Reality TV

Factual Entertainment and Television Audiences

Annette Hill

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2004
• ISBN:
  9781134507047
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Media & Performing Arts
• Subtopic: Television

Reality TV restores a crucial, and often absent, element to the critical debate about reality television: the voices of people who watch reality programmes.

From Animal Hospital to Big Brother, Annette Hill argues that much can be learned from listening to audience discussion about this popular and rapidly changing television genre. Viewers' responses to reality TV can provide invaluable information to enhance our understanding of both the reality genre and contemporary television audiences.

Drawing on quantitative and qualitative audience research to understand how viewers categorise the reality genre, and how they judge the performance of ordinary people and the representation of authenticity within different types of reality programmes.

* Do audiences think reality TV is real?
* Can people learn from watching reality TV?
* How critical are viewers of reality TV?

Reality TV argues that audiences are engaged in a critical examination of the development of popular factual television. The book examines how audiences can learn from watching reality programmes, and how viewers think and talk about the ethics of reality TV.

Chapter 1

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Understanding reality TV

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Welcome to Reality TV. It's Friday night and I'm watching the finale of Teen Big Brother. It's an emotional experience. The remaining housemates sit around a table, choosing who will win the first Teen Big Brother. Commissioned by 4 Learning, the educational wing of Channel 4 in the UK, Teen Big Brother is an experiment in the reality genre. Part observational documentary, life experiment, educational programme, gameshow and soap opera, this reality programme has hit the headlines for being the first UK Big Brother to feature sex. ‘Bonk on Big Bruv’, says the Sun. ‘Horny Teens Show Big Bruv Way to Go’, adds the Daily Star. Love it or hate it, the programme is a popular topic for public debate. I'm watching Teen Big Brother to see what all the fuss is about. I missed the tears and tantrums, the backbiting and bedroom antics, only to tune in to the last ten minutes of the final programme. I'm gripped. The housemates explain why they should win. They go around the group, each one speaking with tightness in their throat. Everyone says the same thing: ‘I should win because I've been myself – what you see is what you get.’ Everyone cries. Everyone votes. The winner bursts into tears of gratitude, excitement and something else known only to them. And I watch with mixed feelings – fascination, anticipation, and scepticism. As I watch I'm enjoying the drama of the moment, and judging the reality of what I see on my television screen. This is my viewing experience of Teen Big Brother.

During the course of writing this book, I have watched a lot of reality TV, from Cops to Children's Hospital, UK's Worst Toilet to Survivor, Celebrity Detox Camp to When Good Times Go Bad 3. I've seen all of these programmes, and more. But I also watched a lot of reality TV before writing this book. And will continue to watch reality TV long after the publication of this book. So, is this a book about my experience of watching reality TV? Like many viewers of reality TV, I only watch certain types of programmes. I like watching Animal Hospital because I'm an animal lover, but I dislike When Animals Attack because I think it's tacky. I enjoy Temptation Island because it is melodramatic, but I don't enjoy The Bachelor because it isn't dramatic enough. I love The Edwardian Country House because the characters are engaging, but I have fallen out of love with Big Brother because the characters are not engaging enough. If this book were about my personal taste in reality programmes then you might learn a lot about me, but little about the social phenomenon of reality TV.

So, what is this book about? Reality TV is about the development of a television genre often called reality TV. Reality TV is a catch-all category that includes a wide range of entertainment programmes about real people. Sometimes called popular factual television, reality TV is located in border territories, between information and entertainment, documentary and drama. Originally used as a category for law and order popular factual programmes containing ‘on-scene’ footage of cops on the job, reality TV has become the success story of television in the 1990s and 2000s. There are reality TV programmes about everything and anything, from healthcare to hairdressing, from people to pets. There are reality TV formats sold all over the world, from the UK to Uruguay. There are people who love reality TV, and people who love to hate reality TV. Whatever your opinion of Cops, Neighbours from Hell, Big Brother, or Survivor, reality TV is here to stay. Rupert Murdoch, the man who gave us Fox TV and Cops, even has a channel devoted to the genre – Reality TV – with plans for further popular factual channels in the future. Where Murdoch leads, others follow.

Reality TV is also about the viewing experience of a developing factual television genre. It is commonly assumed that audiences cannot tell the difference between entertainment and information, or fiction and reality in popular factual television. With such concern regarding audiences and reality TV it is necessary to explore the development of this genre, and audience relationships with these types of popular factual output. If this book is about exploring the genre of reality TV, then what audiences have to say about their experience of watching reality programmes is paramount. Audience responses to reality TV can provide invaluable information and analysis for understanding the transitional terrain of the reality genre, and can enhance critical understanding of contemporary television audiences.

RATING REALITY TV

The reality genre has mass appeal. Popular series such as American Idol in the USA or I'm a Celebrity … in the UK have attracted up to and over 50 per cent of the market share, which means more than half the population of television viewers tuned into these programmes. To achieve such ratings these reality series have to be all round entertainers. The proposed reality cable channel, Reality Central, has signed up more than thirty reality stars to appear on and promote the channel in 2004. According to Larry Namer, the co-founder of E! Entertainment and Reality Central, there is a large base of reality TV fans: ‘to them reality TV is television. It's not a fad.’¹

In 2000, the reality gameshow Survivor rated number one in American network prime time (27 million viewers) and earned CBS during the final three episodes an estimated $50 million in advertising revenue. In 2002, the finale of the reality talent show American Idol (Fox, USA) attracted 23 million viewers, and a market share of 30 per cent, with almost half the country's teenage female viewers tuning in to watch the show.² In January 2003, American Idol drew nearly 25 million viewers two nights running, making it ‘the most watched non-sports show in the network's history’.³ By February 2003, Fox had another winner, this time with the finale of reality dating show Joe Millionaire, which drew 40 million viewers, making it almost as popular as the broadcast of the Academy Awards, and ‘the highest series telecast on any network since CBS' premiere of Survivor II in January 2001’.⁴ In comparison, only 15 million viewers watched the number one crime drama series CSI: Crime Scene Investigation (CBS), or sitcom Friends (NBC), during the same period. Reality programmes regularly win the highest ratings for the majority of half-hour time slots during primetime American television.⁵

Reality TV is just as popular in the UK. In 2000, over 70 per cent of the population (aged 4–65+) watched reality programmes on a regular or occasional basis (Hill/ITC 2000). The types of programmes watched most often by the public in 2000 were: police/crime programmes (e.g. Police Camera Action!, ITV1) watched either regularly or occasionally by 72 per cent of adults and 71 per cent of children; ‘places’ programmes (e.g. Airport, BBC1) watched by 71 per cent of adults and 75 per cent of children; and home/garden shows (e.g. Changing Rooms, BBC1) watched by 67 per cent of adults and 84 per cent of children. Amongst the under 16s (in particular, the under 13s), pet programmes (e.g. Animal Hospital, BBC1) were as popular as the categories cited above – watched by 83 per cent of children and 63 per cent of adults (Hill/ITC 2000). All of these reality programmes have performed strongly in peaktime schedules, and have attracted up to and over a 50 per cent market share.

The highest rated series, such as reality talent show Pop Idol (ITV1) or reality gameshow I'm a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here! (ITV1), attracted over 10 million viewers, which makes such reality series almost as popular as established soap operas such as Coronation Street (ITV1). I'm a Celebrity … was so successful it single-handedly changed the profile of its sister digital channel, ITV2, from the ‘must not watch channel’ to ‘the second most-watched channel in multichannel homes at that time after ITV1’.⁶ The third series of I'm a Celebrity … attracted record ratings, with a 60 per cent market share for particular episodes (over 15 million viewers). The broadcaster charged approximately £90,000 per 30 second advert, compared to its normal charges of between £40,000 and £50,000 for a similar peaktime advertising slot.⁷ Littlewoods, the major gambling organisation in the UK, has signed a five-year interactive television deal with ITV, anticipating that reality series such as I'm a Celebrity … will provide high-level gambling revenues for interactive TV gaming and betting (estimated £2.8 billion per year in total revenue).⁸ Television producer Simon Fuller, the creator of Pop Idol, ‘shot up an astounding 500 places in the Sunday Times Rich List [2003], thanks to his £90m fortune, which has grown by £40m’ as a result of the success of this reality format and its spin-off music products.⁹ Big Brother gave Channel 4 its most popular ratings in the history of the UK channel, attracting nearly 10 million viewers in 2000; the second series of Big Brother averaged 4.5 million viewers, giving Channel 4 more than a 70 per cent increase on their average broadcast share (Hill 2002). Big Brother 3 generated over 10 million text messages, and attracted 10 million viewers for its finale.¹⁰ A 30 second advertising spot during Big Brother 3 cost £40,000, over three times more than for any other show on Channel 4 in 2003 (for example, Frasier's cash value was £14,000 for a 30 second spot).¹¹

The picture is the same in many other countries around the world. In the Netherlands, the first Big Brother ‘became one of the country's top-rated shows within a month, and drew 15 million viewers for its climax on New Year's Eve 1999’.¹² In Spain, more people tuned in to watch Big Brother in 2000 than the Champions League semi-final match between Real Madrid and Bayern Munich (Hill 2002). The finale of Expedition Robinson (the Swedish version of Survivor) was watched by half the Swedish population in 1997.¹³ In Norway, a country with a population of 4.3 million, Pop Idol (2003) received 3.3 million SMS votes.¹⁴ Loft Story, the French version of Big Brother, was a ratings hit in 2003 with over 7 million viewers, despite regular demonstrations by ‘Activists Against Trash TV’ calling for the series to be banned, and carrying placards which read ‘With trash TV the people turn into idiots’.¹⁵ The pan-African version of Big Brother, produced in Malawi, involved ten contestants from ten different countries and, despite calls by Church groups in several African countries for it to be banned, the show remained popular with viewers who praised it for bridging cultural gaps.¹⁶ The Russian reality gameshow The House (Dom) enthralled Russian television viewers in 2003, as they watched contestants build a £150,000 five-bedroomed house (the average wage in Russia is less than £150 a month).¹⁷ When a woman won Big Brother 3 in Australia, Channel Ten attracted twice as many viewers as its main rival, Channel Nine, the number one rated channel (2003).¹⁸ More than 3 million people, about half the population of television viewers in Australia, tuned into the hit reality property series The Block on Channel Nine. The series featured the renovation of apartments in Sydney by four couples, who were given a budget and eleven weeks to renovate their properties. After twelve weeks the apartments were auctioned, and the couple with the highest bid won. The conclusion to The Block was ‘Australia's most watched TV show since the 2000 Sydney Olympics. Only the funeral of Princess Diana drew a bigger audience for a non-sport related program.’¹⁹ The format has been sold to the US Fox network, ITV1 in the UK, TV2 in Denmark, as well as being picked up by broadcasters in Belgium, France, the Netherlands and South Africa. The Herald-Sun called The Block ‘a runaway smash that shows no sign of losing steam’.²⁰

There are hundreds of reality TV websites devoted to keeping viewers informed about a range of reality programmes, related merchandise, news, and fan activities. RealityTVplanet.com has a reality TV calendar with up-to-the-minute scheduling information on the latest reality programmes on US television, plus episode summaries, news, a ‘what's hot’ gossip column, various games, e-cards and bulletin boards. Similarly, realitytvworld.com contains up-to-the-minute schedules, news items, and polls about a range of US reality series. Sirlinksalot contains a site for the reality television genre with selected news items, and websites devoted to US reality series and selected reality series around the world. In the USA alone, sirlinksalot lists a total of 130 reality TV series (during November 2003): 17 reality TV series for ABC, 15 for CBS, 22 for NBC, 25 for Fox, and 20 for MTV, as well as 31 series for other cable channels such as WB Network, UPN, and HBO. Each series has its own list of selected official and unofficial websites. For example, Fox's Joe Millionaire (first and second series) has over fifteen sites listed, including Fox's official site, and several fan forums devoted to debate about ‘who will he choose?’ and Joe's ‘manly thoughts’.

One of the reasons the reality genre has been so powerful in the television market is that it appeals to younger adults in particular. For example, reality gameshows and talent shows in the USA are especially popular with ‘young viewers who have watched reality shows in far bigger numbers than anything else on television and are the consumers most coveted by advertisers’.²¹ Fox reality specials, such as World's Worst Drivers Caught on Tape 2, specifically attract males aged 18–49, a coveted demographic group for advertisers.²² In the UK, reality gameshows such as Big Brother specifically attract upwardly mobile, educated viewers aged 16–34, the target audience for Channel 4 who shows the series (Hill 2002). A national surve...