As all of our readings this week pertained to the
exploitative economic structures and philosophies of reality television, I felt
it appropriate to bring Lifetime’s Unreal
into the conversation. Created by Marti Noxon and Sarah Gertrude Shapiro
(who had previously worked on The
Bachelor), Unreal follows the
behind-the-scenes drama of a reality dating show titled Everlasting. The show primarily focuses on two women, Rachel
Goldberg (Shiri Appleby), an emotionally perceptive, morally conflicted
producer brought back to the show after an emotional and mental breakdown, and
Quinn King (Constance Zimmer), the tenacious, morally flexible executive
producer who lures Rachel back to the show.
Over the
course of the show’s first season (the second season is due this year), we
watch Rachel (often against her will) prod and cajole the women competing for
the affection of a pompous British playboy, including a single mother with a
troubled past, a sexually aggressive model, a closeted virgin from the South,
and a woman suffering from bulimia. This prodding leads to high drama both on
and off camera on Everlasting, while Rachel is forced to put her economic
self-interest ahead of her morals and ethics (it’s worth noting that she is
first seen on the show wearing a shirt that reads “This is what a feminist
looks like”). Throughout the show, we are reminded of the craven nature of
reality TV; its systematic racism, its exploitation of both contestants and
below the line laborers, and the disregard for decency in lieu of manufactured
drama. Pointedly, one of the few major male characters on the show is Chet
Wilson (Craig Bierko), the philandering, drug-addicted creator of Everlasting, who takes almost no part in
the day to day functioning of the show.
Unreal was born out of a short film by
Shapiro titled Sequin Raze, and was
developed into a series by Lifetime, which was in search of a show to compete
in the landscape of dark, serialized cable dramas. Lifetime was in pursuit of
its own Breaking Bad (an influence
Shapiro cites frequently in interviews), and the comparisons are apt. Breaking Bad, while fundamentally a
character study on the descent of Walter White, suggested a broader critique of
American healthcare, the drug war, and contemporary masculinity. Unreal is similarly focused on the
downward spiral of its heroine, but situates this character in an unforgiving
world of perpetual exploitation. Rachel may even have fewer viable options than
Walter White; she is trapped, unable to get away from the show that already caused
one breakdown.
In a
fascinating turn, Lifetime has announced that Unreal season two will do something that The Bachelor has (very noticeably) not done, feature an
African-American bachelor as its primary object of desire, seemingly in an
effort to heighten the show’s already explicit critiques of the reality TV
economy, and in particular its structural racism. The second season also
promises even more timely cultural critique through two new characters
described as a disgraced NFL player (the bachelor) and a Black Lives Matter
activist (one of the contestants). It remains to be seen if the second season
of the show will reach the artistic and critical heights of the first, but what
information is out there suggests that the show is going to double down on its
dark, satirical tone. I cannot wait.
On the (almost completed) season of The Bachelor, there was one African American woman, Jubilee, who survived to the fifth week, which might be a record for any contestant of color. The bachelor, Ben, constantly talked about how much he liked her, but we never saw any specific "connection" between them. They went on one "one-on-one" date (which also was a rare event for any contestant of color), which seemed nice, but rather restrained.
ReplyDeleteClearly the show is full of shit and the affect it tries to edit is almost entirely fake. At the same time, after Jon's presentation on editing a few weeks ago, it would see they're doing the best with the material they have—meaning there might not have been a lot of footage of that couple really "falling in love."
This led me to question whether the show is aware of its (totally legit) bad press about diversity and trying to show it cares about the issue (a similar argument could be made about the Oscars, where Chris Rock's jokes were mostly right on, but also concealed a very homogeneous membership). Within the context of the show and the "reality" it manufactures, there was never really a good reason for Ben to keep Jubilee around... other than to make the show look more diverse.
In the middle of the fifth episode Ben unceremoniously kicked her out during a "group" date, sorta for no good reason. It was very strange (though, not strange at all), particularly because he gave no good reason for getting rid of her (other than the fact that his interest in her was entirely made by the producers).
https://www.whipclip.com/video/oxc9s