Reality TV dominates schedules – but there has been little discussion on the truthful experiences of its stars. A panel of celebrities visited Birmingham City University to reveal the dark secrets behind the shows. MATT JARRAM reports.
Reality TV stars have warned that shows will get even more extreme – and could lead to the death of contestants.
Simon Cowell's close pal, singer Sinitta, claimed producers want to entice audiences with ever more depraved stunts, which one day might include someone dying on a show.
Sinitta, who was forced into a cockroach-filled cave while appearing as a contestant on I'm A Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here, said: "I think the producers are looking for how low you can go – or death.
"It is almost like gladiators. People want to see blood. They want to see you suffer. They want to see someone die on national television."
Dancing on Ice star Donal MacIntyre also fears that reality TV shows could cause a death.
MacIntyre, aged 48, who works as an investigative journalist, warned that the programmes were "catapulting towards The Hunger Games" – the best-selling novels and movie trilogy where youngsters from different regions are forced to participate in annual televised death matches.
Sinitta and MacIntyre were joined on a panel at Birmingham City University (BCU) on Thursday night by TV host Matthew Wright, who appeared in last year's I'm A Celebrity; the first X-Factor winner Steve Brookstein; and The Apprentice contestant Melody Hossaini.
They were invited to debate the reality of reality TV in front of an audience as the latest series of Big Brother began.
Each member of the celebrity panel was critical of the genre.
Head of Psychology at BCU Prof Craig Jackson, was also present at the debate, along with BCU criminology expert Prof David Wilson.
Sinitta, aged 45, who has also starred as a mentor on X-Factor, told the audience that appearing on reality TV is the only way to get ahead in showbusiness these days.
"I don't think reality shows mean that you are desperate," she said.
"It pushes you to the front of commissioners' minds and will get you more work. I have two children to support," said the singer who is about to release her first single in 22 years on June 28 – a cover of her mother's song Miquel Brown's So Many Men, So Little Time.
"It would be better if more reality shows got to show your skills and remind people of what your talents are rather than being famous.
"Celebrities now don't have to have talent, so if you are skilled to do things, now – I went to drama school, I went to dance school – you have to do these shows to be cast and considered for something else because these are the heroes of this generation.
"People who win those shows are the people who commissioners are interested in using for the other shows. They don't go 'so and so is educated, trained or qualified'.
"Who is popular on social media? Who won that last show, which shows the public really liked them?"
Former tabloid journalist Wright, aged 48, complained about the way he was portrayed on I'm A Celebrity and claimed the producers had a clear idea of how they wanted the audiences to view him.
He was broadcast rowing with former Olympic swimmer Rebecca Adlington during one scene.
The host of Channel Five's The Wright Stuff said: "What viewers didn't see is Rebecca Adlington nagging at me like my ex-wife morning to tea."
Wright said he was asked to sneer at the lens on the title sequence of the programme like "an evil tabloid journalist".
He continued: "The truth of reality television is that it is trapped on a sensationalist conveyor belt and no-one knows where that conveyor belt ends.
"It is just going to keep pushing boundaries and contestants to go further and further, and if you don't continue down this path these shows will die."
When asked if he did the show for money, he said: "I had spent 13 years building a show up from 0.1 per cent to seven per cent, being completely ignored by the mainstream press.
"I was slightly concerned that I might have outstayed my welcome and what I needed to do was push Brand Matthew Wright out there and show that I am not the tedious, reprehensible monster and I'm funny at times – and I think I came out okay."
Brookstein, aged 45, remained tight-lipped about his experience on X-Factor after show – but said he has never been offered any more reality television work.
An outspoken critic of Simon Cowell who clashed with Sharon Osbourne, Brookstein, said: "I do knock Simon a lot because of our personal relationship, but for a guy who knows pop music he is a genius.
"The way that the show was set up, it was all to do with boxing. It was Simon against Louis against Sharon.
"It was a big competition about judges. You get 60 million votes, number one album, number one single, that's great, and then the reality changes when you fall out with someone.
"All those reality shows you could get offered I never got offered any of them. That's the reality.
"For some reason anything on mainstream television that Steve Brookstein might say – something against the establishment, because it is an establishment –it won't happen."
Hossaini, aged 26, who was in series seven of The Apprentice and was fired by Alan Sugar in week 10, told the audience that there is an agenda behind reality television – and it is to make it as interesting as possible.
She said: "There is half an hour in the boardroom, and half an hour of a task which we took three days as teams to do, so you imagine the level of footage they compress to reduce it to that. They can create whatever they want really.
"The agenda is there to make it look interesting to you. Nine million people watch The Apprentice and you would not watch if you saw lots of people acting super-capable. I am thankful for the opportunity. It is an incredible experience that I will never do again."
Criminologist Prof David Wilson worked as a psychological adviser to the Big Brother reality show for 10 days.
He told the Birmingham City University audience that he left because it wasn't the social experiment he believed it would be.
Discussing The Truth Behind Reality Television, Prof Wilson said he joined the programme in 2004, but in just a day began to question its moral and ethical codes of conduct.
He said: "I was far too trusting and open-minded. I thought I was going into something that was a social psychological experiment. It didn't take long, the first day.
"The previous Big Brother was won by a Christian virgin from the Orkney islands. The problem according to the producers was that the storyline had not worked. It had the worst viewing figures.
"Increasingly, when I read the profiles of the people that had been chosen, they had been chosen very deliberately to create a narrative of tension. They chose people who were alpha personalities, who had issues in relationships, and did not like certain people and clearly issues of sexuality.
"I went in far too bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and, by gosh, did I get an awakening of how manipulative reality television can be."
Head of Psychology at BCU Prof Craig Jackson, BCU Head of Psychology believes that reality television will take a more macabre turn and is no longer about pushing boundaries but nothing more than "a race to the bottom".
He told the audience: "No-one walks away with dignity on reality television.
"I don't know where it will end, but I know it will end badly.
"Death is clearly part of becoming the context of reality television and where it will inevitably go. It is desperation and a lack of insight. If there was a Britain's Got Paedophiles, people would line up. It is not pushing boundaries. It is racing to the bottom. It is not cutting edge."
0 comments:
Post a Comment