F06 :: Feminist Film Studies

It’s been a while since I’ve seen cable television… this assignment was a great opportunity to catch up on my MTV while I was home for break. I ssswatched the Real World: Denver. I used to watch the real world all the time. The great thing about it is that it’s relatively predictable, yet still somehow manages to keep you hooked. It’s been on the air for eighteen seasons and the show is considered to be the leading creation of the "reality television" explosion of today… and not that I’ve watched all eighteen seasons, but I have seen my fair share and I feel the producers have the casting to a science which leads to the inevitable drunken drama. This show is on MTV, which is probably the most watched television of teenagers in the United States, and I don't think that is too big a generalization to say so, which means they have to have a "hit" show. According to an article I read in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel the day after the season premier “The Real World Denver is about seven people from around the country living in a totally cool Denver house designed for fun. From the get-go, they have little more on their minds than getting loaded and, well, sex.� This season we’ve got three girls and four guys. All the members are attractive and in their twenties. This touches one the ideas of Young's "Scaling of bodies" because the girls all are relatively skinny, with long hair, wearing makeup and the guys are athletic with nice bodies. The show contorts to the stereotypical image of what society thinks is "attractive." You’ve also got your minority groups in there, the two black males and the gay guy so that the show isn't considered as "racist" or "prejudiced." The show is essentially about exploiting kids in their twenties to see the reactions of living with complete strangers with different viewpoints on certain subjects for entertainment. The producers want to put people on the show who are attractive for several reasons. One, because they want the cast member to be attracted to eachother. It makes for good television drama which in tern makes for good television content. I feel like people will also be more inclined to watch the show if they are attracted to the cast members as well.

This first episode basically introduces us to the cast members. Throughout the episode, there were several comments, other than the obvious and expected sexual comments, that I found particularly interesting. Brooke, the “cute� southern girl, stated when asked what she thought the rest of the roommates would be like that “there will probably be someone gay because there always is.� And the other was kind of a voice over when all the roommates were introducing themselves in the house by one of the two black males: “I just assumed I was going to be the only black guy in the house.� I thought they were very important, and proved to be later in the episode when Davis is forced to spill the news that he’s the sole gay member of the house during a dinner conversation and his roommate Stephen is offended by that. He confronts Davis saying that he doesn’t agree with him being gay and Davis says it’s not something you choose, just like Stephen didn’t choose being black. It just is. In the article on WebCT by Tara Katchgal “Look at the real world: there’s always a gay teen on there,� it referenced a writing that “argued that The Real World deployed narrative strategies to engender conflict between…� two of the cast members. This can be related to Bell Hooks' idea of "motivated representation," as I feel that this might have been the intentions of the producers and that this was a deliberate result of type casting. We shall see more as the season progresses though.

In a previous post, Nodira Ismoilova discussed the different views of reality shows as either being “real� or “constructed� reality. I agree with the opinion that the Real World is "constructed" reality. Not only for the editing, but also for the intentions of the show. In the past there used to be members on the show under the age of 21 who could not go to the bars. Now all the cast members are conveniently 21 and can legally drink, get drunk and make terrible decisions that they might regret. I think the editing is just a direct result of time constraints and for the purposes of allowing the viewer to follow the plot without the extra everyday activities that don't pertain to the storyline. Although, I guess the editors to get to choose which storyline will be more interesting for the show. I do, however find the camera angles, transitions and smoothness of the editing to be done quite beautifully.