Escape from Reality TV

My exposure to reality TV has been limited; just enough, really, to have allowed me to conclude that I despise everyone who ever has or ever will appear on a reality TV show. In fact, I once concocted a plan to cull all such people from the population by placing an ad for a fake reality show in Variety (that's where they put these things, right? I mean, Annonce if you're trying to sell your '82 Skoda, Variety if you're casting a reality tv show. I didn't spend four years in journalism school for nothing). Anyone who answered the ad would be transported to an island with fake television cameras in all the trees (red lights on) and left there to die.

But that was before some friends and I came up with a brilliant idea for a reality TV show of our own. If you'll permit me, I'm going to practice the pitch I'll be giving NBC (that's who you pitch these things to, right? TV Nova if you have an idea for a naked traffic girl, NBC if you're pitching a new reality show. I haven't lived in the Czech Republic for 10 years for nothing.)

Our show was inspired by (is, in fact, derivative of) a real reality show we watched last night in which this chick had to live for a week each with three different guys and then decide which one she wanted to marrry or date or learn the last name of or something (it's blurry, I blame the saki).

The show was, as you can imagine, AMAZING. The girl was a gym queen with a head of artfully highlighted* and permed hair which she kept STRAIGHTENING. She had a gorgeous Manhattan apartment (or had been loaned one for the show) and a chihuahua named Mooky. (This, according to one friend -- the friend who owns a chihuahua and who admitted she'd watch an all-chihuahua reality show, if one existed -- made her "cool.")

I could go into far too much detail about the three guys and the hijinx that ensued, but suffice to say, the show followed most of the conventions of reality shows including that of having participants talk directly to the camera about what they're thinking.

There's also a crazy-ass panel of relationship "experts" who advise everyone and do colour-commentary on the proceedings.

At some point, fed up with the inanity of the dialogue (and the people, for that matter) we hatched a plan for our own, pseudo-intellectual reality show: "Who Wants to Date Noam Chomsky?"

The premise would be similar to that of the show we watched -- three women would each live with Noam for a week, after which, he'd decide...actually, I don't know if he would decide anything, because I think he's married. The big thing would just be his interaction with the contestants, all of whom would, of course, be airheads. We could imagine him sitting in his bedroom at the end of the day telling the camera bemusedly, "I just couldn't believe the way she'd watch television so...uncritically."

Noam's wife, we decided, would be on the panel (and possibly having the time of her life).

It strikes me now that it has the most important quality for a successful reality TV show -- it could translate across cultures. I can already imagine the Czech version, "Who Wants to Date Jiri Dientsbier?" And the Canadian version, "Who Wants to Date John Kenneth Galbraith?" only he's dead, so recruiting contestants might be more of a challenge. But wait, the generic, "Who Wants to Date a Dead Guy?" might be the most brilliant idea of all.

Does anybody have a number for NBC?


*Whenever I think of highlights, I think of Ukrainian figure skater Oksana Baiul who told reporters she'd gotten "headlights" in her hair. I thought at first it was as an aid to night skating, but it turned out to be a malapropism -- she'd actually been to see Miss Clairol.**


**"Been to see Miss Clairol" is a euphemism I've coined for dying one's hair. It could catch on, except that there's really no need for a euphemism for dying one's hair -- it's like coming up with a euphemism for taking a short stroll, or eating a small meal (both of which, come to think of it, sound like euphemisms in their own right).