The Apprentice Article
"This is the UK's most-watched business programme."
Business programme. Really?
I'd say it's a silly but entertaining programme in which the contestants are set up for a predictable humiliation.
Haven't you seen it before? Every episode is essentially the same.
What a waste of space this article is, the apprentice is just a bloody TV program which does not entirely reflect what happens in the real business world.
This is a game show, populated by inadequates and grotesques who the general public can mock when the programme is informally reviewed around the water cooler. Just as you would have sacked one of the participants, most people bright enough to succeed in business will realise that The Apprentice is edited to within an inch of recognisability so as to create car-crash entertainment.
As for the TV programme, well, even if it is all set up, no one can deny the influence that messages conveyed through the media have over the general public.
Friday 12 November 2010
Thursday 11 November 2010
Audience Theories
Cultivation theory - Audiences might watch shows such as The Apprentice and think that being like them is what they need to be successful; Rather than 'dumbing down' audiences, they are looking for education while still enjoying the reality element of the shows
Copycat theory - People see contestants becoming famous and successful so they aspire to become like them
Uses and gratifications - People should learn from and be educated by what they watch, rather than just watching for light entertainment
Reception analysis and ethnography - Different people read shows in different ways; Just because talent shows are popular, it doesn;t mean that it is popular with everyone; The elite would rather watch educational shows
Copycat theory - People see contestants becoming famous and successful so they aspire to become like them
Uses and gratifications - People should learn from and be educated by what they watch, rather than just watching for light entertainment
Reception analysis and ethnography - Different people read shows in different ways; Just because talent shows are popular, it doesn;t mean that it is popular with everyone; The elite would rather watch educational shows
Wednesday 10 November 2010
Reality TV - What's Happening? (Relevant Quotes)
"The hottest and most talked about TV genre of our time"; "The genre has taken over our schedules" - Increasing popularity
"Real people in somewhat strange situations, and we expect to watch them, safe in the knowledge that they are unable to watch us back"; "The success of reality TV is partly due to the increasingly voyeuristic nature of the society in which we live, and in part due to the obsession with celebrity and everyone wanting to be one" - Voyeurism has a big appeal in reality TV; Audiences relate
"These programmes are relatively cheap to make, certainly compared to drama, and they appear to guarantee audiences" - Commercial channels can rely on them to be profitable
"People seem prepared to do anything to achieve fifteen minutes of fame" - Participants want and expect their fifteen minutes of fame
"Intelligence is being compromised to some extent" - Reality TV doesn't require intelligence so it can be held responsible for the dumbing down of the media and society
"It isn’t scripted, and should be conducted in private. But I’ve loved seeing Michelle manipulate Stuart into cuddles, kisses and even sex. I’ve enjoyed watching the anger of the Average Joes as they have been rejected and sent home. There is something much more gripping about watching someone crying, or losing his or her temper if there is no script or acting involved. It is a similar experience to craning our necks on the motorway to see an accident. Hoping that we won’t see blood and guts, but at the same time …"
"It certainly helps you forget about the stresses of the day when you can see people having a much worse day than you have had"; "Comparisons are a relatively natural thing to make: we either take the stance that we are better than the participants, or we want to be them"
"Once you see the mediation process involved, you are aware that it is not a real situation" - Structuralisation; Even reality TV isn't reality
"Real people in somewhat strange situations, and we expect to watch them, safe in the knowledge that they are unable to watch us back"; "The success of reality TV is partly due to the increasingly voyeuristic nature of the society in which we live, and in part due to the obsession with celebrity and everyone wanting to be one" - Voyeurism has a big appeal in reality TV; Audiences relate
"These programmes are relatively cheap to make, certainly compared to drama, and they appear to guarantee audiences" - Commercial channels can rely on them to be profitable
"People seem prepared to do anything to achieve fifteen minutes of fame" - Participants want and expect their fifteen minutes of fame
"Intelligence is being compromised to some extent" - Reality TV doesn't require intelligence so it can be held responsible for the dumbing down of the media and society
"It isn’t scripted, and should be conducted in private. But I’ve loved seeing Michelle manipulate Stuart into cuddles, kisses and even sex. I’ve enjoyed watching the anger of the Average Joes as they have been rejected and sent home. There is something much more gripping about watching someone crying, or losing his or her temper if there is no script or acting involved. It is a similar experience to craning our necks on the motorway to see an accident. Hoping that we won’t see blood and guts, but at the same time …"
"It certainly helps you forget about the stresses of the day when you can see people having a much worse day than you have had"; "Comparisons are a relatively natural thing to make: we either take the stance that we are better than the participants, or we want to be them"
"Once you see the mediation process involved, you are aware that it is not a real situation" - Structuralisation; Even reality TV isn't reality
Reality TV - What's Happening?
It’s debatably the hottest and most talked about TV genre of our time. Whether you’re a sceptic, a cynic or a fan, you’ve been watching reality TV – but what does it mean to you? And how can you use Big Brother, Property Ladder or What Not to Wear in your AQA Med 4 topic on Audiences. AQA Examiner Tina Dixon tells you how.
Reality TV – a phenomenon it is difficult to define, though in a general sense we all know what we are talking about when we use the term. We certainly expect to see real people in somewhat strange situations, and we expect to watch them, safe in the knowledge that they are unable to watch us back.
However we define reality TV, it appears that the genre has taken over our schedules. We have just watched the fifth Big Brother, and after its success a Big Brother 6 is guaranteed; there will shortly be a third series of Celebrity Big Brother, and a fourth I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here has us glued to the TV as I write. This year we have also seen a new series of Wife Swap; Pop Idol; Fame Academy; Bollywood Star; Hell’s Kitchen; Joe Millionaire; Average Joe; Musicality; Location, Location, Location; Property Ladder; The Block, etc., etc.
It seems clear why producers make reality TV: these programmes are relatively cheap to make, certainly compared to drama, and they appear to guarantee audiences. And, of late, one could also argue that reality TV can go as far as the limits of the imagination, given that people seem prepared to do anything to achieve fifteen minutes of fame.
So, what is in them for audiences; what do audiences get out of these shows, and what function do they perform? And whilst thinking about audiences can we apply some theory and contexts in order to fulfil a Med4 question on ‘Media Audiences’?
The audience
The success of reality TV is partly due to the increasingly voyeuristic nature of the society in which we live, and in part due to the obsession with celebrity and everyone wanting to be one. I would also argue that we are living in a much more ‘open society’; not open in terms of freedoms (in fact we have less freedoms), but open in terms of the ‘nothing is sacred’ philosophy. Tabloids and gossip magazines give graphic details and photographs of anyone and everyone. There is very little we don’t know about Victoria and David Beckham, Sven Gorran Eriksson’s love life, Jordan and Peter Andre’s relationship, Elaine Lordan and Jesse Wallace’s pregnancies, Jodie Marsh’s wardrobe and sex life, and Charlotte Church’s clubbing antics. Magazines like Heat, Closer, OK!, Hello and so on have huge circulation figures and even bigger readerships; a trip to the newsagents sees a new gossip magazine on the shelves weekly.
I personally watched as much BB5 as was humanly possible and caught up with Big Brother’s Little Brother every day at 6.00pm. I find myself transfixed by Wife Swap and was obsessed by Average Joe to the point of video recording it if I was out or away. I have to ask myself why? I feel a need to analyse why I watch them, as my intelligence is being compromised to some extent. I know that there is a huge voyeuristic component attached to my own and others’ viewing. I’m watching people in odd situations, with their warts and all in full view, but they can’t see me watching them. Do I watch because it makes me feel better about myself, because I think I am not like them?
I’ve enjoyed watching Stuart and Michelle’s romance unfold on my television screen, knowing that this is not Dennis and Zoë in EastEnders. It isn’t scripted, and should be conducted in private. But I’ve loved seeing Michelle manipulate Stuart into cuddles, kisses and even sex. I’ve enjoyed watching the anger of the Average Joes as they have been rejected and sent home. There is something much more gripping about watching someone crying, or losing his or her temper if there is no script or acting involved. It is a similar experience to craning our necks on the motorway to see an accident. Hoping that we won’t see blood and guts, but at the same time …
Contextualising reality TV – real people in soaps
So how do we contextualise reality TV, how do we put these particular texts into context? There are possibly hundreds of ways of contextualising them, but I will concentrate on the social and cultural as they seem the most apt, and it is important with contexts that they are not contrived, that they are naturally arrived at. Firstly, reality TV appears to have arrived in our schedules at a time when soap operas were becoming more and more realistic: very naturalistic acting/characterisation and realistic storylines and issues. There seems to be few stones unturned in terms of the issues soaps have covered. We have seen drugs, murder, incest, abuse, teenage pregnancy, homosexuality, adultery, rape, sex change, mental illness etc. It is not surprising, therefore, that producers could see that the next step was to use real people and see how they react, hence the title docu-soap when they were first screened.
Read all about it
Secondly, the proliferation of gossip magazines: Heat, Closer, OK!, Hello, Star to name just a few, all of which have a market. These magazines trade gossip on celebrities, but also ensure that readers see them in a way that reveals them to be real people with spots, who have bad hair days, affairs, lose babies, divorce, get married, buy new houses, date unsuitable partners, etc. The knock-on effect of these magazines is to help create Reality TV involving celebrities, for example Celebrity Big Brother, I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here and Hell’s Kitchen. And the other side of the coin is that reality TV creates new celebrities for the magazines, for example Jade Goody, Kate Lawler, Brian Dowling and the participants of BB5 were immediately (and still are) in the gossip magazines.
Instant success – no talent required
Finally, I would argue that, socially, hard work as the basis of success is being eroded and replaced by the belief that if we have an iota of talent (or not) we can go on a talent show or enter the Big Brother house and become famous. Several ex-Big Brother housemates have gone on to become television presenters (Brian Dowling, Kate Lawler, Nick Bates, Melanie Hill, Alison Hammond, Craig Phillips). Will Young has become a household name. Alex Parks (winner of this year’s Fame Academy) was a student at the college I teach and could have worked hard as a jobbing singer/actress but instead was catapulted to instant success, fame and money.
Some theoretical perspectives
Can we apply any theoretical perspectives to the reality TV phenomenon? Firstly, given that this would be relevant to the ‘Audience’ section of Med4, Uses and Gratifications theory could certainly be applied. All four categories of Uses and Gratifications research: (Diversion, Personal Relationships, Personal Identity, Surveillance), can be applied to reality TV.
• There is no doubt that we use reality TV as a form of escapism, it certainly helps you forget about the stresses of the day when you can see people having a much worse day than you have had.
• Reality TV performs the function of companionship through identification with television characters, and there is no doubt that there is sociability
• In discussion: everyone was talking about BB5. In terms of personal identity, comparisons are a relatively natural thing to make: we either take the stance that we are better than the participants, or we want to be them.
• And finally, it is a source of information about the world, not just from a psychological perspective, but also from finding out about a particular way of life – for example, Airport, Property Ladder etc.
Reality and post-modernism
I would argue that you could apply a postmodern theoretical perspective to the reality TV phenomenon. To quote Baudrillard:
Art today has totally penetrated reality.
If we substitute the term popular culture for art this makes more sense. He meant that the border between popular culture and reality has vanished as both have collapsed into the universal simulacrum. There are four stages to this:
• It is the reflection of a basic reality.
• It masks and perverts a basic reality.
• It marks the absence of a basic reality.
• It bears no relation to any reality whatever – it is its own pure simulacrum in which the distinctions between ‘real life’ and its media representations have become blurred.
Reality becomes redundant and we have a hyper-reality, in which images breed with each other without reference to reality or meaning. Though a little abstract, it is possible to apply this to reality TV in the sense that we watch the shows because we believe we are watching real people; which in fact in a postmodern sense is nonsense. They are not real anymore; they are not even in a real situation anymore. In real terms, once you see the mediation process involved, you are aware that it is not a real situation. As soon as Jason came out of the Big Brother house he was interviewed by Closer magazine, in which he argued that we were not seeing the real Jason in the house, but an edited and manipulated version. So, was anyone real in the house?
Reality and hegemony
And, finally, I would argue that the most easily applicable theory is from a Marxist perspective: it is the concept of hegemony. The whole notion of hegemony is that we are ruled by ideas: if we believe that the world is actually a reasonable place to live, and a good education and a good job will provide everything we could ever need, then the system remains intact. As mentioned earlier, the notion of hard work has been replaced by something much more instant – being a contestant on reality TV show. In Marxist terms this could be perceived of as a masterstroke on the part of the ruling class: they don’t even have to convince the masses to work hard anymore, just convince a whole generation of young people that the key to fame and fortune is to appear as a contestant on a reality TV show. It is even more of an incentive than the Football Pools or the National Lottery. What more could we ask for? Reality TV seems to have it all.
Tina Dixon is an Examiner for AQA.
This article first appeared in MediaMagazine 10, December 2004
Reality TV – a phenomenon it is difficult to define, though in a general sense we all know what we are talking about when we use the term. We certainly expect to see real people in somewhat strange situations, and we expect to watch them, safe in the knowledge that they are unable to watch us back.
However we define reality TV, it appears that the genre has taken over our schedules. We have just watched the fifth Big Brother, and after its success a Big Brother 6 is guaranteed; there will shortly be a third series of Celebrity Big Brother, and a fourth I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here has us glued to the TV as I write. This year we have also seen a new series of Wife Swap; Pop Idol; Fame Academy; Bollywood Star; Hell’s Kitchen; Joe Millionaire; Average Joe; Musicality; Location, Location, Location; Property Ladder; The Block, etc., etc.
It seems clear why producers make reality TV: these programmes are relatively cheap to make, certainly compared to drama, and they appear to guarantee audiences. And, of late, one could also argue that reality TV can go as far as the limits of the imagination, given that people seem prepared to do anything to achieve fifteen minutes of fame.
So, what is in them for audiences; what do audiences get out of these shows, and what function do they perform? And whilst thinking about audiences can we apply some theory and contexts in order to fulfil a Med4 question on ‘Media Audiences’?
The audience
The success of reality TV is partly due to the increasingly voyeuristic nature of the society in which we live, and in part due to the obsession with celebrity and everyone wanting to be one. I would also argue that we are living in a much more ‘open society’; not open in terms of freedoms (in fact we have less freedoms), but open in terms of the ‘nothing is sacred’ philosophy. Tabloids and gossip magazines give graphic details and photographs of anyone and everyone. There is very little we don’t know about Victoria and David Beckham, Sven Gorran Eriksson’s love life, Jordan and Peter Andre’s relationship, Elaine Lordan and Jesse Wallace’s pregnancies, Jodie Marsh’s wardrobe and sex life, and Charlotte Church’s clubbing antics. Magazines like Heat, Closer, OK!, Hello and so on have huge circulation figures and even bigger readerships; a trip to the newsagents sees a new gossip magazine on the shelves weekly.
I personally watched as much BB5 as was humanly possible and caught up with Big Brother’s Little Brother every day at 6.00pm. I find myself transfixed by Wife Swap and was obsessed by Average Joe to the point of video recording it if I was out or away. I have to ask myself why? I feel a need to analyse why I watch them, as my intelligence is being compromised to some extent. I know that there is a huge voyeuristic component attached to my own and others’ viewing. I’m watching people in odd situations, with their warts and all in full view, but they can’t see me watching them. Do I watch because it makes me feel better about myself, because I think I am not like them?
I’ve enjoyed watching Stuart and Michelle’s romance unfold on my television screen, knowing that this is not Dennis and Zoë in EastEnders. It isn’t scripted, and should be conducted in private. But I’ve loved seeing Michelle manipulate Stuart into cuddles, kisses and even sex. I’ve enjoyed watching the anger of the Average Joes as they have been rejected and sent home. There is something much more gripping about watching someone crying, or losing his or her temper if there is no script or acting involved. It is a similar experience to craning our necks on the motorway to see an accident. Hoping that we won’t see blood and guts, but at the same time …
Contextualising reality TV – real people in soaps
So how do we contextualise reality TV, how do we put these particular texts into context? There are possibly hundreds of ways of contextualising them, but I will concentrate on the social and cultural as they seem the most apt, and it is important with contexts that they are not contrived, that they are naturally arrived at. Firstly, reality TV appears to have arrived in our schedules at a time when soap operas were becoming more and more realistic: very naturalistic acting/characterisation and realistic storylines and issues. There seems to be few stones unturned in terms of the issues soaps have covered. We have seen drugs, murder, incest, abuse, teenage pregnancy, homosexuality, adultery, rape, sex change, mental illness etc. It is not surprising, therefore, that producers could see that the next step was to use real people and see how they react, hence the title docu-soap when they were first screened.
Read all about it
Secondly, the proliferation of gossip magazines: Heat, Closer, OK!, Hello, Star to name just a few, all of which have a market. These magazines trade gossip on celebrities, but also ensure that readers see them in a way that reveals them to be real people with spots, who have bad hair days, affairs, lose babies, divorce, get married, buy new houses, date unsuitable partners, etc. The knock-on effect of these magazines is to help create Reality TV involving celebrities, for example Celebrity Big Brother, I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here and Hell’s Kitchen. And the other side of the coin is that reality TV creates new celebrities for the magazines, for example Jade Goody, Kate Lawler, Brian Dowling and the participants of BB5 were immediately (and still are) in the gossip magazines.
Instant success – no talent required
Finally, I would argue that, socially, hard work as the basis of success is being eroded and replaced by the belief that if we have an iota of talent (or not) we can go on a talent show or enter the Big Brother house and become famous. Several ex-Big Brother housemates have gone on to become television presenters (Brian Dowling, Kate Lawler, Nick Bates, Melanie Hill, Alison Hammond, Craig Phillips). Will Young has become a household name. Alex Parks (winner of this year’s Fame Academy) was a student at the college I teach and could have worked hard as a jobbing singer/actress but instead was catapulted to instant success, fame and money.
Some theoretical perspectives
Can we apply any theoretical perspectives to the reality TV phenomenon? Firstly, given that this would be relevant to the ‘Audience’ section of Med4, Uses and Gratifications theory could certainly be applied. All four categories of Uses and Gratifications research: (Diversion, Personal Relationships, Personal Identity, Surveillance), can be applied to reality TV.
• There is no doubt that we use reality TV as a form of escapism, it certainly helps you forget about the stresses of the day when you can see people having a much worse day than you have had.
• Reality TV performs the function of companionship through identification with television characters, and there is no doubt that there is sociability
• In discussion: everyone was talking about BB5. In terms of personal identity, comparisons are a relatively natural thing to make: we either take the stance that we are better than the participants, or we want to be them.
• And finally, it is a source of information about the world, not just from a psychological perspective, but also from finding out about a particular way of life – for example, Airport, Property Ladder etc.
Reality and post-modernism
I would argue that you could apply a postmodern theoretical perspective to the reality TV phenomenon. To quote Baudrillard:
Art today has totally penetrated reality.
If we substitute the term popular culture for art this makes more sense. He meant that the border between popular culture and reality has vanished as both have collapsed into the universal simulacrum. There are four stages to this:
• It is the reflection of a basic reality.
• It masks and perverts a basic reality.
• It marks the absence of a basic reality.
• It bears no relation to any reality whatever – it is its own pure simulacrum in which the distinctions between ‘real life’ and its media representations have become blurred.
Reality becomes redundant and we have a hyper-reality, in which images breed with each other without reference to reality or meaning. Though a little abstract, it is possible to apply this to reality TV in the sense that we watch the shows because we believe we are watching real people; which in fact in a postmodern sense is nonsense. They are not real anymore; they are not even in a real situation anymore. In real terms, once you see the mediation process involved, you are aware that it is not a real situation. As soon as Jason came out of the Big Brother house he was interviewed by Closer magazine, in which he argued that we were not seeing the real Jason in the house, but an edited and manipulated version. So, was anyone real in the house?
Reality and hegemony
And, finally, I would argue that the most easily applicable theory is from a Marxist perspective: it is the concept of hegemony. The whole notion of hegemony is that we are ruled by ideas: if we believe that the world is actually a reasonable place to live, and a good education and a good job will provide everything we could ever need, then the system remains intact. As mentioned earlier, the notion of hard work has been replaced by something much more instant – being a contestant on reality TV show. In Marxist terms this could be perceived of as a masterstroke on the part of the ruling class: they don’t even have to convince the masses to work hard anymore, just convince a whole generation of young people that the key to fame and fortune is to appear as a contestant on a reality TV show. It is even more of an incentive than the Football Pools or the National Lottery. What more could we ask for? Reality TV seems to have it all.
Tina Dixon is an Examiner for AQA.
This article first appeared in MediaMagazine 10, December 2004
Reality bites: documentary in the 21st century (Relevant Quotes)
"‘The creative treatment of actuality’ has adapted to the changing media landscape and to audiences often believed to be switched off from current affairs" - Reality has been structuralised to fit the audience as audiences change
"Critics often point to the dreaded ‘dumbing down’ debate when discussing recent documentaries, suggesting the documentary form has been tabloidised with a stronger emphasis on sensationalism and voyeurism in order to make them more palatable to mass audiences" - This can also be related to reality TV as no intelligence is needed and this is becoming a worry
"Scripted drama, documentary needs opposing characters, tension and a strong sense of narrative"; "Documentaries, like every other genre, have developed to keep pace with changing audience trends and this has involved ‘borrowing’ from fiction, particularly narrative techniques, structures and characterisation" - Characters and narratives are constructed
"Voiceover is a key documentary device used to direct audiences towards a preferred reading" - The voiceover in reality TV such as The Apprentice also helps to anchor specific meanings and directs audiences to certain readings
"Critics often point to the dreaded ‘dumbing down’ debate when discussing recent documentaries, suggesting the documentary form has been tabloidised with a stronger emphasis on sensationalism and voyeurism in order to make them more palatable to mass audiences" - This can also be related to reality TV as no intelligence is needed and this is becoming a worry
"Scripted drama, documentary needs opposing characters, tension and a strong sense of narrative"; "Documentaries, like every other genre, have developed to keep pace with changing audience trends and this has involved ‘borrowing’ from fiction, particularly narrative techniques, structures and characterisation" - Characters and narratives are constructed
"Voiceover is a key documentary device used to direct audiences towards a preferred reading" - The voiceover in reality TV such as The Apprentice also helps to anchor specific meanings and directs audiences to certain readings
Reality bites: documentary in the 21st century
From the herring fishermen of the 1920s to today’s exploitation of South-East Asian tuna workers by the fast food industry: similar subjects, but worlds apart in presentation, viewpoint and audience. Modern documentary forms are frequently castigated for tabloidisation, dumbing down, and celebrity-led narratives. Carly Sandy analyses some recent examples to explore how ‘the creative treatment of actuality’ has adapted to the changing media landscape and to audiences often believed to be switched off from current affairs.
The documentary form has come a long way since the pioneering films of John Grierson in the 1930s. Grierson’s film-making evidenced a strong public service ethos, and had an emphasis on education and raising awareness, rather than entertainment values. It was Grierson who originally coined the term documentary describing it as ‘the creative treatment of actuality’. Early Grierson documentaries such as Drifters (1929), an account of a North Sea fishing fleet trawling for herrings, and Night Mail (1936) charting the Royal Mail’s delivery service from London to Glasgow seem a world away from Danny Dyer’s Deadliest Men, Ross Kemp on Pirates and Blood Sweat and Takeaways, but what similarities do they share? How have the core principles of documentary making evolved in an age of rating wars, channel proliferation and audience fragmentation? What issues do documentaries raise about the institutions that produce them and the audiences who consume them?
Critics often point to the dreaded ‘dumbing down’ debate when discussing recent documentaries, suggesting the documentary form has been tabloidised with a stronger emphasis on sensationalism and voyeurism in order to make them more palatable to mass audiences. This article aims to draw together an analysis of the modern documentary form whilst also looking at issues of audience and institution, in particular the rise of narrowcasting, as opposed to more traditional forms of broadcasting.
The rise of narrowcasting
Narrowcasting refers to broadcasting that targets smaller, more tightly defined audiences such as 16-34-year-old men (Dave) or 8-12-year-old children (Nickelodeon). The ratings for some of these channels may be small in comparison to more traditional broadcasters such as ITV1 or BBC1 (QI on Dave attracting 0.61million viewers compared with ITV1’s Coronation Street audience of 8.65 million). But ratings aside, what these channels offer advertisers (the lifeblood of commercial television) is their desired demographic on a plate. For example satellite channel Bravo targets the 16-34-year-old C2/D and E male demographic – a perfect arena for advertising razors, beer, mobile phones, sportswear, lads’ mags...
In terms of narrowcasting and audiences, the ‘youth’ market, generously referred to as the 16-34 demographic, is seen by broadcasters as both the most desirable – and most elusive. Commercially the youth market is seen as the most desirable to advertisers because they have a high disposable income and are the earliest adopters of new technology (you are far more likely to have an iPhone than your parents). In terms of PSB (Public Service Broadcasting)channels such as BBC3, they are not trying to sell products but rather their whole brand to an audience who will one day be licence fee payers. In an effort to connect with this audience BBC3 has developed a very distinctive documentary style which they have designed with their young (16-34) demographic in mind.
The BBC3 approach
Blood Sweat and Takeaways is the follow-up to the highly successful Blood Sweat and T Shirts series which attracted both popular and critical acclaim, securing a BAFTA nomination in 2008; sending a group of six young people to investigate the true cost of cheap clothing and the impact of globalisation on the developing world. Similarly, Takeaways follows six young Brits to South East Asia to live and work amongst families who work in the food industry. Again the emphasis is on issues of globalisation, exploitation and the human cost of mass food production.
Borrowing from the hybrid documentary form of reality TV, the participants are clearly selected with contrasting backgrounds and attitudes because, like scripted drama, documentary needs opposing characters, tension and a strong sense of narrative. Manos, a 20-year-old ‘fast food junkie’, establishes his credentials at the outset of the programme by declaring:
I don’t know how they produce it, where they produce it, I don’t care.
Stacey is introduced as a ‘concerned consumer’ and Jess will ‘only eat meat in the form of a sausage or a burger’. Olu, Josh and Lauren complete the line up.
The young Brits are soon stripped of their highly polished nails and sent to work in one of the leading tuna-producing factories for around 40p an hour. But the pressure of working in the factory soon proves too much and after just 10 minutes Lauren collapses, and Olu pushes Manos through a glass window pane. The dramatic exchanges between them owes as much to Big Brother as it does to traditional documentary modes of representation.
The voiceover is a key documentary device used to direct audiences towards a preferred reading. In this case the informal, female voice provides statistics about the hourly wages of the tuna workers and their exploitation (factory workers process 600 tins of tuna per day, the factory sells them for £300 and pays the employee £3).
Throughout the episode, parallels are drawn between the comfortable, affluent lives of the Brits and the lives of the tuna workers. For example, the voiceover explains that Josh, ‘although just 20’, already owns his own house. Jess later admits ‘all my family describe me as Paris Hilton’, and this is reinforced through scenes of Jess applying make-up in her bedroom. The mise-en-scène reveals a pair of red sparkly high heels and a bottle of Moet and Chandon champagne both shot in close-up, to signify her wealth and lifestyle. Predictably the trip and the conditions that they live and work in, forces the young Brits to re-think their attitudes to globalisation and cheap food. It’s a change epitomised by Manos’ piece to camera:
I said some very silly things at the start when I said that economic exploitation was good for me ... but now I really wanna take that back after seeing all the effort and how hard they work ... it makes me look like an idiot.
Like any documentary, Blood Sweat and Takeaways contains a point of view and a preferred reading; clearly this series is aiming to raise awareness of economic exploitation amongst an audience not readily drawn to more ‘traditional’ forms of documentary. Instead Takeaways adopts a more informal approach, for example using a non-diegetic soundtrack featuring artists such as Lady Ga Ga and Elbow and featuring participants who are all under 25 and from a variety of ethnic and economic backgrounds.
Takeaways, like the majority of BBC3’s factual programming, adopts an informal, upbeat mode of address, despite the fact that it deals with serious and sensitive issues. Similarly in Jess: My New Face, 17-year-old Jess Lees set out to investigate Western perceptions of beauty whilst also coping with her own facial disfigurement as a result of Apert Syndrome. Across the schedule, Jack: A Soldier’s Story approached the war in Afghanistan from the perspective of 23-year-old Lance Corporal Jack Mizon whose bravery on the frontline of a war zone was contrasted with his involvement in a pub brawl in the UK which almost earned him a custodial prison sentence. Note from the titles of these programmes the way in which they attempt to interweave personal narratives with wider, more political issues and in doing so offer a fresh approach to documentary-making for a generation of viewers often considered switched off by current affairs.
The commercial approach: celebrity
While BBC3 has opted for an informal mode of address and young people to front its factual programmes, Bravo and Sky One have enlisted the help of celebrities to promote their most successful documentary strands. The Ross Kemp on… series for Sky One has been a banker programme for the channel since its launch in 2006. Ross Kemp on Gangs sees the former EastEnders’ ‘hardman’ head to areas affected by gang/gun crime and interview everybody from gang members to the (then) Home Secretary, Jacqui Smith. Like many contemporary documentaries, the series draws upon the ‘moral panic’ surrounding gun/knife crime which gives it a modern and relevant edge. Kemp’s voiceover frequently uses real-life cases to frame the narrative of each episode; in Liverpool, for example, he highlights the murder of 11-year-old Rhys Jones, a tragic casualty of a turf war between two neighbouring gangs. A montage of newspaper headlines, radio excerpts and tense non-diegetic music accompanies Kemp’s recounting of the poignant events leading up to the murder, which provides a platform for his investigation and subsequent interviews.
Following the success of Gangs (which won a BAFTA for Best Factual series in 2007), Ross Kemp in Afghanistan saw Kemp joining front line troops on their mission against the Taliban, and in 2009 Ross Kemp on Pirates investigated the problem of piracy in South East Asia and Africa. Kemp claims that:
the BBC don’t commission me. But I’m lucky I do have somebody who listens [Sky]. And I hope it’s a populist take
Popular is the key word here; in the fiercely contested world of multichannel ratings Kemp scores highly with Pirates attracting a 0.7 million audience in its well-established 9pm slot. These programmes also seem to hold considerable appeal to a young male demographic, (53% of this audience was male and 30% aged 16-34).
Like the Ross Kemp on… series, Danny Dyer’s Deadliest Men is another attempt to draw on the star persona of an actor, also known for playing ‘hard men’. The appeal of Dyer to young working-class males is considerable. His ‘wide boy’ image and use of cockney rhyming slang are used as a unique selling point; his film career (The Football Factory, The Business, Adulthood) reinforces this secondary persona and as a result has made Dyer a lucrative brand. Dyer’s first programme The Real Football Factories was described by Bravo’s controller, Dave Clarke, as ‘a photofit ideal’ for the channel. More recently in the Deadliest Men series, Dyer lives with ‘dangerous’ men learning about their life and criminal pasts. Now in series two, the programme continues to be a ratings winner for Bravo with a strong emphasis on entertainment values and the fulfilling of the personal relationships and diversion aspects of Blumler and Katz’s Uses and Gratifications theory (1974).
Some key questions
Clearly documentaries, like every other genre, have developed to keep pace with changing audience trends and this has involved ‘borrowing’ from fiction, particularly narrative techniques, structures and characterisation, leading many to question whether entertainment values are being pursued over content. This is certainly one way of looking at contemporary documentaries; but you may also want to consider the following:
• Does a factual programme have to be formal and authoritarian in order to be informative?
• Does it have to be presented by a middle-aged professor or ‘expert’ in order to have credibility?
• Can any documentary ever really provide us with an unbiased ‘truth’?
I would argue no to all of the above. Furthermore, I would suggest the subject matter explored in the documentaries I have discussed is both contemporary and relevant to its audience. At their core they share a commitment to raise awareness of socially challenging issues (poverty, gang crime, globalisation) and openly seek to challenge opinions. Yes, there is ‘the creative treatment of actuality’ with a sharper edge than perhaps Grierson had envisaged, but he was not a broadcaster struggling to compete for an audience amongst hundreds of channels. And let’s face it, who really wants to watch a documentary about a Royal Mail overnight delivery service? ... I’d settle for Ross Kemp every time.
Carly Sandy teaches Media Studies at Palmers College, Essex.
References
Broadcast magazine – 19/6/2009, source of all ratings and statistics cited in the article.
Broadcast magazine – 30/11/2007 ‘Fighting for young male viewers’, discussion of Bravo.
The Observer – 24/05/2009 ‘The Other Side of Ross Kemp’, interview http://www.broadcastnow.co.uk/news/multi-platform/news/channel-report-has-nickelodeon-met-its-match/1139193.article – discussion of Nickelodeon audience.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/7005061.stm – news item discussing the rebranding of UK G2 to ‘Dave’.
This article first appeared in MediaMagazine 30, December 2009.
The documentary form has come a long way since the pioneering films of John Grierson in the 1930s. Grierson’s film-making evidenced a strong public service ethos, and had an emphasis on education and raising awareness, rather than entertainment values. It was Grierson who originally coined the term documentary describing it as ‘the creative treatment of actuality’. Early Grierson documentaries such as Drifters (1929), an account of a North Sea fishing fleet trawling for herrings, and Night Mail (1936) charting the Royal Mail’s delivery service from London to Glasgow seem a world away from Danny Dyer’s Deadliest Men, Ross Kemp on Pirates and Blood Sweat and Takeaways, but what similarities do they share? How have the core principles of documentary making evolved in an age of rating wars, channel proliferation and audience fragmentation? What issues do documentaries raise about the institutions that produce them and the audiences who consume them?
Critics often point to the dreaded ‘dumbing down’ debate when discussing recent documentaries, suggesting the documentary form has been tabloidised with a stronger emphasis on sensationalism and voyeurism in order to make them more palatable to mass audiences. This article aims to draw together an analysis of the modern documentary form whilst also looking at issues of audience and institution, in particular the rise of narrowcasting, as opposed to more traditional forms of broadcasting.
The rise of narrowcasting
Narrowcasting refers to broadcasting that targets smaller, more tightly defined audiences such as 16-34-year-old men (Dave) or 8-12-year-old children (Nickelodeon). The ratings for some of these channels may be small in comparison to more traditional broadcasters such as ITV1 or BBC1 (QI on Dave attracting 0.61million viewers compared with ITV1’s Coronation Street audience of 8.65 million). But ratings aside, what these channels offer advertisers (the lifeblood of commercial television) is their desired demographic on a plate. For example satellite channel Bravo targets the 16-34-year-old C2/D and E male demographic – a perfect arena for advertising razors, beer, mobile phones, sportswear, lads’ mags...
In terms of narrowcasting and audiences, the ‘youth’ market, generously referred to as the 16-34 demographic, is seen by broadcasters as both the most desirable – and most elusive. Commercially the youth market is seen as the most desirable to advertisers because they have a high disposable income and are the earliest adopters of new technology (you are far more likely to have an iPhone than your parents). In terms of PSB (Public Service Broadcasting)channels such as BBC3, they are not trying to sell products but rather their whole brand to an audience who will one day be licence fee payers. In an effort to connect with this audience BBC3 has developed a very distinctive documentary style which they have designed with their young (16-34) demographic in mind.
The BBC3 approach
Blood Sweat and Takeaways is the follow-up to the highly successful Blood Sweat and T Shirts series which attracted both popular and critical acclaim, securing a BAFTA nomination in 2008; sending a group of six young people to investigate the true cost of cheap clothing and the impact of globalisation on the developing world. Similarly, Takeaways follows six young Brits to South East Asia to live and work amongst families who work in the food industry. Again the emphasis is on issues of globalisation, exploitation and the human cost of mass food production.
Borrowing from the hybrid documentary form of reality TV, the participants are clearly selected with contrasting backgrounds and attitudes because, like scripted drama, documentary needs opposing characters, tension and a strong sense of narrative. Manos, a 20-year-old ‘fast food junkie’, establishes his credentials at the outset of the programme by declaring:
I don’t know how they produce it, where they produce it, I don’t care.
Stacey is introduced as a ‘concerned consumer’ and Jess will ‘only eat meat in the form of a sausage or a burger’. Olu, Josh and Lauren complete the line up.
The young Brits are soon stripped of their highly polished nails and sent to work in one of the leading tuna-producing factories for around 40p an hour. But the pressure of working in the factory soon proves too much and after just 10 minutes Lauren collapses, and Olu pushes Manos through a glass window pane. The dramatic exchanges between them owes as much to Big Brother as it does to traditional documentary modes of representation.
The voiceover is a key documentary device used to direct audiences towards a preferred reading. In this case the informal, female voice provides statistics about the hourly wages of the tuna workers and their exploitation (factory workers process 600 tins of tuna per day, the factory sells them for £300 and pays the employee £3).
Throughout the episode, parallels are drawn between the comfortable, affluent lives of the Brits and the lives of the tuna workers. For example, the voiceover explains that Josh, ‘although just 20’, already owns his own house. Jess later admits ‘all my family describe me as Paris Hilton’, and this is reinforced through scenes of Jess applying make-up in her bedroom. The mise-en-scène reveals a pair of red sparkly high heels and a bottle of Moet and Chandon champagne both shot in close-up, to signify her wealth and lifestyle. Predictably the trip and the conditions that they live and work in, forces the young Brits to re-think their attitudes to globalisation and cheap food. It’s a change epitomised by Manos’ piece to camera:
I said some very silly things at the start when I said that economic exploitation was good for me ... but now I really wanna take that back after seeing all the effort and how hard they work ... it makes me look like an idiot.
Like any documentary, Blood Sweat and Takeaways contains a point of view and a preferred reading; clearly this series is aiming to raise awareness of economic exploitation amongst an audience not readily drawn to more ‘traditional’ forms of documentary. Instead Takeaways adopts a more informal approach, for example using a non-diegetic soundtrack featuring artists such as Lady Ga Ga and Elbow and featuring participants who are all under 25 and from a variety of ethnic and economic backgrounds.
Takeaways, like the majority of BBC3’s factual programming, adopts an informal, upbeat mode of address, despite the fact that it deals with serious and sensitive issues. Similarly in Jess: My New Face, 17-year-old Jess Lees set out to investigate Western perceptions of beauty whilst also coping with her own facial disfigurement as a result of Apert Syndrome. Across the schedule, Jack: A Soldier’s Story approached the war in Afghanistan from the perspective of 23-year-old Lance Corporal Jack Mizon whose bravery on the frontline of a war zone was contrasted with his involvement in a pub brawl in the UK which almost earned him a custodial prison sentence. Note from the titles of these programmes the way in which they attempt to interweave personal narratives with wider, more political issues and in doing so offer a fresh approach to documentary-making for a generation of viewers often considered switched off by current affairs.
The commercial approach: celebrity
While BBC3 has opted for an informal mode of address and young people to front its factual programmes, Bravo and Sky One have enlisted the help of celebrities to promote their most successful documentary strands. The Ross Kemp on… series for Sky One has been a banker programme for the channel since its launch in 2006. Ross Kemp on Gangs sees the former EastEnders’ ‘hardman’ head to areas affected by gang/gun crime and interview everybody from gang members to the (then) Home Secretary, Jacqui Smith. Like many contemporary documentaries, the series draws upon the ‘moral panic’ surrounding gun/knife crime which gives it a modern and relevant edge. Kemp’s voiceover frequently uses real-life cases to frame the narrative of each episode; in Liverpool, for example, he highlights the murder of 11-year-old Rhys Jones, a tragic casualty of a turf war between two neighbouring gangs. A montage of newspaper headlines, radio excerpts and tense non-diegetic music accompanies Kemp’s recounting of the poignant events leading up to the murder, which provides a platform for his investigation and subsequent interviews.
Following the success of Gangs (which won a BAFTA for Best Factual series in 2007), Ross Kemp in Afghanistan saw Kemp joining front line troops on their mission against the Taliban, and in 2009 Ross Kemp on Pirates investigated the problem of piracy in South East Asia and Africa. Kemp claims that:
the BBC don’t commission me. But I’m lucky I do have somebody who listens [Sky]. And I hope it’s a populist take
Popular is the key word here; in the fiercely contested world of multichannel ratings Kemp scores highly with Pirates attracting a 0.7 million audience in its well-established 9pm slot. These programmes also seem to hold considerable appeal to a young male demographic, (53% of this audience was male and 30% aged 16-34).
Like the Ross Kemp on… series, Danny Dyer’s Deadliest Men is another attempt to draw on the star persona of an actor, also known for playing ‘hard men’. The appeal of Dyer to young working-class males is considerable. His ‘wide boy’ image and use of cockney rhyming slang are used as a unique selling point; his film career (The Football Factory, The Business, Adulthood) reinforces this secondary persona and as a result has made Dyer a lucrative brand. Dyer’s first programme The Real Football Factories was described by Bravo’s controller, Dave Clarke, as ‘a photofit ideal’ for the channel. More recently in the Deadliest Men series, Dyer lives with ‘dangerous’ men learning about their life and criminal pasts. Now in series two, the programme continues to be a ratings winner for Bravo with a strong emphasis on entertainment values and the fulfilling of the personal relationships and diversion aspects of Blumler and Katz’s Uses and Gratifications theory (1974).
Some key questions
Clearly documentaries, like every other genre, have developed to keep pace with changing audience trends and this has involved ‘borrowing’ from fiction, particularly narrative techniques, structures and characterisation, leading many to question whether entertainment values are being pursued over content. This is certainly one way of looking at contemporary documentaries; but you may also want to consider the following:
• Does a factual programme have to be formal and authoritarian in order to be informative?
• Does it have to be presented by a middle-aged professor or ‘expert’ in order to have credibility?
• Can any documentary ever really provide us with an unbiased ‘truth’?
I would argue no to all of the above. Furthermore, I would suggest the subject matter explored in the documentaries I have discussed is both contemporary and relevant to its audience. At their core they share a commitment to raise awareness of socially challenging issues (poverty, gang crime, globalisation) and openly seek to challenge opinions. Yes, there is ‘the creative treatment of actuality’ with a sharper edge than perhaps Grierson had envisaged, but he was not a broadcaster struggling to compete for an audience amongst hundreds of channels. And let’s face it, who really wants to watch a documentary about a Royal Mail overnight delivery service? ... I’d settle for Ross Kemp every time.
Carly Sandy teaches Media Studies at Palmers College, Essex.
References
Broadcast magazine – 19/6/2009, source of all ratings and statistics cited in the article.
Broadcast magazine – 30/11/2007 ‘Fighting for young male viewers’, discussion of Bravo.
The Observer – 24/05/2009 ‘The Other Side of Ross Kemp’, interview http://www.broadcastnow.co.uk/news/multi-platform/news/channel-report-has-nickelodeon-met-its-match/1139193.article – discussion of Nickelodeon audience.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/7005061.stm – news item discussing the rebranding of UK G2 to ‘Dave’.
This article first appeared in MediaMagazine 30, December 2009.
What can philosophy teach us about reality TV? (Relevant Quotes)
"Reality television appears to have taken over our TV schedules"; "Obsession with reality television" - The popularity of reality TV is always increasing
"Many hybrids and sub-genres"; "It is acceptable now for the middle-classes openly to discuss reality television, so long as it is a conversation on last night’s The Apprentice and not the sexual antics on Big Brother" - More variety to appeal to different audiences; The Apprentice appeals to a more sophisticated audience as it is a sub-genre of reality TV; Wider audience appeal
"Serious documentary on BBC4 or Wife Swap on Channel 4, most of the nation seems to choose the ‘reality’ option" - Reality appeals to wider audiences; Intellect is needed for a serious documentary but not for Wife Swap
"Moving into ever more controversial programming" - Shock tactics
"Relatively cheap production costs"; "Channel 4 and ITV are the organisations that broadcast the most popular reality television formats" - Commercial TV channels make profit from making cheap productions that are popular with mainstream audiences
"The ‘real’ drama of the programmes is added to by the interactivity, with the audience supposedly directly influencing events on screen"; "Big interactive buzz of ‘...pressing the red button...’" - Audience interactivity has appeal as they have the excitement of being involved
"Make celebrities out of unknown wanabees"; "The ‘winners’ fade quickly into obscurity" - Celebrity status seems important in contemporary society, even though it is usually just fifteen minutes of fame
"Voyeuristic scopophilia"
"Puppet-handlers, the ones holding those in the cave captive"; "The voice of authority, issuing instructions, informing the contestants of events and generally controlling the environment" - Always an authoritative and respected character; Lord Sugar, The Dragons
"Judges decide who will be plucked from their drab life (the drabber and harder the better), to enter over the threshold into celebrity" - Empathy with backgrounds and personalities of characters and their sob stories
"Manipulative editing" - Structuralised and constructed; Actuality is unreliable
"The audience could be said to be using reality television for voyeuristic escape into this celebrity culture" - Aspiring to be like them
"A slightly twisted appeal of watching someone you dislike" - Character roles are still present
"The reality television spectacle caused British people to engage with difficult issues which would perhaps not have happened if the programme had not been broadcast" - Media effects
"The on/off love affair of the 2007 run of Big Brother was a major talking point; how much Charley annoyed you was another"; "Audiences engage and chat to each other more about reality television than any other format" - Social interaction as everyone is watching
"The Apprentice created more lasting celebrity than Big Brother" - Intellecual shows hold more lasting value
"Many hybrids and sub-genres"; "It is acceptable now for the middle-classes openly to discuss reality television, so long as it is a conversation on last night’s The Apprentice and not the sexual antics on Big Brother" - More variety to appeal to different audiences; The Apprentice appeals to a more sophisticated audience as it is a sub-genre of reality TV; Wider audience appeal
"Serious documentary on BBC4 or Wife Swap on Channel 4, most of the nation seems to choose the ‘reality’ option" - Reality appeals to wider audiences; Intellect is needed for a serious documentary but not for Wife Swap
"Moving into ever more controversial programming" - Shock tactics
"Relatively cheap production costs"; "Channel 4 and ITV are the organisations that broadcast the most popular reality television formats" - Commercial TV channels make profit from making cheap productions that are popular with mainstream audiences
"The ‘real’ drama of the programmes is added to by the interactivity, with the audience supposedly directly influencing events on screen"; "Big interactive buzz of ‘...pressing the red button...’" - Audience interactivity has appeal as they have the excitement of being involved
"Make celebrities out of unknown wanabees"; "The ‘winners’ fade quickly into obscurity" - Celebrity status seems important in contemporary society, even though it is usually just fifteen minutes of fame
"Voyeuristic scopophilia"
"Puppet-handlers, the ones holding those in the cave captive"; "The voice of authority, issuing instructions, informing the contestants of events and generally controlling the environment" - Always an authoritative and respected character; Lord Sugar, The Dragons
"Judges decide who will be plucked from their drab life (the drabber and harder the better), to enter over the threshold into celebrity" - Empathy with backgrounds and personalities of characters and their sob stories
"Manipulative editing" - Structuralised and constructed; Actuality is unreliable
"The audience could be said to be using reality television for voyeuristic escape into this celebrity culture" - Aspiring to be like them
"A slightly twisted appeal of watching someone you dislike" - Character roles are still present
"The reality television spectacle caused British people to engage with difficult issues which would perhaps not have happened if the programme had not been broadcast" - Media effects
"The on/off love affair of the 2007 run of Big Brother was a major talking point; how much Charley annoyed you was another"; "Audiences engage and chat to each other more about reality television than any other format" - Social interaction as everyone is watching
"The Apprentice created more lasting celebrity than Big Brother" - Intellecual shows hold more lasting value
What can philosophy teach us about reality TV?
Sean Richardson suggests the Greek philosopher Plato might give us a steer.
Reality television appears to have taken over our TV schedules. From the monstrous behemoth that is Big Brother the genre spawned many hybrids and sub-genres. Faced with a serious documentary on BBC4 or Wife Swap on Channel 4, most of the nation seems to choose the ‘reality’ option. Indeed, Endemol, the Dutch company behind Big Brother, is announcing record profits and moving into ever more controversial programming. In its provocative, consciousness-raising hoax The Big Donor Show 2007, Lisa, the 37-year-old victim of a brain tumour, asked the audience to help her decide which of the three contestants with degenerative kidney conditions deserved to get her healthy kidneys.
The relatively cheap production costs and high audience viewing figures ensure a steady stream of new and repeated formats of reality television on our screens. The ‘real’ drama of the programmes is added to by the interactivity, with the audience supposedly directly influencing events on screen. From Big Brother through Castaway, Grease Is The Word, Any Dream Will Do to Britain’s Got Talent, we’re invited to join in and make celebrities out of unknown wanabees, plucked from obscurity to enter the fabulous life of celebrity and success.
Curiously, the ancient Greek philosopher Plato offers us an ancient model which we can apply to much of Media Studies, and particularly to ideas about audience and our obsession with reality television.
In his most famous allegory, Plato described a dark cave containing prisoners chained to the floor facing a blank wall. They know nothing other than the shadows they see on the wall, cast by objects and people moving in front of a fire. They have lived this way for their entire lives, and most of them are content to sit staring at the shadows.
If you consider the physical act of watching programmes like reality shows on the television or ‘shadow box’, then Plato’s idea becomes really relevant and worth looking at in 2007. The voyeuristic scopophilia of watching reality TV is undeniable.
As well as the chained people, there are other people in the cave. Plato calls them the puppet-handlers, the ones holding those in the cave captive. They walk behind the prisoners and hold up various objects found in the real world. A fire is burning in the mouth of the cave and the prisoners are able to see the objects and each other only as distorted, flickering shadows on the cavern wall in front of them. For a programme like Big Brother, the puppet handler could be the equivalent of Big Brother himself: the voice of authority, issuing instructions, informing the contestants of events and generally controlling the environment. If we think of the puppet handlers as the ‘elite’ or ruling class then this idea of a reality television-obsessed audience becomes controversial, drawing on the Media Studies concept of hegemony.
The hegemonic view
Theories of hegemony are based around the idea that dominant classes persuade subordinate or lower ones to accept and adopt their values. In programmes like Britain’s Got Talent and The X Factor, a panel of so-called experts decide who has talent and who has not. These judges decide who will be plucked from their drab life (the drabber and harder the better), to enter over the threshold into celebrity. In case you hadn’t noticed, the ‘winners’ fade quickly into obscurity and do not get a fabulous life. The winner of The X Factor in 2004, Steve Brookstein, is not an international music artist and you probably barely remember him: he was reduced to working the ‘P&O’ Portsmouth to Bilbao ferry in June 2007 as a cabaret act, together with fellow reality television ‘celebrities’ as Chico Slimani and Journey South.
The network and the judges
The programme makers and the television networks are the ultimate puppet handlers, with their manipulative editing and presentation of the judges to the viewing public. Channel 4 and ITV are the organisations that broadcast the most popular reality television formats. The celebrity lifestyle, mythologised by programmes such as The Fabulous Life of..., is the ultimate aim for the participants of programmes such as The X Factor. The celebrity judges are chosen as gatekeepers to this world, which is almost presented as an alternate reality. If you think about Blumler and Katz’s theory of audience uses and gratifications, then the audience could be said to be using reality television for voyeuristic escape into this celebrity culture. So the audience, crucially, are content to sit and watch the shadow box, pacified by the entertaining spectacle. They enjoy and engage with what they are seeing, with the big interactive buzz of ‘...pressing the red button...’
The appeals of reality television
Big Brother and The X Factor are watched by millions, and the volume of text and phone votes they generate demonstrates the popularity of the genre. In Plato’s Cave, the chained mass have no interaction with what they are seeing. The only way to escape from chains is to reject what is seen, and exit into the light; according to Plato, only the philosopher King can do this. However it could be argued that we mere mortals can escape by engaging and interacting with the images cast. The appeal of following your favourite reality show participant is undeniable, with a slightly twisted appeal of watching someone you dislike. Jade Goody’s fall from grace on Celebrity Big Brother was a fantastic example of the power of the public. The public engagement with race, representation and bullying was massive, with debates on television, in the newspapers and on the radio. The reality television spectacle caused British people to engage with difficult issues which would perhaps not have happened if the programme had not been broadcast.
The love of gossip
Gossiping about reality television is probably as pleasurable for the audience as the physical act of watching it. Chantelle and Ziggy, the on/off love affair of the 2007 run of Big Brother was a major talking point; how much Charley annoyed you was another. The social function of reality television is worth exploring. It’s been said that audiences engage and chat to each other more about reality television than any other format. The passive, silent TV watcher, anaesthetised by television is the stuff of dystopian nightmares, imagined by authors such as Welles, Ballard and Huxley – but it is not the reality! The interactive element of reality television is not just about texting or telephone votes. Social interaction, part of the ‘Uses and Gratifications theory’, is an undeniable product of mass viewing of this genre. The tabloid obsession with Big Brother suggests that newspapers know they will sell more with a juicy reality TV headline. The Sun, Britain’s biggest selling tabloid, even has special pull-out supplements on the contestants.
Case study – The Apprentice
The Apprentice was originally broadcast on BBC2, but became so popular that it was moved to primetime BBC1. The programme follows 16 hopeful business-types who compete in tasks to become Sir Alan Sugar’s apprentice in his business empire. The Apprentice proved that reality TV can be intelligent and popular with both audiences and critics. The slick presentation and candid comments from the participants have made it a massive hit for the BBC and it has been argued that it has changed the face of the ‘reality’ genre on British television. If Plato’s model saw an elite manipulating a mass then it is interesting how audience figures for The Apprentice show an elite demographic, with professionals and opinion makers viewing the programme in their droves.
‘Celebrity’ winners
Past winners and participants of the programme have become part of the infamous ‘celebrity’ pack. Ruth Badger, former runner-up, landed her own Sky One programme Badger Or Bust, a six-part factual entertainment programme, following Ruth Badger’s attempts to turn struggling sales teams into winners.
The allegory of the cave
Behold! human beings living in a underground den, which has a mouth open towards the light and reaching all along the den; here they have been from their childhood, and have their legs and necks chained so that they cannot move, and can only see before them, being prevented by the chains from turning round their heads.
Plato (360 B.C.)
Another former would-be ‘apprentice’, Syed Ahmed got his own show on Sky One, Hot Air, which suggested that The Apprentice created more lasting celebrity than Big Brother. Also, permanent cast members, Margaret Mountford and Nick Hewer, Sugar’s sidekicks on the show, are now celebrities in their own right.
A question of class
The majority of reality television programmes are consumed by working-class audiences, or so elite compacts like The Times or The Independent, would have us believe. Margaret Mountford and Nick Hewer are distinctly middle-class with real ‘Middle England’ appeal. Respectable publications like The Spectator and The Economist have given the BBC flagship programme rave reviews. It is acceptable now for the middle-classes openly to discuss reality television, so long as it is a conversation on last night’s The Apprentice and not the sexual antics on Big Brother.
If you apply psychographics as an audience research tool to reality television viewing, then ‘contented conformers’ are being replaced by ‘aspirational achievers’. Professionals and managerial types are becoming hooked on The Apprentice, looking for insights into cutting-edge business approaches. Or, you might argue, they are hooked on the salacious, gossipy nature of the programme – which is as driven by conflict and confrontation as any other reality show. John Dovey in Freakshow: First Person Media and Factual Television (2000) argued that we live in a confessional society, obsessed with the idea of celebrity and describes these reality genres and sub-genres as ‘first person media’ where subjectivity, the personal and the intimate have become prioritised.
Reality TV’s future
The allegory of Plato’s cave offers an interesting comment on reality television programming, particularly with the notion of celebrity, our obsession with confession and voyeurism, and the desire to get past the ‘puppet handlers’ and the fire to the rarefied celebrity lifestyle. The chained audience theory might be limited by the active social engagement that audiences bring to this viewing experience, as reality programmes clearly seem to serve a social function.
The future of reality TV in the UK seems assured, as new series are continually commissioned. However, in Italy, for example, the state broadcaster has stopped their broadcast; La Repubblica, the national newspaper has labelled reality television ‘a dinosaur’. La Repubblica points to poor ratings in recent series of the country’s two most popular reality TV shows, Grande Fratello (Big Brother) on Mediaset and L’Isola dei Famosi (Celebrity Island) on Rai. Grande Fratello is said to have lost a million viewers last year. The audience may yet decide...press your red buttons now!
Sean Richardson is Head of Media Studies at Penistone Grammar School, and an examiner for WJEC Media Studies A Level.
from MediaMagazine 22, December 2008.
Reality television appears to have taken over our TV schedules. From the monstrous behemoth that is Big Brother the genre spawned many hybrids and sub-genres. Faced with a serious documentary on BBC4 or Wife Swap on Channel 4, most of the nation seems to choose the ‘reality’ option. Indeed, Endemol, the Dutch company behind Big Brother, is announcing record profits and moving into ever more controversial programming. In its provocative, consciousness-raising hoax The Big Donor Show 2007, Lisa, the 37-year-old victim of a brain tumour, asked the audience to help her decide which of the three contestants with degenerative kidney conditions deserved to get her healthy kidneys.
The relatively cheap production costs and high audience viewing figures ensure a steady stream of new and repeated formats of reality television on our screens. The ‘real’ drama of the programmes is added to by the interactivity, with the audience supposedly directly influencing events on screen. From Big Brother through Castaway, Grease Is The Word, Any Dream Will Do to Britain’s Got Talent, we’re invited to join in and make celebrities out of unknown wanabees, plucked from obscurity to enter the fabulous life of celebrity and success.
Curiously, the ancient Greek philosopher Plato offers us an ancient model which we can apply to much of Media Studies, and particularly to ideas about audience and our obsession with reality television.
In his most famous allegory, Plato described a dark cave containing prisoners chained to the floor facing a blank wall. They know nothing other than the shadows they see on the wall, cast by objects and people moving in front of a fire. They have lived this way for their entire lives, and most of them are content to sit staring at the shadows.
If you consider the physical act of watching programmes like reality shows on the television or ‘shadow box’, then Plato’s idea becomes really relevant and worth looking at in 2007. The voyeuristic scopophilia of watching reality TV is undeniable.
As well as the chained people, there are other people in the cave. Plato calls them the puppet-handlers, the ones holding those in the cave captive. They walk behind the prisoners and hold up various objects found in the real world. A fire is burning in the mouth of the cave and the prisoners are able to see the objects and each other only as distorted, flickering shadows on the cavern wall in front of them. For a programme like Big Brother, the puppet handler could be the equivalent of Big Brother himself: the voice of authority, issuing instructions, informing the contestants of events and generally controlling the environment. If we think of the puppet handlers as the ‘elite’ or ruling class then this idea of a reality television-obsessed audience becomes controversial, drawing on the Media Studies concept of hegemony.
The hegemonic view
Theories of hegemony are based around the idea that dominant classes persuade subordinate or lower ones to accept and adopt their values. In programmes like Britain’s Got Talent and The X Factor, a panel of so-called experts decide who has talent and who has not. These judges decide who will be plucked from their drab life (the drabber and harder the better), to enter over the threshold into celebrity. In case you hadn’t noticed, the ‘winners’ fade quickly into obscurity and do not get a fabulous life. The winner of The X Factor in 2004, Steve Brookstein, is not an international music artist and you probably barely remember him: he was reduced to working the ‘P&O’ Portsmouth to Bilbao ferry in June 2007 as a cabaret act, together with fellow reality television ‘celebrities’ as Chico Slimani and Journey South.
The network and the judges
The programme makers and the television networks are the ultimate puppet handlers, with their manipulative editing and presentation of the judges to the viewing public. Channel 4 and ITV are the organisations that broadcast the most popular reality television formats. The celebrity lifestyle, mythologised by programmes such as The Fabulous Life of..., is the ultimate aim for the participants of programmes such as The X Factor. The celebrity judges are chosen as gatekeepers to this world, which is almost presented as an alternate reality. If you think about Blumler and Katz’s theory of audience uses and gratifications, then the audience could be said to be using reality television for voyeuristic escape into this celebrity culture. So the audience, crucially, are content to sit and watch the shadow box, pacified by the entertaining spectacle. They enjoy and engage with what they are seeing, with the big interactive buzz of ‘...pressing the red button...’
The appeals of reality television
Big Brother and The X Factor are watched by millions, and the volume of text and phone votes they generate demonstrates the popularity of the genre. In Plato’s Cave, the chained mass have no interaction with what they are seeing. The only way to escape from chains is to reject what is seen, and exit into the light; according to Plato, only the philosopher King can do this. However it could be argued that we mere mortals can escape by engaging and interacting with the images cast. The appeal of following your favourite reality show participant is undeniable, with a slightly twisted appeal of watching someone you dislike. Jade Goody’s fall from grace on Celebrity Big Brother was a fantastic example of the power of the public. The public engagement with race, representation and bullying was massive, with debates on television, in the newspapers and on the radio. The reality television spectacle caused British people to engage with difficult issues which would perhaps not have happened if the programme had not been broadcast.
The love of gossip
Gossiping about reality television is probably as pleasurable for the audience as the physical act of watching it. Chantelle and Ziggy, the on/off love affair of the 2007 run of Big Brother was a major talking point; how much Charley annoyed you was another. The social function of reality television is worth exploring. It’s been said that audiences engage and chat to each other more about reality television than any other format. The passive, silent TV watcher, anaesthetised by television is the stuff of dystopian nightmares, imagined by authors such as Welles, Ballard and Huxley – but it is not the reality! The interactive element of reality television is not just about texting or telephone votes. Social interaction, part of the ‘Uses and Gratifications theory’, is an undeniable product of mass viewing of this genre. The tabloid obsession with Big Brother suggests that newspapers know they will sell more with a juicy reality TV headline. The Sun, Britain’s biggest selling tabloid, even has special pull-out supplements on the contestants.
Case study – The Apprentice
The Apprentice was originally broadcast on BBC2, but became so popular that it was moved to primetime BBC1. The programme follows 16 hopeful business-types who compete in tasks to become Sir Alan Sugar’s apprentice in his business empire. The Apprentice proved that reality TV can be intelligent and popular with both audiences and critics. The slick presentation and candid comments from the participants have made it a massive hit for the BBC and it has been argued that it has changed the face of the ‘reality’ genre on British television. If Plato’s model saw an elite manipulating a mass then it is interesting how audience figures for The Apprentice show an elite demographic, with professionals and opinion makers viewing the programme in their droves.
‘Celebrity’ winners
Past winners and participants of the programme have become part of the infamous ‘celebrity’ pack. Ruth Badger, former runner-up, landed her own Sky One programme Badger Or Bust, a six-part factual entertainment programme, following Ruth Badger’s attempts to turn struggling sales teams into winners.
The allegory of the cave
Behold! human beings living in a underground den, which has a mouth open towards the light and reaching all along the den; here they have been from their childhood, and have their legs and necks chained so that they cannot move, and can only see before them, being prevented by the chains from turning round their heads.
Plato (360 B.C.)
Another former would-be ‘apprentice’, Syed Ahmed got his own show on Sky One, Hot Air, which suggested that The Apprentice created more lasting celebrity than Big Brother. Also, permanent cast members, Margaret Mountford and Nick Hewer, Sugar’s sidekicks on the show, are now celebrities in their own right.
A question of class
The majority of reality television programmes are consumed by working-class audiences, or so elite compacts like The Times or The Independent, would have us believe. Margaret Mountford and Nick Hewer are distinctly middle-class with real ‘Middle England’ appeal. Respectable publications like The Spectator and The Economist have given the BBC flagship programme rave reviews. It is acceptable now for the middle-classes openly to discuss reality television, so long as it is a conversation on last night’s The Apprentice and not the sexual antics on Big Brother.
If you apply psychographics as an audience research tool to reality television viewing, then ‘contented conformers’ are being replaced by ‘aspirational achievers’. Professionals and managerial types are becoming hooked on The Apprentice, looking for insights into cutting-edge business approaches. Or, you might argue, they are hooked on the salacious, gossipy nature of the programme – which is as driven by conflict and confrontation as any other reality show. John Dovey in Freakshow: First Person Media and Factual Television (2000) argued that we live in a confessional society, obsessed with the idea of celebrity and describes these reality genres and sub-genres as ‘first person media’ where subjectivity, the personal and the intimate have become prioritised.
Reality TV’s future
The allegory of Plato’s cave offers an interesting comment on reality television programming, particularly with the notion of celebrity, our obsession with confession and voyeurism, and the desire to get past the ‘puppet handlers’ and the fire to the rarefied celebrity lifestyle. The chained audience theory might be limited by the active social engagement that audiences bring to this viewing experience, as reality programmes clearly seem to serve a social function.
The future of reality TV in the UK seems assured, as new series are continually commissioned. However, in Italy, for example, the state broadcaster has stopped their broadcast; La Repubblica, the national newspaper has labelled reality television ‘a dinosaur’. La Repubblica points to poor ratings in recent series of the country’s two most popular reality TV shows, Grande Fratello (Big Brother) on Mediaset and L’Isola dei Famosi (Celebrity Island) on Rai. Grande Fratello is said to have lost a million viewers last year. The audience may yet decide...press your red buttons now!
Sean Richardson is Head of Media Studies at Penistone Grammar School, and an examiner for WJEC Media Studies A Level.
from MediaMagazine 22, December 2008.
Saturday 6 November 2010
The Apprentice (MIGRAIN/SHEP)
The Apprentice - Series 6, Episode 4
Media Language
Classical music - sophisticated, elite
Close up shots in opening - intent, realism, audience can emphasise
Clothing - formal, sophisticated
'Previously on The Apprentice' - open to new audiences as they can catch up
Non diegetic parallel music
Different tasks - each week will appeal to audiences with different interests, diverse
Reality but character roles are still in place (15.08-16.30, 55.45-56.40)
Voice over helps to create character roles
Institution
BBC
Public service broadcasting
Educating as well as entertaining
Genre
Reality TV
Business
Voyeurism (Boardroom)
Representation
Lord Sugar, Nick and Karren - Wise, Superior
Different characters represented differently
Winning team - admirable
Losing team - shameful
Audience
Male and female audience
Primary audience - ABC1, 25-50, White
Secondary audience - C2D, 12-14, All ethnicities
Ideology
Money is important
Put yourself first
Success can be achieved with hard work
Narrative
Social
People are now striving for success more than they used to
Historical
Economic
Recession - making money
Political
Media Language
Classical music - sophisticated, elite
Close up shots in opening - intent, realism, audience can emphasise
Clothing - formal, sophisticated
'Previously on The Apprentice' - open to new audiences as they can catch up
Non diegetic parallel music
Different tasks - each week will appeal to audiences with different interests, diverse
Reality but character roles are still in place (15.08-16.30, 55.45-56.40)
Voice over helps to create character roles
Institution
BBC
Public service broadcasting
Educating as well as entertaining
Genre
Reality TV
Business
Voyeurism (Boardroom)
Representation
Lord Sugar, Nick and Karren - Wise, Superior
Different characters represented differently
Winning team - admirable
Losing team - shameful
Audience
Male and female audience
Primary audience - ABC1, 25-50, White
Secondary audience - C2D, 12-14, All ethnicities
Ideology
Money is important
Put yourself first
Success can be achieved with hard work
Narrative
Social
People are now striving for success more than they used to
Historical
Economic
Recession - making money
Political
Friday 5 November 2010
The Apprentice Research
- Began in America with Donald Trump
- 2004-
- The Apprentice US
- The Apprentice UK
- The Apprentice Australia
- The Apprentice Ireland
- UK series began in 2005 with Load Alan Sugar
- 14-16 contestants from the UK
- £100 000 a year earning apprentice to Lord Sugar
- Series 1 and 2 aired on BBC2
- Series 3 - present aired on BBC1
- Two advisers - Nick and Margaret, Series 1-5; Nick and Karren, Series 6-
- The Apprentice: You're Fired!
- Spin-off show
- 30 minutes, straight after The Apprentice main show
- Began in 2006 during The Apprentice Series 2
- Series 1 aired on BBC3
- Series 2 - present aired on BBC2
- Adrian Chiles, Series 1-4; Dara O Briain, Series 5-
- Panel of 3 guests and the fired candidate
- Never before seen footage
- Junior Apprentice
- 2010-
- 10 young people who are interested in business
- 16-17 year olds
- £25 000 for winner's education and businesses
- Comic Relief/Sport Relief Does The Apprentice
- Celebrity versions
- 2007-2009
Issues, Debates and Theories
Reality TV
- Cultivation theory
- Media effects on audiences
- More people aspiring to be like them
- Becomes more mainstream
Dumbing down
- Stuart Hall
- People who are worried of dumbing down prefer intellectual shows
PSB and commercial TV
- Different values in BBC and ITV shows
- PSBs benefit the public
- Informational and educational
- Commercial channels are privately owned so are more about making profit and gathering mass audiences
- Entertaining
- Appeal to the mainstream - not too intellectual or would exclude viewers
Democracy/interaction
- Audiences like to be able to interact
- See the effect that they have on the television show (someone leaving?)
Structuralism
- Is even reality TV constructed?
- Proppian character roles created - hero, villain
- Audience can emphasise with 'characters'
Media A-Z
Actuality - The texts are reality; They have not been scripted
Audience flow - The Apprentice: You're Fired! gets audience flow from The Apprentice as viewers 'might as well' just turn over to BBC2
Audience participation - Audiences increasingly like the democracy of voting; In The Apprentice: You're Fired!, audiences vote, although their vote doesn't influence the show
British Broadcasting Corporation - Differences in the ideologies of PSB shows (The Apprentice) and commercial shows (The X Factor)
Celebrity - Contestants may gain celebrity status (Celebrity Coach Trip)
Demographics - Demographics differ from entrepreneur shows to entertainment talent shows
Dumbing down - Commercial shows could be seen as dumbing down society
Elite - The elite would appreciate PSB shows such as The Apprentice
Empathy - Audiences emphasise with the characters due to the actuality
Fifteen-minutes-of-fame - Ordinary people gain celebrity status but it hardly lasts
Hegemony - The elite have control over PSBs but commercial TV is for the working class
Highbrow - The Apprentice and Dragons' Den are intellectual
Independent Television - Provide entertainment over education
Interactive media - Voting system
Lowbrow - Talent shows are for light entertainment
Mainstream - Talent shows appeal to mainstream audiences; Entrepreneur shows appeal to smaller audiences
Niche marketing - Targeting a small audience
Non-narrative television - Follows reality
Public service broadcasting - Information and education as well as entertainment
Reality television - Real life situations
Talking heads - The Apprentice: You're Fired!
Audience flow - The Apprentice: You're Fired! gets audience flow from The Apprentice as viewers 'might as well' just turn over to BBC2
Audience participation - Audiences increasingly like the democracy of voting; In The Apprentice: You're Fired!, audiences vote, although their vote doesn't influence the show
British Broadcasting Corporation - Differences in the ideologies of PSB shows (The Apprentice) and commercial shows (The X Factor)
Celebrity - Contestants may gain celebrity status (Celebrity Coach Trip)
Demographics - Demographics differ from entrepreneur shows to entertainment talent shows
Dumbing down - Commercial shows could be seen as dumbing down society
Elite - The elite would appreciate PSB shows such as The Apprentice
Empathy - Audiences emphasise with the characters due to the actuality
Fifteen-minutes-of-fame - Ordinary people gain celebrity status but it hardly lasts
Hegemony - The elite have control over PSBs but commercial TV is for the working class
Highbrow - The Apprentice and Dragons' Den are intellectual
Independent Television - Provide entertainment over education
Interactive media - Voting system
Lowbrow - Talent shows are for light entertainment
Mainstream - Talent shows appeal to mainstream audiences; Entrepreneur shows appeal to smaller audiences
Niche marketing - Targeting a small audience
Non-narrative television - Follows reality
Public service broadcasting - Information and education as well as entertainment
Reality television - Real life situations
Talking heads - The Apprentice: You're Fired!
Things to consider
- The Apprentice, Dragon's Den, Beat the Boss
- Format TV
- Popularity compared to X Factor?
- Both competitions
- How is the audience’s social demographic different to the reality TV talent search?
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