One of the producers I worked with used to be with The Biggest Loser. A contestant's backstory that year was that her husband had been killed in an industrial accident. So the psychopaths in charge wanted to interview her next to the same type of garbage compactor that had killed the love of her life. The plan was to turn it on halfway through, so she'd start spontaneously crying. If you think that sounds like some straight-up serial killer shit, well, that's probably offensive to serial killers.
NBCUniversal Television Distribution
Honestly, that's just the tip of the dickberg.
No comments:
Post a Comment