Speaker 1: Hi, Curse Up listeners, I know you miss me on
Speaker 1: your feed. Don't worry. We're working on an all new
Speaker 1: season of Curse Of coming out later this year. In
Speaker 1: the meantime, if you can't stop thinking about the shocking
Speaker 1: stories you heard about America's Next Top Model, you'll definitely
Speaker 1: want to check out our new docuseries from E Dirty
Speaker 1: Rotten Scandals. In the series, you'll hear from the America's
Speaker 1: Next Top Model participants you heard from on Curse Of,
Speaker 1: and a few you didn't like former A and TM
Speaker 1: judge Janis Dickinson. Dirty Rotten Scandals unveils the dark underbelly
Speaker 1: of the long running TV series through the untold stories
Speaker 1: of former contestants, and shows what happens when a golden
Speaker 1: opportunity for aspiring models unravels into a harrowing saga of exploitation,
Speaker 1: shattered dreams, and resilience. You can find the two part
Speaker 1: docuseries Dirty Rotten Scandals America's Next Top Model on E Network.
Speaker 1: Check your local TV provider schedule. If you've ever watched
Speaker 1: America's Next Top Model, or even if you haven't, you
Speaker 1: probably recognize this scene coming.
Speaker 2: Here with a defeatist attitude I don't have.
Speaker 1: A bad attitude. Maybe I am angry inside.
Speaker 2: I've been through stuff, so I'm angry, which is not
Speaker 2: anybody belot that's what is watching you.
Speaker 1: But you're not bad on the surface. It's Tyra Banks
Speaker 1: finally losing her patients on a seemingly apathetic contestant named
Speaker 1: Tiffany Richardson. Tiffany had just been eliminated from the competition,
Speaker 1: and Tyra was disappointed in her attitude. But there's something
Speaker 1: deeper going on here. I've never in my life yolder
Speaker 1: the girl like this.
Speaker 2: When my mother yells at this, it's because she loves me.
Speaker 1: I was rooting for you.
Speaker 2: We were all rooting for you. Out Damn you learn
Speaker 2: something from this.
Speaker 1: It's become one of the most iconic moments in all
Speaker 1: of reality TV history, maybe in all of pop culture history.
Speaker 1: I was rooting for you. We were all rooting for you.
Speaker 1: Those words have trans sended their context. They've become a
Speaker 1: meme and a catchphrase. That moment aired on April thirteenth,
Speaker 1: two thousand and five, just a few days short of
Speaker 1: my seventeenth birthday, and I was one of the five
Speaker 1: point five million people watching it live. For a long time,
Speaker 1: I thought I understood that moment, But after doing some
Speaker 1: digging and talking to the models and crew members who
Speaker 1: were there that day, I found out I had no clue.
Speaker 3: If you were so rooting for her and saw her drowning,
Speaker 3: what did you help her?
Speaker 1: I'm just clutching my pearls. Okay, at this point, it
Speaker 1: is ooh scary.
Speaker 4: It's the same feeling that you get when your mom
Speaker 4: was cursing out your sibling.
Speaker 5: There was a huge chunk that got cut out of that.
Speaker 5: Tyra got real personal with her and she hit her
Speaker 5: below the bell.
Speaker 2: I cried every freaking episode.
Speaker 1: I cried so much. I was just like, I'm not crying.
Speaker 6: Them all gone, like I'm not.
Speaker 1: Gonna beg to be here. People often wonder if that
Speaker 1: moment was staged, and while a lot of the stuff
Speaker 1: that happened on America's Next Top Model or ANTM was,
Speaker 1: according to everyone I spoke to and Tiffany Richardson herself,
Speaker 1: the I was rooting for you moment was not staged.
Speaker 1: That was real emotion and it's one of the few
Speaker 1: times we see Tyra's wiggslip, a moment where we see
Speaker 1: the real her.
Speaker 2: You go to bed at night, you lay there and
Speaker 2: you take responsibility for yourself because nobody's gonna take responsibility
Speaker 2: for you. You rolling your eyes and because you've heard
Speaker 2: it all before. You've heard it all before. You don't
Speaker 2: know where the hell I come from. You have no
Speaker 2: idea what I've been through. But I'm not a victim.
Speaker 2: I grow from it and I learn take responsibility for yourself.
Speaker 1: I've been looking into what happened on set that day,
Speaker 1: and I've talked to people from every part of the
Speaker 1: A and T and production, like Jose Torres. He was
Speaker 1: a sound mixer on the show for twenty seasons, and
Speaker 1: he was there during the we were Rooting for You moment.
Speaker 5: Tyra took some mean shots, and a lot of it
Speaker 5: felt like she was personally invested in her. But she
Speaker 5: said some things to her about what are you going
Speaker 5: to do when you go back home and you're sleeping
Speaker 5: on that mattress again, when it's just you and your baby.
Speaker 5: You know, she got personal and she didn't need to,
Speaker 5: but I could see she was really pissed off.
Speaker 1: For the past six months, I've interviewed dozens of contestants, producers,
Speaker 1: and crew members about their experiences on the show. I've
Speaker 1: been sent contracts and heard about dubious psyche valuations. I've
Speaker 1: been told about dangerous photoshoots and production standards that sound
Speaker 1: were like psychological experiments. I've heard about body shaming that
Speaker 1: caused lifelong trauma and edits that ruin people's careers. I
Speaker 1: wanted to know everything, from how this show got made
Speaker 1: to what really happened behind the scenes. I wanted to
Speaker 1: figure out why A and TM had so many of
Speaker 1: us in a choke hold and the effect it had
Speaker 1: on us the audience. I wanted to know if the
Speaker 1: price the contestants paid for their fifteen minutes of fame
Speaker 1: was really worth it. And I wanted to figure out
Speaker 1: if the show was cursed like so many people say,
Speaker 1: and if it was, who are the real victims of
Speaker 1: the curse. Now, let's go on this investigative journey so
Speaker 1: we can figure this out together. We want to beyond some,
Speaker 1: want to beyond some. I'm Bridget Armstrong, and this is
Speaker 1: the Curse of America's Next Top Model. A deep dive
Speaker 1: into one of the most iconic and problematic shows in
Speaker 1: American history. When A and TM premiered in two thousand
Speaker 1: and three, it felt like it was the first reality
Speaker 1: show for so one like me. I wouldn't say I
Speaker 1: ever wanted to be a model, but I certainly thought
Speaker 1: that with my high top Melissa Jelly sneakers, the girls
Speaker 1: who Know Know, and my low rise Deilia's jeans, I
Speaker 1: was a fashion girly while my peers were rocking micro raids.
Speaker 1: I printed out a picture of Eva the Diva's makeover
Speaker 1: haircut from cycle three, took it to my stylus and said,
Speaker 1: give me that. I don't think it's an exaggeration to
Speaker 1: say A and TM had an impact on the woman
Speaker 1: I became, and I know I'm not the only one.
Speaker 1: For millennial women. The influence of the show was inescapable.
Speaker 1: Even if you didn't watch, it was in the air
Speaker 1: around you, and in a way, it's still embedded in
Speaker 1: our pop culture all these years later. And I would
Speaker 1: know because I still love reality TV and pop culture
Speaker 1: so much so that I've made a whole career out
Speaker 1: of it. I've spent the last fifteen years as a
Speaker 1: producer covering pop culture from NPR to box media to
Speaker 1: the skim. The thing that's always fascinated me about pop
Speaker 1: culture is that it's a reflection of our society, of
Speaker 1: who we are. It's what we choose to create and consume,
Speaker 1: and even if we don't want to admit it, it's
Speaker 1: a reflection of our values and beliefs. That's what makes
Speaker 1: America's Next Top Model such an interesting case study. In
Speaker 1: a lot of ways, it's a time capsule of us.
Speaker 1: And when the A and TM time capsule was opened
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty, many of us were horrified at what
Speaker 1: we saw. And welcome back to another episode of why
Speaker 1: America's Next opp Model is the most toxic show up
Speaker 1: its decade.
Speaker 3: Robin was getting body shamed and age shamed the worst
Speaker 3: out of all of them.
Speaker 1: And I just need to talk about some of the
Speaker 1: makeovers that still make me mad to this day. A
Speaker 1: and TM, especially in the early seasons, it's riddled with
Speaker 1: body shaming and misguided and ignorant views on sexuality and race.
Speaker 1: The things that didn't seem deep to us back then
Speaker 1: now seem deeply problematic. In every speaking engagement Tyra's done
Speaker 1: since twenty twenty, she's had to address the backlash. Here
Speaker 1: she is in twenty twenty five, accepting a luminary spotlight
Speaker 1: of work from Essen and she's still talking about the
Speaker 1: A ANDTM controversy. Did we get in right?
Speaker 6: Hell?
Speaker 1: No, I say some dumb shit.
Speaker 6: But I refuse to have my legacy be about some
Speaker 6: stuff linked together on the internet when there were twenty
Speaker 6: four cycles.
Speaker 1: Of changing the world. Tyra's right, they did say some
Speaker 1: dumb shit. But here's the thing, even with my twenty
Speaker 1: twenty five sensibilities and maturity, when I rewatched America's Next
Speaker 1: Top Model, there's something about it that's still so good.
Speaker 1: There's a reason why it lasted for twenty first seasons,
Speaker 1: and why it's been adapted in fifty countries, why there
Speaker 1: are so many Reddit pages with thousands of posts dedicated
Speaker 1: to reliving A andtm's best moments, and why at its
Speaker 1: peak it drew over seven million viewers in episode. Even
Speaker 1: with all the problematic shit, there's something magical about America's
Speaker 1: Next Top Model, at least for the audience, But for
Speaker 1: the models it's more complicated. Today, many of them are
Speaker 1: speaking out about the negative experiences they had on the show.
Speaker 1: Take Yo Wanna House. She won the competition on cycle two,
Speaker 1: but in that year afterwards she didn't feel like she
Speaker 1: won much of anything. She was flat broke and she
Speaker 1: wasn't getting any help from A and TM here's Yuanna.
Speaker 4: It was really hard to not get in that headspace
Speaker 4: of being bitter towards the show because you spit me
Speaker 4: on as a winner. I won it rightfully so and
Speaker 4: now I'm having to look and be a million bucks,
Speaker 4: but I'm not making any money right now. I'm living
Speaker 4: on a couch from a makeup artist who extended their
Speaker 4: couch for me. Yet I'm famous.
Speaker 1: And Cycle four finalist Kenya Hill, whose entire storyline on
Speaker 1: the show was about how much she ate. Kenya was thin,
Speaker 1: she just wasn't afraid to eat on camera, so producers
Speaker 1: decided a good storyline for her would be about her
Speaker 1: supposed overeating that caused her to gain weight uncontrollably, which
Speaker 1: wasn't true.
Speaker 7: Even still to this day, I am mindful of is
Speaker 7: there anybody watching me eat right now? They believed what
Speaker 7: was portrayed on the show, and so that has actually
Speaker 7: been a struggle of just even eating in public.
Speaker 1: I've heard a lot of disturbing stories and you will
Speaker 1: too as this season goes on. But out of all
Speaker 1: the criticisms and complaints, the contestants say, the biggest one
Speaker 1: is that the show was never really voting for them.
Speaker 1: That A ANDTM failed to deliver the one thing it
Speaker 1: repeatedly promised, a career in the high fashion modeling industry.
Speaker 1: In fact, only one contestant went on to achieve top
Speaker 1: model stardom that's anything close to Tyro's career, and that
Speaker 1: was Winnie Harlowe. She's probably one of the most recognizable
Speaker 1: women in fashion today. She has a true, one of
Speaker 1: a kind look. She has been algo, a condition that
Speaker 1: causes patches of skin to lose their color. It makes
Speaker 1: her incredibly striking. When she was on A ANDTM cycle
Speaker 1: twenty one, she went by her real name Chantelle, and
Speaker 1: she was eliminated on the fourth episode, brought back, and
Speaker 1: then eliminated again on episode thirteen. When she was first eliminated,
Speaker 1: it was for an optical illusion photoshoot. In her picture,
Speaker 1: she's perched in this awkward sitting position and she looks
Speaker 1: like she's wearing her shoulders as earrings. I don't know
Speaker 1: if this was her best picture, but you can certainly
Speaker 1: see why the judges sent her home.
Speaker 8: Chantelle, here you are looking so beautiful, but we feel
Speaker 8: like all this beauty is being thrown away. The judges
Speaker 8: and social media are not happy with your photo.
Speaker 1: After she was eliminated, Winnie went on to have a
Speaker 1: hugely successful career. She've walked the Victoria Secret Runway. She
Speaker 1: was in Beyonce's visual album Lemonade. She's been on the
Speaker 1: cover of Al Magazine, Harper's Bizarre, Vogue, Grease, Vogue India.
Speaker 1: She's that girl. But according to Winnie, A and TM
Speaker 1: didn't help her modeling career at all. Here she is
Speaker 1: on Watch What Happens Live. You were on America's Next
Speaker 1: Top Model.
Speaker 5: You did great, but then you really broke through and
Speaker 5: here we are.
Speaker 1: So I really started after the show because that really
Speaker 1: didn't do anything for my career, which it doesn't do
Speaker 1: anything for any model's career realistically. I went on because
Speaker 1: I thought like that was going to be a career starter,
Speaker 1: but it was really like a reality TV show. That's
Speaker 1: not what I signed up for. I mean, it is
Speaker 1: what she signed up for. She just thought she was
Speaker 1: going to get a lot more out of it. Season
Speaker 1: after season, we saw dozens of models compete for a
Speaker 1: career making opportunity, and we watched one model be crowned
Speaker 1: the winner of a and TM. But when they didn't
Speaker 1: appear on the cover of Vogue or walk the Chanelle
Speaker 1: or do your runways, when they didn't actually become top models,
Speaker 1: it didn't stop us from tuning in the next season
Speaker 1: because it wasn't about that the show was entertaining short
Speaker 1: Some contestants did work his models after the show, and
Speaker 1: some used their fame to launch careers in other areas
Speaker 1: of entertainment. But if this was a show that was
Speaker 1: really about creating top models, why are there so many
Speaker 1: contestants who say being on it actually hurt their chances
Speaker 1: in the fashion industry. Like Angelie Preston, who first competed
Speaker 1: on Cycle fourteen and then later on All Star seventeen.
Speaker 1: After the show ended, she wasn't booking modeling gigs, and
Speaker 1: she didn't know why until a friend in the industry
Speaker 1: told her the truth.
Speaker 3: My booker was like, he loves you, but he cannot
Speaker 3: sign you and he can't work with you because of
Speaker 3: how you were portrayed.
Speaker 1: Basically, they not messing with you. And I was so
Speaker 1: gutted because I was just like, why did I go
Speaker 1: on the show? Angelie was portrayed as a girl who'd
Speaker 1: left the hood, but couldn't quite get the hood to
Speaker 1: leave her. But when she came back for the All
Speaker 1: Star season, she'd had a glow up. It wasn't that
Speaker 1: her look had changed, it was the way she carried
Speaker 1: herself and the judges noticed. She was crowned the winner
Speaker 1: of A and TM All Stars, but she didn't keep
Speaker 1: that title long. A and TM stripped her of her
Speaker 1: win and after she couldn't book any modeling jobs. But
Speaker 1: that's a story we'll get into later this season. Angelie
Speaker 1: wasn't the only model who told me she had a
Speaker 1: hard time finding representation after being on A ANDTM. Gina
Speaker 1: Turner was on the final cycle of A and TM.
Speaker 1: You may remember her clean, bald haircut that gave her
Speaker 1: an otherworldly look. After she left Top Model, she had
Speaker 1: trouble of finding an agent who would sign her.
Speaker 9: I did have an agent tell me she knew I
Speaker 9: was on America's Except Model and not as much as
Speaker 9: she loved my look and would have loved to sign
Speaker 9: into the agency. The agency unfortunately, does not typically affiliate
Speaker 9: themselves with girls who have been on the show. It's
Speaker 9: just really distracting for a lot of clients. And that
Speaker 9: you know, she was happy to meet me that unfortunately
Speaker 9: she couldn't sign me, and I was really bummed.
Speaker 1: Out of course, for this show, I had to call
Speaker 1: Lisa Dematto. She's probably one of the most infamous contestants
Speaker 1: from ANTM because of her wild child antics, like the
Speaker 1: time she peeded in a diaper on the set of
Speaker 1: a photoshoot on cycle five. She's also known because to
Speaker 1: this day she still trashes ANTM every chance she gets.
Speaker 1: I couldn't get an agency.
Speaker 4: They're like, we can't book you for anything.
Speaker 9: The clients that I would normally see for like nutrient
Speaker 9: gene are crust or you.
Speaker 4: Know, any type of catalog.
Speaker 1: No one wanted to see me. After the show. They
Speaker 1: completely destroyed me. This is how a lot of contestants
Speaker 1: talk about Tyra and A and TM today, But I
Speaker 1: don't think it was Tyra's initial intention to ruin their careers.
Speaker 1: Coming up, we're going to dive into the origins of
Speaker 1: America's Next Top Model. When a young Tyra Banks came
Speaker 1: up with an idea to launch her second act, an
Speaker 1: idea that will propel want to be models into supermodel stardom.
Speaker 1: But as we know, only one of those things became
Speaker 1: a reality when we talk about A and TM today,
Speaker 1: it's usually about how problematic it was, or the fact
Speaker 1: that it didn't really produce top models and that it
Speaker 1: featured rampant body shaming and so called race flapping photo shoots.
Speaker 1: Critics of the show usually fall into one of two camps.
Speaker 1: You either believe Tyra was an evil mastermind responsible for
Speaker 1: everything wrong with ANTM, or you believe she was just
Speaker 1: a host, a pretty face brought in to anchor a
Speaker 1: modeling competition, just doing what she was told by sinister
Speaker 1: faithless execs. The first thing I learned in reporting this
Speaker 1: podcast is that the second option is not true. America's
Speaker 1: next top Model was Tyra's idea. It was her baby,
Speaker 1: her passion project. So let's go back to the beginning
Speaker 1: to figure out how this germ of an idea in
Speaker 1: Tyra's mind became a pop culture phenomenon. Don't you get
Speaker 1: the idea for that show? That is such a good idea,
Speaker 1: it's a weird. It was two thousand and two. Tyra
Speaker 1: Banks was in her late twenty and looking for her
Speaker 1: next move. Oprah.
Speaker 2: I looked out the window and have this beautiful view,
Speaker 2: and it came to me. I was like, I want
Speaker 2: to do like an American idol book for models, but
Speaker 2: they lived together like the real world.
Speaker 1: A modeling boot camp based on her early career, those
Speaker 1: scrappy years when she was just trying to become a supermodel,
Speaker 1: Tyra started modeling she was still a teenager. A girl
Speaker 1: at school came up to her and told her she
Speaker 1: had the right look.
Speaker 2: She was a beautiful girl, and she was like, you know,
Speaker 2: you look like you should be a model, and mighty
Speaker 2: tell you you'd model. You ain't model, And I was like, what,
Speaker 2: you know, people stare at me, but not for that.
Speaker 2: And she kind of took me under her wing and
Speaker 2: taught me everything, and she started modeling, I think later
Speaker 2: in the ninth grade. She started kind of early, and
Speaker 2: then I started in the eleventh grade when I was fifteen.
Speaker 1: And at first Tyra actually got rejected by a lot
Speaker 1: of agencies. But all you need is one yes, and
Speaker 1: she got that when she was seventeen, so she packed
Speaker 1: her bags and went to Paris alone. She went to
Speaker 1: casting after casting, walked runway after runway to make it
Speaker 1: to the top. And this was a time when there
Speaker 1: were very few black supermodels, and Tyra was no Gigi
Speaker 1: hided she didn't have the benefit of nepotism. She had
Speaker 1: to get it out the mud. Here's a CNN segment
Speaker 1: about her rise to fame.
Speaker 10: Nineteen year old Tyra Banks uses her chameleon likability to
Speaker 10: change her attitude as often as she changes her clothes.
Speaker 10: One minute, she shined, demure, the next salty and sex sea.
Speaker 10: Tyra stands five feet eleven inches and especially in her
Speaker 10: way to international fame.
Speaker 1: In the span of a decade, which is quite a
Speaker 1: long career for a model, Tyra became the first black
Speaker 1: woman to do the cover of GQ and Sports Illustrated,
Speaker 1: and she eventually went on to become one of the
Speaker 1: most recognizable Victoria's Secret Angels. But from the beginning, Tyra
Speaker 1: knew her modeling career was temporary. She was always planning
Speaker 1: her next big thing. Here she is at age nineteen.
Speaker 2: I'd like to reach my peaking around twenty three or
Speaker 2: twenty four, like five years from now, I guess, and
Speaker 2: move on to something else.
Speaker 10: What can you want to do besides modeling.
Speaker 2: I'm going to film and television first media as an actress,
Speaker 2: to learn that side of the camera.
Speaker 1: But that's not my main though.
Speaker 2: I mean that's not what I want to do.
Speaker 8: I want to be on the other side.
Speaker 2: Account like writing for film and televisions.
Speaker 1: And she made the first part happen. Tyra did TV
Speaker 1: appearances like this one where she played Wilsmith's homegirl Jackie
Speaker 1: on The Fresh Prince. That's it.
Speaker 2: I didn't come all the way here from Philly.
Speaker 1: You are not even gonna change. Oh my gosh. I
Speaker 1: remember that episode, and Tyra nailed it. She had a
Speaker 1: pretty significant role in the nineteen ninety five film Higher Learning.
Speaker 1: She was even in a Disney movie with Lindsay Lohan
Speaker 1: called Life Size, where she played a doll come to life.
Speaker 1: So by the early two thousands, Tyra was a household name,
Speaker 1: but she was also in her late twenties. And if
Speaker 1: there's anything A and TM taught me, it's that if
Speaker 1: you're over the age of twenty two, you might as
Speaker 1: well be dead. In the modeling industry, some models use
Speaker 1: their beauty to pivot into serious acting careers, like Charlie's
Speaker 1: Thereon or Cameron Diaz. Others were content to fade into
Speaker 1: the shadow to become fashion icons of yesteryear. But Tyra
Speaker 1: was determined to roll her fame into something even bigger.
Speaker 2: Because I'm not satisfied with just my career now. I mean,
Speaker 2: I always want more.
Speaker 4: I always want to do more.
Speaker 2: I never like just stop and get satisfied with something.
Speaker 1: So that's when Tyra got her billion dollar idea, a
Speaker 1: show that would use her expertise in modeling and launched
Speaker 1: her career in TV. And just like she had to
Speaker 1: fight to make it on the Runway, Tyra had to
Speaker 1: fight to get a and TM made. When Tyra initially
Speaker 1: came up with the show, her agent told her it
Speaker 1: was a bad idea.
Speaker 2: I had a lot of people tell me that this
Speaker 2: wasn't going to work, that models are unsympathetic characters. Actually
Speaker 2: is my agent. He told me models are unsympathetic characters.
Speaker 2: Nobody wants to see this.
Speaker 1: I hope she fired that guy. But Tyra knew she
Speaker 1: had something special, so she kept telling people about her
Speaker 1: little reality show idea until she found someone who saw
Speaker 1: the vision, an established television producer named Ken Mock. A
Speaker 1: friend introduced Tyran. Ken, they had a two hour meeting
Speaker 1: and he was sold. They decided to be partners on
Speaker 1: this project. Ken had already produced a few reality shows,
Speaker 1: so we had some connections and he helped their set
Speaker 1: up meetings to pitch the show to networks, and they
Speaker 1: got a lot of nos.
Speaker 2: And we pitched it like I stood up because I
Speaker 2: knew who I wanted my cast to be. I walk
Speaker 2: and acted like miss Jay Honeycappache, I think you don't.
Speaker 6: I did the whole thing for all of the networks.
Speaker 2: I sure did acted out everybody.
Speaker 1: They must have loved it.
Speaker 4: They loved it.
Speaker 2: Not everybody bought it, but they loved it.
Speaker 1: Tyron's over the top antics started before she even had
Speaker 1: a deal. She was in those boardrooms putting on a
Speaker 1: one woman show. She literally acted out her dream cast
Speaker 1: and people loved it, but not enough to fund the show.
Speaker 1: That was until she met with an exec from CBS
Speaker 1: named Ken Maynard, who also told her it was a
Speaker 1: no for CBS, but he did think it could be
Speaker 1: good for a smaller network. He oversaw UPN UPN didn't
Speaker 1: have as wide of a reach as CBS. It targeted
Speaker 1: a smaller demographic, and I was in that smaller demographic.
Speaker 1: By two thousand and three, the golden era of nineties
Speaker 1: black sitcoms had ended, so UPN stepped in to fill
Speaker 1: in the gap, and I used to Love Me Some, UPN,
Speaker 1: Half in Half, One on One, Moesha, The Parkers. While
Speaker 1: it didn't cast as wide of a net as other networks,
Speaker 1: a lot of UPN's programming was younger and blacker. It
Speaker 1: featured shows that starred black leads and majority black casts
Speaker 1: at a time when other networks were basically presended like
Speaker 1: black people didn't exist for a while. That really worked
Speaker 1: for UPN. They had the market cornered on scripted programming
Speaker 1: with black leads. BT obviously was the other network that
Speaker 1: featured black celebrities, but they had more unscripted shows and
Speaker 1: music countdowns, and that was really it if you wanted
Speaker 1: to see more than two black people on TV at
Speaker 1: the same time. Here's Raquel Gates, an associate professor of
Speaker 1: film at Columbia University. She studies, writes, and teaches about television,
Speaker 1: particularly through the lens of race and culture.
Speaker 11: UPN and the WB really follow in the line of
Speaker 11: Fox Network in the nineties, where you have these new
Speaker 11: networks that realized that younger audiences, black audiences are a
Speaker 11: really safe bet in terms of getting eyeballs on the
Speaker 11: screens and on the programming.
Speaker 1: Initially, UPN heard the pitch as a courtesy, but after
Speaker 1: meeting with Tyra, they realized she wasn't just a pretty face,
Speaker 1: she was an entertainer, and they decided to take a
Speaker 1: chance on the show. They greenlit it for one season.
Speaker 1: Tyra was a little disappointed at first. She envisioned her
Speaker 1: project on a more mainstream network, but to me, the
Speaker 1: placement on UPN made a lot of sense. Tyra was
Speaker 1: one of a small handful of black supermodels, and from
Speaker 1: the beginning, Tyra said she wanted A and TM to
Speaker 1: feature diverse beauty to challenge the rigid standards of the
Speaker 1: high fashion world. Here's Tyra reflecting back on her initial
Speaker 1: vision for the show.
Speaker 8: The why for me with this top Model show is
Speaker 8: because I want to expand the definition of beauty.
Speaker 1: I want to kick to the curb.
Speaker 2: This thing about this cookie cutter and you have to
Speaker 2: be six feet one hundred and twenty pounds, have.
Speaker 6: Blonde hair, and you know like all that.
Speaker 1: I was like, I want to kick that to the curb.
Speaker 1: That's funny because at least when it came to looks,
Speaker 1: the first two winners didn't exactly break the mold. They
Speaker 1: were both six feet tall, skinny, white women, they just
Speaker 1: weren't blonde, But that's a different conversation. For Tyra, getting
Speaker 1: the opportunity to bring this show to life overshadowed her
Speaker 1: disappointment of not being on CBS. Plus, she realized one
Speaker 1: of the perks of being a big fish in a
Speaker 1: small pond was that she had more control. Tyra owned
Speaker 1: twenty five percent of America's Next Time Model A and
Speaker 1: TM was part of Tyra's larger plan for her career.
Speaker 1: She wanted to be Oprah, and she said as much
Speaker 1: in a two thousand and four interview with Newsweek. Top
Speaker 1: Model was supposed to be her first step towards becoming
Speaker 1: a media mogul. After the break the story of how
Speaker 1: Tyra's big idea made it to our TV screens. Tyra
Speaker 1: Banks had drive, she had vision, and she certainly had
Speaker 1: that it factor. The only thing she didn't have was
Speaker 1: reality TV production experience. That's where her new collaborator, Kim
Speaker 1: Mock came in. Here's an interview with Kim Mock from
Speaker 1: twenty sixteen where the interviewer talks about Kim Mack's reality TV.
Speaker 12: Legacy even called the godfather of reality TV. You produced
Speaker 12: making the band, which I think was the forerunner to
Speaker 12: all these singing audition programs that we have today. I
Speaker 12: did Pussycat Dolls Present and of course your most successful
Speaker 12: hit so far, America's Next Top Model.
Speaker 1: Let's talk about Kim Mack's formula for making a good
Speaker 1: reality competition show. First, you find people who are desperate
Speaker 1: to attain something they couldn't otherwise get. Then you offer
Speaker 1: them that thing in a way that seems like a
Speaker 1: shortcut or a cheat code. Next, you turn on the cameras,
Speaker 1: and this is very important, you put them through embarrassing, stressful,
Speaker 1: and demeaning experiences in order to prove their worthiness for
Speaker 1: the grand prize. This was the formula kN Mack used
Speaker 1: before on another reality show you may have heard of
Speaker 1: that hasn't aged well. It was called Making the Band.
Speaker 3: The Big figure over it was Sean Poffstati Calms.
Speaker 1: That's Amanda Kline, a reality TV historian and expert. Making
Speaker 1: the Band was like A and TM, but for music groups.
Speaker 1: The show was famous for making These young musicians performed
Speaker 1: demeaning task at Shawn Combe's request, like the iconic Cheesecake
Speaker 1: incident where Diddy asked the contestants to walk the six
Speaker 1: plus miles from Manhattan to Brooklyn to deliver him a
Speaker 1: piece of cheesecake from Juniors. The rumor is the cheesecake
Speaker 1: was actually for Beyonce, who was working with him in
Speaker 1: the studio.
Speaker 5: Puffy just told us to go to the store in
Speaker 5: Brooklyn and bring about the cheesecake and walk as well.
Speaker 1: Making the bitch not making back and tell them when
Speaker 1: you're doing it.
Speaker 7: And God.
Speaker 1: Here it was a task that had nothing to do
Speaker 1: with how well these people rapped or sank. It was
Speaker 1: about entertaining the audience. I don't know whose idea that was,
Speaker 1: but America's Next Top Model is also notorious for putting
Speaker 1: models in difficult and yes, sometimes demeaning and even dangerous
Speaker 1: situations that seemed to be strictly for our entertainment and
Speaker 1: had nothing to do with modeling. And that isn't the
Speaker 1: only parallel. The last part of Kim Mack's formula is
Speaker 1: an expert host with a larger than life personality, someone
Speaker 1: who could get the contestants to do the demeaning tasks.
Speaker 1: The host needed to be someone who could make or
Speaker 1: break the contestants' careers. Know whether they would actually make
Speaker 1: their career that's another story. But Ken Mock needed someone
Speaker 1: who's very presence on set raised the stakes for the
Speaker 1: contestants and for us, someone who these contestants would do
Speaker 1: anything to impress on making the band. It was Sean Combs.
Speaker 1: He'd already launched the careers of some of the most
Speaker 1: successful artists in hip hop, and when Ken met Tyra Banks,
Speaker 1: he saw the same potential. She was a veteran supermodel
Speaker 1: who'd climb to the top of the fashion industry.
Speaker 3: It makes sense that ken Mock would kind of stick
Speaker 3: with that idea of a kingmaker. Tyra Banks has this
Speaker 3: eye right where she can pick out the model.
Speaker 1: Now here's where we need need to talk about some
Speaker 1: disturbing coincidences. The first three seasons of making the band
Speaker 1: before it went to MTV and Diddy became the host,
Speaker 1: followed the journey to bring together train and launch a
Speaker 1: boy band called O Town. Their first music industry expert
Speaker 1: and guide was a man named Lou Pearlman. Hey, all
Speaker 1: you singers out there.
Speaker 5: Lou Pearlman, the mastermind behind such bands as LFO in
Speaker 5: Sync of the Backstreet Boys.
Speaker 4: As looking for five talented young men to form a
Speaker 4: new band.
Speaker 1: Lou Pearlman made his name by launching and managing some
Speaker 1: of the most successful boy bands in the nineties and
Speaker 1: two thousands. He died in prison in disgrace in twenty
Speaker 1: sixteen after being convicted of running one of the largest
Speaker 1: Ponzi schemes in US history. He was also accused by
Speaker 1: multiple young male performers of sexual misconduct. The person who
Speaker 1: took Pearlman spot on Making the Band after he left
Speaker 1: was Sean P. Diddy Combes, and we all know what
Speaker 1: he's been accused of, including allegations of abuse, sexual misus conduct, harassment,
Speaker 1: and intimidation by former Making the Band cast members. At
Speaker 1: least one of those contestants, Sarah Rivers, sued Ditty for
Speaker 1: sexual harassment she said took place during the taping of
Speaker 1: Making the Band. To be clear, there's no evidence kN
Speaker 1: mak knew about any of that while the shows were airing,
Speaker 1: and while he remained credited as the show's creator during
Speaker 1: Ditty's tenure. He reportedly took a more hands off role
Speaker 1: in later seasons. But it is striking that on both
Speaker 1: these shows, the kingmakers at the center were later accused
Speaker 1: of abusing their power. And here's the thing. Years before
Speaker 1: these serious allegations against Seawn Holmes and Lou Pearlman came
Speaker 1: to light. Both of these men already had a reputation
Speaker 1: for shady business dealings. In the late nineties and early
Speaker 1: two thousands, Ditty was accused of unfair business practices by
Speaker 1: several of his artists, including Mace one twelve and hip
Speaker 1: hop group The Locks. Here's a two thousand and five
Speaker 1: radio interview with The Locks where Jadakis confronted.
Speaker 5: Ditty stopped pumping on the radio.
Speaker 1: Now you because you just don't want to know what
Speaker 1: you was done. We made one record with you money
Speaker 1: to out of respect. It's ten years later, and you
Speaker 1: showed got half about publishing. That wasn't all. Diddy was
Speaker 1: literally on trial for shooting someone in the nightclub in
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety nine. He was acquitted, but the rapper who
Speaker 1: was convicted, who was also signed to Bad Boy, has
Speaker 1: strongly implied that he took the fall for Ditty and Lou.
Speaker 1: Pearlman's affinity for three sixty deals was well known in
Speaker 1: the pop music industry. Here's insincs Lance Bass talking about him.
Speaker 13: Lou really thought he was just entitled to all of this.
Speaker 13: You know, if it was idea, you know, to do this,
Speaker 13: and he introduced you to this person to get you
Speaker 13: that record deal. Then yeah, he was entitled in ninety
Speaker 13: percent of your business because if it wasn't for him,
Speaker 13: he'd be nothing. So you want ten percent or nothing.
Speaker 1: That was all out in the open before either of
Speaker 1: them was hired on making band, So even if the
Speaker 1: show's producers didn't know about the more serious allegations, they
Speaker 1: seem to have turned a blind eye to the allegedly
Speaker 1: unethical business practices making the band. Worked with the con
Speaker 1: artists because he made good TV. Then they worked with
Speaker 1: a guy who was accused of shooting someone and cheating
Speaker 1: his artists because he made better TV. Now I'm not
Speaker 1: saying Tyra was on the same level as Ditty or
Speaker 1: lu Pearlman. She's never been accused of sexual misconduct or
Speaker 1: any other crime. But the point is in the early
Speaker 1: days of reality TV, the ethical lines were quite blurred.
Speaker 1: The only thing that mattered was if the show was
Speaker 1: a success. And the show Ken Mob created positioned not
Speaker 1: one but two ethically dubious men as mentors to impressionable
Speaker 1: young people. And while Tyra may not be of super
Speaker 1: villain like Ditty, she chose the partner with the man
Speaker 1: who gave him and lu Pearlman a bigger place. And
Speaker 1: just like we saw on making the band, she was
Speaker 1: willing to make humiliation a big part of America's Next
Speaker 1: Top Model. The models safety, their bodies, their appearance, their
Speaker 1: identity was put on the line and picked apart for
Speaker 1: our entertainment.
Speaker 8: Do you really think he can have a cover bell
Speaker 8: contract with the gap in your room?
Speaker 11: Yes?
Speaker 2: Why not?
Speaker 14: This is all people say Israel's beautiful cover girl.
Speaker 1: She felt twice. I was like, oh my gosh.
Speaker 2: You're trying to be so sexy and so girly and you.
Speaker 4: Look like a man in a dress.
Speaker 1: Girl. Now. I never thought I'd be mentioning Tyra Banks's
Speaker 1: name next to these two criminals, But her legacy is
Speaker 1: tied together with Ken mox and the shady early days
Speaker 1: of reality TV. And Ken wasn't just an EP on paper.
Speaker 1: He was there calling the shots on set Harri's former
Speaker 1: a and tm soal mixer Jose Torres.
Speaker 5: Any of the major events that happened on that show,
Speaker 5: they did not happen without Ki approval, without his say
Speaker 5: so good or bad. If anything happened on that show,
Speaker 5: Ken Mock.
Speaker 1: Signed off Tyra could not have made this show without
Speaker 1: her co pilot Ken Mock. Sure, they were just a
Speaker 1: production team making another reality show when Reality TV was
Speaker 1: still in its Wild Wild West era. But what I've
Speaker 1: heard from models over and over is that America's Next
Speaker 1: Top Model took advantage of their dreams, and the models
Speaker 1: who were on the earlier seasons had no idea what
Speaker 1: this show really was. There's something kind of cruel about
Speaker 1: embarrassing young people who trust you with their dreams. These
Speaker 1: aren't the same people who signed up to starve on
Speaker 1: Survivor in order to win a million dollars. These were
Speaker 1: mostly teenagers and young adults who were told this opportunity
Speaker 1: could give them access to the otherwise inaccessible career they
Speaker 1: desperately wanted. There's this idea that ANTM was cursed because
Speaker 1: so few of the contestants went on to have successful
Speaker 1: careers as models. When I first started reporting, I thought
Speaker 1: this was an unfortunate reality of the modeling world. Maybe
Speaker 1: the winners turned out to be fashion industry flops because
Speaker 1: they didn't have what it took to be on top.
Speaker 1: But now I'm wondering if the show was a setup
Speaker 1: all along.
Speaker 14: America's Next Top Model is about dreams, plain and simple,
Speaker 14: and it's about accomplishing these dreams through hard work and
Speaker 14: talent and passion. I worked my boat off to get
Speaker 14: to the top of the modeling industry, so I know
Speaker 14: exactly what.
Speaker 13: It takes to make the star.
Speaker 1: Tyra wanted us to believe she was wholeheartedly invested in
Speaker 1: making these contestants dreams come true.
Speaker 2: I was rooting for you, We're all rooting for you
Speaker 2: out damn you.
Speaker 1: But after talking to the models and the people behind
Speaker 1: the scenes, I'm not too sure. On this season, you're
Speaker 1: going to hear from A ANDTM fans and critics, the
Speaker 1: show's producers, and of course the models themselves. Being on
Speaker 1: America's Next Top Model actually saved my life.
Speaker 4: Did they even know that I was in debt after
Speaker 4: the show?
Speaker 1: They just kept focusing on me being suicidal. To try
Speaker 1: to figure out if A and TM was really cursed
Speaker 1: and what that means for the models, judges, Tyra, and
Speaker 1: us the audience. On the next episode, We're going back
Speaker 1: to where it all began. Cycle one, a season that
Speaker 1: looked like it was shot on a camcorder, yet somehow
Speaker 1: launched a global franchise. We'll meet the very first contestants,
Speaker 1: revisit the chaotic production, and uncover how A and TM
Speaker 1: deceived us and the contestants. Right from the start.
Speaker 3: Tyra Banks did not follow through on any of the winnings.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to the Curse of America's Next Top Model.
Speaker 1: We really appreciate the support. We'd love for you to
Speaker 1: really show your support by subscribing to our show on
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, and don't forget to leave us a five
Speaker 1: star rating and review. If you love the show, tell
Speaker 1: your group, chat, your co workers, your friends, your mama
Speaker 1: to check us out. And if you don't, maybe keep
Speaker 1: that one to yourself. Thanks again to all of our listeners.
Speaker 1: The Curse of America's Next Top Model is a production
Speaker 1: of Glass Podcasts, a division of Glass Entertainment Group, in
Speaker 1: partnership with iHeart Podcasts. The show is executive produced by
Speaker 1: Nancy Glass, hosted and senior produced by me Bridget Armstrong.
Speaker 1: Our story editor is Monique Leboard, also produced by Ben
Speaker 1: Fetterman and Andrea Gunny. Associate producers are Alisha Key, Kristin Melcriy,
Speaker 1: and Curry Richmond. Consulting producers are Oliver Twist and Kate Taylor.
Speaker 1: Our iHeart team is Ali Perry and Jessica Kroncheck. Audio
Speaker 1: editing and mixing by Andrew Callaway and Matt del Vecchio.
Speaker 1: The Curse of America's Next Top Model theme music was
Speaker 1: composed by Oliver Bain Music library provided by My Music
Speaker 1: Special Thanks to everyone we interviewed for this podcast, especially
Speaker 1: the models for sharing their stories. And For more podcasts
Speaker 1: from iHeart, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
Speaker 1: you get your podcast. Also check out the Glass Podcast
Speaker 1: Instagram at Glass Podcasts for Curse of America's Next Top Model,
Speaker 1: behind the scenes content and more.