WEBVTT - Reality TV: The Great Experiment | BONUS 0:00:00.520 --> 0:00:02.760 Hi, Curse Up listeners, I know you miss me on 0:00:02.800 --> 0:00:05.560 your feed. Don't worry. We're working on an all new 0:00:05.600 --> 0:00:08.520 season of Curse Of coming out later this year. In 0:00:08.560 --> 0:00:11.879 the meantime, if you can't stop thinking about the shocking 0:00:11.920 --> 0:00:15.320 stories you heard about America's Next Top Model, you'll definitely 0:00:15.360 --> 0:00:18.320 want to check out our new docuseries from E Dirty 0:00:18.400 --> 0:00:21.840 Rotten Scandals. In the series, you'll hear from the America's 0:00:21.840 --> 0:00:24.279 Next Top Model participants you heard from on Curse Of, 0:00:24.680 --> 0:00:27.240 and a few you didn't like former A and TM 0:00:27.320 --> 0:00:32.080 judge Janis Dickinson. Dirty Rotten Scandals unveils the dark underbelly 0:00:32.080 --> 0:00:35.159 of the long running TV series through the untold stories 0:00:35.200 --> 0:00:38.519 of former contestants, and shows what happens when a golden 0:00:38.560 --> 0:00:43.640 opportunity for aspiring models unravels into a harrowing saga of exploitation, 0:00:44.120 --> 0:00:47.560 shattered dreams, and resilience. You can find the two part 0:00:47.640 --> 0:00:51.919 docuseries Dirty Rotten Scandals America's Next Top Model on E Network. 0:00:52.280 --> 0:00:59.520 Check your local TV provider schedule. Now, if y'all know, 0:00:59.600 --> 0:01:01.840 I couldn't just leave you high and dry like that. 0:01:02.160 --> 0:01:11.000 Want to beyond some? You want to beyond some want 0:01:11.000 --> 0:01:15.800 to be on the show Welcome to the Curse of 0:01:15.840 --> 0:01:22.120 America's Next Top Model, the bonus episode. First, let me 0:01:22.160 --> 0:01:25.160 say thank you for listening to the season. The response 0:01:25.160 --> 0:01:30.360 has been great and a little overwhelming. When my team 0:01:30.400 --> 0:01:33.039 and I started researching and reporting, we had to make 0:01:33.080 --> 0:01:35.720 some difficult decisions about what to include in the ten 0:01:35.800 --> 0:01:38.759 episode season and what to leave on the cutting room floor. 0:01:39.520 --> 0:01:42.080 That's one of the hardest things about this job. My 0:01:42.200 --> 0:01:45.640 interviews to the show usually went on for hours. As 0:01:45.640 --> 0:01:48.240 you can imagine, we heard a lot of stuff that 0:01:48.320 --> 0:01:50.960 didn't neatly fit into the season arc we decided on 0:01:51.680 --> 0:01:54.280 like the cringey origins of reality TV. 0:01:55.520 --> 0:01:59.480 When we talked about ethics and reality TV even back 0:01:59.640 --> 0:02:03.760 in the fifties, we were doing some pretty suspect things. 0:02:03.960 --> 0:02:06.840 And of course there were more behind the scenes details 0:02:06.840 --> 0:02:09.560 from the models that couldn't fit into the season. Some 0:02:09.720 --> 0:02:12.880 of it was downright weird. I heard a lot about 0:02:12.960 --> 0:02:15.920 stuff that happened on set that made me realize what 0:02:16.040 --> 0:02:21.320 a strange world reality TV production really is. All season long, 0:02:21.600 --> 0:02:24.520 we talked about how producers created the stories we saw 0:02:24.600 --> 0:02:28.160 play out on A and TM. Casting producers find and 0:02:28.280 --> 0:02:34.200 create characters, show producers, stirrup drama and manufacture storylines. Creative 0:02:34.200 --> 0:02:37.920 producers craft over the top photoshoots and runways, and a 0:02:37.960 --> 0:02:42.560 surprising number of contestants willingly sign up for it all. Now, 0:02:42.600 --> 0:02:45.280 of course, there are some who walk off set and 0:02:45.360 --> 0:02:48.720 others who ask to be eliminated, but for the most part, 0:02:48.919 --> 0:02:52.200 a Tom got ten to fourteen contestants to stay through 0:02:52.240 --> 0:02:58.320 the humiliation for twenty four seasons. People stuck it out 0:02:58.360 --> 0:03:01.520 because they wanted the title and the prom others just 0:03:01.560 --> 0:03:06.320 wanted the exposure. But still it's actually impressive. I mean 0:03:06.440 --> 0:03:09.799 in a dark way that producers got contestants to cooperate 0:03:09.840 --> 0:03:12.960 with all this. This's equip I hear a lot from 0:03:13.000 --> 0:03:15.960 people who criticize the models for coming forward today to 0:03:16.000 --> 0:03:17.960 talk about their negative experiences on the show. 0:03:18.400 --> 0:03:20.960 These were not miners. There were grown ups who knew 0:03:20.960 --> 0:03:23.960 what they were getting into. And if you hated it 0:03:24.040 --> 0:03:27.840 that much, you could have quit, you could have stopped. 0:03:28.680 --> 0:03:31.919 That was Perez Hilton standing in for the popular opinion. 0:03:32.560 --> 0:03:34.840 There's a belief that if the models didn't like it, 0:03:34.880 --> 0:03:37.440 they could just leave, But I don't think it's quite 0:03:37.520 --> 0:03:42.320 that simple. From the moment you walk on set as 0:03:42.360 --> 0:03:46.280 a reality show participant, you have to suspend your understanding 0:03:46.360 --> 0:03:52.440 of how the world in normal human interaction works. Reality 0:03:52.480 --> 0:03:56.120 shows like A and TM are successful because the contestants' trust, 0:03:56.320 --> 0:03:59.560 to a certain extent, the version of reality the show 0:03:59.640 --> 0:04:04.280 is create. In order to maintain that reality, producers have 0:04:04.320 --> 0:04:08.040 to get to contestants to do what they say. Sarah Harttthorn, 0:04:08.080 --> 0:04:11.120 who competed on Cycle nine, told me how A and 0:04:11.160 --> 0:04:14.760 TM achieved this power dynamic and what she compared it 0:04:14.760 --> 0:04:15.920 to surprised me. 0:04:17.720 --> 0:04:22.680 I think it's difficult to convey the power dynamic to 0:04:22.720 --> 0:04:25.240 someone who hasn't been in it. But the closest comparison 0:04:25.279 --> 0:04:29.000 really is a cult. Sarah explained this using her own 0:04:29.160 --> 0:04:34.159 cult ranking system. So the People's Temple aka Jonestown, you know, 0:04:34.320 --> 0:04:36.880 the ones who drank the kool aid, that's a level ten. 0:04:37.720 --> 0:04:41.440 Fitness programs like Soul Cycle or CrossFit with cult like 0:04:41.520 --> 0:04:43.159 followings are a level one. 0:04:43.480 --> 0:04:47.200 Lots of people follow level one cults. Even dedicated fandoms 0:04:47.200 --> 0:04:52.120 are level one cults. I'm a Beyonce devote. Sarah wrote 0:04:52.120 --> 0:04:54.320 a book about her experience as a contestant on A 0:04:54.400 --> 0:04:58.159 and TM. When she started her research, she saw some 0:04:58.240 --> 0:05:02.520 parallels between A and TM and at first, she felt 0:05:02.520 --> 0:05:04.680 like being a contestant on the show was a level 0:05:04.720 --> 0:05:08.880 two or three. Now, after writing the book, Sarah thinks 0:05:08.920 --> 0:05:11.640 the show's actually closer to a five or six. 0:05:12.640 --> 0:05:15.599 It takes young girls, and it uses our labor, It 0:05:15.600 --> 0:05:17.279 does not pay us, and then it spits us out 0:05:17.320 --> 0:05:20.320 really poor and ill equipped to deal with the after effects. 0:05:22.480 --> 0:05:25.240 Here's a list of parallels Sarah saw between A and 0:05:25.279 --> 0:05:29.160 TM and colts. Isolation from everyone you know and love. 0:05:29.560 --> 0:05:33.320 Check a figurehead or leader the followers can believe in. 0:05:34.040 --> 0:05:37.080 Check a group of people who are in charge and 0:05:37.120 --> 0:05:41.320 do the leader's bidding. Check a group of followers who 0:05:41.320 --> 0:05:44.520 are willing to do whatever is asked of them. Check, 0:05:45.640 --> 0:05:49.280 and a prize or reward at the end to make 0:05:49.360 --> 0:05:55.960 up for all the followers suffering. Also check. Sarah says 0:05:56.000 --> 0:05:59.440 A and TM even use coersive tactics on the contestants, 0:06:00.120 --> 0:06:02.719 some of the same ones cults have been known to use, 0:06:03.480 --> 0:06:04.440 like language parroting. 0:06:05.080 --> 0:06:07.560 They would repeat the same words and phrases to us 0:06:07.560 --> 0:06:08.760 over and over and over again. 0:06:09.360 --> 0:06:12.400 Sarah told me that during the casting process, she and 0:06:12.440 --> 0:06:15.360 the other finalists were kept in a small conference room 0:06:15.400 --> 0:06:16.400 for hours. 0:06:16.720 --> 0:06:19.200 They were prepping us, and we spent hours just sitting 0:06:19.200 --> 0:06:22.320 in these conference rooms with lawyers and producers talking at 0:06:22.400 --> 0:06:24.400 us for hours and hours and hours and hours and hours. 0:06:25.360 --> 0:06:27.520 They used mind control tactics. 0:06:29.240 --> 0:06:32.680 The lawyers and producers repeatedly told contestants that if they 0:06:32.720 --> 0:06:35.000 ever violated their contracts. 0:06:34.800 --> 0:06:36.839 We will dock your wages for the rest of your life. 0:06:37.440 --> 0:06:40.160 That's the phrase that they said, over and over, we 0:06:40.200 --> 0:06:43.040 will dock your wages for the rest of your life. 0:06:43.160 --> 0:06:46.200 Sarah said it felt like producers were trying to drill 0:06:46.279 --> 0:06:49.880 the message into their heads, and that wasn't the only thing. 0:06:50.680 --> 0:06:54.880 From the start. Producers wanted the contestants to feel disposable 0:06:54.920 --> 0:06:58.040 and replaceable. The other mantra they would repeat. 0:06:57.920 --> 0:07:00.400 There are a million girls that want this opportunity, and 0:07:00.440 --> 0:07:03.000 we have their phone number. They probably said that to 0:07:03.080 --> 0:07:07.560 us hundreds of times, different people setting it, and those 0:07:07.600 --> 0:07:09.479 phrases just got stuck in our head. There are a 0:07:09.480 --> 0:07:11.760 million girls that want this opportunity, and they have their 0:07:11.760 --> 0:07:12.360 phone number. 0:07:13.800 --> 0:07:18.040 While it was probably true, the statement served a larger purpose. 0:07:18.600 --> 0:07:23.480 It made the contestants more cooperative. They knew if they 0:07:23.520 --> 0:07:26.400 didn't do what the producer said, there would be someone 0:07:26.480 --> 0:07:30.400 waiting in the wings to take their place. Once producers 0:07:30.520 --> 0:07:34.000 established that power dynamic. They could get contestants to follow 0:07:34.080 --> 0:07:35.880 rules they wouldn't normally agree to. 0:07:36.840 --> 0:07:40.640 They removed our ability to have any agency right. They 0:07:40.720 --> 0:07:42.400 controlled when we could eat, when we could go to 0:07:42.480 --> 0:07:44.520 the bathroom. Like I still remember the first time I 0:07:44.560 --> 0:07:46.200 said can I go to the bathroom? And they said no. 0:07:47.080 --> 0:07:49.800 That's a very jarring thing to hear, Like that's a 0:07:49.840 --> 0:07:53.720 script that humans have, right, You say, can I use 0:07:53.760 --> 0:07:55.520 the restroom? Someone says, oh, yes, of course. 0:07:55.600 --> 0:07:56.600 That's like a back and forth. 0:07:56.600 --> 0:07:59.400 It's like a given. It's like a social norm. And 0:07:59.600 --> 0:08:02.560 that was removed. When we said can I go to 0:08:02.560 --> 0:08:04.320 the bathroom? We didn't know what the answer would be. 0:08:05.360 --> 0:08:08.880 While reporting this podcast, I learned A ANDTM and shows 0:08:09.000 --> 0:08:12.320 like it have pretty strict rules contestants have to follow. 0:08:12.840 --> 0:08:16.280 If so producers can control what's happening on set. They 0:08:16.280 --> 0:08:19.320 didn't want the models just wandering around while they were taping. 0:08:20.160 --> 0:08:24.800 Another rule I heard about might seem counterintuitive. Sometimes the 0:08:24.840 --> 0:08:28.080 models couldn't even talk to each other. Let's say they 0:08:28.120 --> 0:08:30.880 were waiting to start a photoshoot or a judging panel. 0:08:31.480 --> 0:08:34.559 Maybe the location wasn't ready or tyro wasn't there yet. 0:08:34.960 --> 0:08:37.800 The models couldn't pass the time by just chatting with 0:08:37.880 --> 0:08:41.960 each other. They had to be on Ice hair Cycle 0:08:42.000 --> 0:08:46.040 four and seventeen contestant Lisa Dematto, Ice is being silent. 0:08:46.080 --> 0:08:48.880 You can't even talk to each other, so I'm not 0:08:48.960 --> 0:08:49.800 allowed to talk. 0:08:50.400 --> 0:08:53.040 The whole point of a reality show is to get 0:08:53.120 --> 0:08:57.880 everything on camera. Producers didn't want to risk missing juicy moments. 0:08:58.200 --> 0:09:02.400 They also didn't want the contestantspply behind their backs. Producers 0:09:02.400 --> 0:09:05.120 didn't just draw the line at talking with each other. 0:09:05.679 --> 0:09:09.319 There was a no socializing rule between contestants and crew members. 0:09:10.000 --> 0:09:13.040 Even though the camera operators and sound engineers were in 0:09:13.120 --> 0:09:16.880 their faces every day, the models weren't supposed to even 0:09:16.880 --> 0:09:20.800 say hello or how you doing. Producers wanted the models 0:09:20.800 --> 0:09:23.959 to behave as though the cameras weren't there, so they 0:09:24.080 --> 0:09:28.120 literally told them to ignore the people behind them, although 0:09:28.160 --> 0:09:31.040 one crew member told me that rule eventually went out 0:09:31.040 --> 0:09:33.520 the window a few seasons in because it was too 0:09:33.559 --> 0:09:37.800 hard to enforce even though you're surrounded by people. With 0:09:37.920 --> 0:09:41.360 these rules, you can see why so many contestants say 0:09:41.480 --> 0:09:45.720 being on a reality show is actually a pretty isolating experience, 0:09:46.320 --> 0:09:49.440 and that wasn't just on A and TM. Here's reality 0:09:49.480 --> 0:09:53.160 TV psychologist doctor Stephen Stein. He's worked on shows like 0:09:53.200 --> 0:09:54.320 Survivor and Big Brother. 0:09:55.080 --> 0:09:57.960 Some shows are really restrictive. Like a show like Big Brother, 0:09:58.360 --> 0:10:00.640 the only people they can talk to would be one 0:10:00.679 --> 0:10:03.120 person in production when they're in the diary room, and 0:10:03.160 --> 0:10:04.679 then myself and that's it. 0:10:05.160 --> 0:10:07.680 We see contestants on A and TM talking on the 0:10:07.679 --> 0:10:10.520 phone to their loved ones back home, but those calls 0:10:10.559 --> 0:10:14.480 are usually scheduled and very brief. On some reality shows, 0:10:14.600 --> 0:10:17.960 you can't even talk to your loved ones. I don't know. 0:10:18.200 --> 0:10:23.800 It's getting a little more culty. Removing objective reality is 0:10:23.840 --> 0:10:29.280 a foundational part of brainwashing. Also from a production standpoint, 0:10:29.520 --> 0:10:31.959 they didn't want their cast to be distracted with personal 0:10:32.040 --> 0:10:35.160 updates and breaking news. They want the set and the 0:10:35.200 --> 0:10:38.520 house they're filming in to be their entire world for 0:10:38.600 --> 0:10:41.320 the weeks and months they were in production. But the 0:10:41.360 --> 0:10:45.680 outside world doesn't stop and sometimes it trumps the reality 0:10:45.760 --> 0:10:49.400 that's being created by the show. Doctor Stein remembers the 0:10:49.480 --> 0:10:52.320 time when he had to burst the reality TV bubble 0:10:52.520 --> 0:10:54.960 with some big news from the outside world. 0:10:55.200 --> 0:10:58.640 I think my worst situation was COVID. I had to 0:10:58.679 --> 0:11:03.040 empty entire house a Big Brother Canada when COVID happened, 0:11:03.120 --> 0:11:06.439 the city forced everything to close down, and everyone's dream 0:11:06.760 --> 0:11:08.840 sort of fell apart, and I had to deal with 0:11:08.920 --> 0:11:11.720 each contestant, each house guests coming out. 0:11:13.040 --> 0:11:16.760 Booming had started right before the COVID nineteen crisis. The 0:11:16.840 --> 0:11:19.800 cast had no clue what was going on. They'd been 0:11:19.880 --> 0:11:23.760 completely isolated, and now they had to abruptly leave and 0:11:23.800 --> 0:11:26.160 go back into this world that was all of a sudden, 0:11:26.600 --> 0:11:27.200 very different. 0:11:28.160 --> 0:11:30.560 So I had to tell them there's something that's happened. 0:11:30.600 --> 0:11:32.440 The world has kind of changed from what it was 0:11:32.480 --> 0:11:34.800 like when you went into the house and just go 0:11:34.880 --> 0:11:37.240 through what some of these changes are, and it's going 0:11:37.280 --> 0:11:38.840 to affect you, and you're gonna have to go right 0:11:38.880 --> 0:11:41.520 home and you're gonna have to isolate And no, they 0:11:41.520 --> 0:11:45.920 were shocked. They couldn't believe that we're telling them. It's like, like, what. 0:11:45.280 --> 0:11:45.840 What is this? 0:11:48.200 --> 0:11:50.760 Here's the thing. The Big Brother contestants were in such 0:11:50.760 --> 0:11:54.440 a controlled environment already that when Doctor Stein delivered the 0:11:54.480 --> 0:11:58.040 news about the COVID lockdown, they didn't believe him. 0:11:58.240 --> 0:12:00.280 They're like, is this a joke? Is this part of 0:12:00.320 --> 0:12:00.720 the show. 0:12:04.559 --> 0:12:08.360 Big Brother had so thoroughly conditioned the cast that they 0:12:08.400 --> 0:12:12.360 were initially unsure if the pandemic was even real or 0:12:12.520 --> 0:12:16.200 part of the production. To me, that says a lot 0:12:16.280 --> 0:12:19.000 about how much of a mind fuck being on reality 0:12:19.040 --> 0:12:23.520 TV can be. Sarah Hartthorn compared A and TM to 0:12:23.600 --> 0:12:26.040 being in a cult, and Sarah's not the only one 0:12:26.080 --> 0:12:29.880 who said something about mind controlled and reality TV. Several 0:12:29.920 --> 0:12:33.520 people I've interviewed for this podcast compared reality television and 0:12:33.600 --> 0:12:40.240 more specifically A and TM to psychological experiments. Here's Lisa Dematto. 0:12:41.040 --> 0:12:44.960 It is literally a show about how to survive. 0:12:45.600 --> 0:12:49.199 The Stanford Prison Experiment like psychological warfare. 0:12:49.720 --> 0:12:53.040 The Stanford Prison Experiment was a psychological study done in 0:12:53.040 --> 0:12:57.240 the seventies at Stanford University. Researchers were interested in looking 0:12:57.280 --> 0:13:03.599 at obedience, power, and control. Here's doctor Stein explaining the experiment. 0:13:04.360 --> 0:13:07.520 It stemmed from the Nazis in Germany. Like. The question 0:13:07.800 --> 0:13:12.000 was were the people who orchestrated the Holocaust? Were they 0:13:12.240 --> 0:13:16.880 inherently evil and bad? Or could anybody be bad and 0:13:17.000 --> 0:13:20.040 evil in the right circumstances. That's what he intended to 0:13:20.080 --> 0:13:23.360 look at, which was a really good question. Were they 0:13:23.400 --> 0:13:26.559 evil people who were doing all this stuff? Or were 0:13:26.559 --> 0:13:28.840 they ordinary people who just did bad things. 0:13:29.320 --> 0:13:32.880 The Stanford prison experiment is infamous for two reasons, first 0:13:33.080 --> 0:13:36.800 because of how unethically it was conducted, and second because 0:13:36.840 --> 0:13:42.040 of what it revealed. The lead researcher, doctor Phillips Embardo, 0:13:42.400 --> 0:13:45.679 took a group of twenty four college age men, paid 0:13:45.720 --> 0:13:49.040 them fifteen dollars a day, and randomly assigned them to 0:13:49.080 --> 0:13:53.000 two groups. The first group were the prisoners. They went 0:13:53.040 --> 0:13:56.199 through a mock arrest by real police. Then they were 0:13:56.240 --> 0:13:58.760 sent to a makeshift prison in the basement of a 0:13:58.800 --> 0:14:02.640 building on campus. They were searched, given a prisoner number, 0:14:02.800 --> 0:14:07.440 a uniform, and led into sales. The second group, the guards, 0:14:07.640 --> 0:14:12.200 were given fancy uniforms, including mirrored sunglasses to prevent eye contact. 0:14:12.760 --> 0:14:15.880 The guards received the simple instruction to keep the prisoners 0:14:15.920 --> 0:14:21.080 in line without physically abusing them. Needless to say, all 0:14:21.160 --> 0:14:26.920 hell broke loose. What they learned was that given the chance, 0:14:26.960 --> 0:14:31.040 in the right circumstances, humans will be trash. 0:14:31.720 --> 0:14:33.880 Please welcome, doctor Philip Zimbardo. 0:14:34.080 --> 0:14:35.360 What did your experiment prove? 0:14:35.520 --> 0:14:36.400 Evil behavior? 0:14:36.640 --> 0:14:38.720 Can be listed in the Best of Us. 0:14:40.400 --> 0:14:42.280 The study was supposed to go on for two weeks, 0:14:42.480 --> 0:14:44.640 but after six days they had to pull the pug. 0:14:46.000 --> 0:14:49.000 Phil Bombardo just sort of threw it out there and 0:14:49.160 --> 0:14:52.320 let it happen, and by goodness, those bad people got 0:14:52.400 --> 0:14:56.440 really bad. There was physical altercations, the prisoners took on 0:14:56.560 --> 0:14:59.720 the role of prisoners like they fought back like prisoners would, 0:15:00.040 --> 0:15:03.280 and the guards were mean, an awful, an authoritarian like 0:15:03.360 --> 0:15:06.120 guards would be. And again, these were ordinary people who 0:15:06.160 --> 0:15:07.440 were randomly assigned. 0:15:11.440 --> 0:15:14.320 Now, saying A and TM is like the Stanford prison 0:15:14.360 --> 0:15:18.360 experiment can be a little extreme. But as I looked 0:15:18.360 --> 0:15:22.000 into the history, I learned that the comparison between reality 0:15:22.080 --> 0:15:25.640 TV and psychological experiments isn't that much of a leap. 0:15:28.960 --> 0:15:32.840 Hannah cat Jones was a contestant on cycle sixteen. She 0:15:32.960 --> 0:15:35.840 told me about two situations that happened on her season 0:15:36.120 --> 0:15:40.120 that I didn't know what to make of. Producers could 0:15:40.200 --> 0:15:43.040 argue that certain photo shoots and challenges were a test 0:15:43.120 --> 0:15:46.880 of the contestant's talent or their ability to perform under pressure, 0:15:47.480 --> 0:15:50.840 but the situations Hannah told me about were seemingly designed 0:15:50.960 --> 0:15:53.080 solely to fuck with the contestants and see how they 0:15:53.080 --> 0:15:56.360 would react. One of those moments happened before the season 0:15:56.400 --> 0:15:57.280 even kicked off. 0:15:58.000 --> 0:16:02.480 This is the final round where the show officially begins. 0:16:03.280 --> 0:16:07.840 Mister and Missus Jay walk up and they're like, okay, ladies. 0:16:08.080 --> 0:16:10.760 The girls who have their pictures in these envelopes are 0:16:10.800 --> 0:16:13.320 the ones going into the house, and the girls who 0:16:13.320 --> 0:16:15.720 don't have their pictures in the envelope are going home. 0:16:16.040 --> 0:16:19.200 Each person is their envelope and they're like, okay, Betty one, 0:16:19.320 --> 0:16:22.560 two three, and I pull out a blank piece of paper. 0:16:24.480 --> 0:16:25.000 And I'm like. 0:16:28.920 --> 0:16:36.960 It's over. That crushed me. Then the contestants were separated. 0:16:37.320 --> 0:16:40.000 Hannah's group, the ones with no pictures in their envelopes, 0:16:40.320 --> 0:16:43.320 were sent up the elevator to a room, presumably to 0:16:43.360 --> 0:16:44.640 get their bags and go home. 0:16:45.120 --> 0:16:48.160 We're like picking up our suitcases, and then Tyra Banks 0:16:48.200 --> 0:16:52.080 starts walking down this staircase and she's like looking down 0:16:52.120 --> 0:16:53.200 at us, Hi. 0:16:53.160 --> 0:16:56.000 Ladies, I'm so sorry. 0:16:56.400 --> 0:16:59.560 Okay, but you guys can't give up, right, no, right, 0:16:59.680 --> 0:17:01.480 This is like you guys got really far. 0:17:01.800 --> 0:17:04.359 The tears keep coming and you're trying to hold them back, 0:17:04.880 --> 0:17:07.040 and you can't hold them back anymore because she's coming 0:17:07.040 --> 0:17:07.639 to say goodbye. 0:17:07.720 --> 0:17:08.280 This is it. 0:17:08.560 --> 0:17:11.240 I've gotten like so turned down. 0:17:11.560 --> 0:17:12.800 The door slammed in my face. 0:17:13.320 --> 0:17:15.439 The road to success and to the top is not 0:17:15.480 --> 0:17:18.000 a straight line. It's a zigzag line. 0:17:18.560 --> 0:17:21.879 So unfortunately, you guys have to go home now, but 0:17:21.920 --> 0:17:23.320 you don't have to go far. 0:17:26.400 --> 0:17:27.119 Because you're. 0:17:29.520 --> 0:17:32.240 And she pressed a button and there was like drapes 0:17:32.320 --> 0:17:35.679 that I hadn't really noticed around the stairwell. So then 0:17:35.720 --> 0:17:37.720 all of a sudden, these drapes fall and we're in 0:17:37.760 --> 0:17:41.960 like a penthouse apartment with like pictures of ourselves and 0:17:42.040 --> 0:17:47.080 toys and candy, and like we're all like it's like 0:17:47.119 --> 0:17:50.680 the silence, like what's going on? And she's like, you're 0:17:50.720 --> 0:17:53.040 on this show, and we all just start like jumping 0:17:53.119 --> 0:17:53.560 up and down. 0:17:53.640 --> 0:17:55.720 We're like, some of us are crying again. 0:17:56.880 --> 0:17:59.720 Some of the girls were literally falling on the ground. 0:17:59.760 --> 0:18:03.840 And punped was popular at the time. Tyra referenced it 0:18:03.880 --> 0:18:07.520 on this episode. This little stunt was her sick nod 0:18:07.560 --> 0:18:08.080 to the show. 0:18:08.840 --> 0:18:11.920 And that was like the first night. The next day 0:18:11.920 --> 0:18:13.760 they're like, okay, we're gonna start filming. 0:18:14.200 --> 0:18:17.400 But remember there was another group of girls who had 0:18:17.440 --> 0:18:20.760 gotten pictures in their envelopes. They thought they made it 0:18:20.800 --> 0:18:23.600 onto the show, but they were actually getting sent home. 0:18:24.240 --> 0:18:29.400 We didn't see A and TM break that news to them. 0:18:29.560 --> 0:18:31.400 The girls that didn't get on the show, like that's 0:18:31.440 --> 0:18:35.320 way worse for them. Psychologically. I would have trust issues 0:18:35.359 --> 0:18:38.000 for a really long time after that, because I remember 0:18:38.080 --> 0:18:40.479 running into one of the girls like a year later 0:18:40.880 --> 0:18:44.960 that had been in the group that thought they were 0:18:45.080 --> 0:18:47.240 on the show first, and she said that they sat 0:18:47.280 --> 0:18:50.600 in a bus for hours and then somebody came on 0:18:50.600 --> 0:18:52.600 the bus and said that was all for show. You're 0:18:52.640 --> 0:18:55.680 going home tomorrow, and Tyra Biggs did not say bye. 0:18:56.400 --> 0:18:59.880 I asked Hannah why she thinks A and TM did that, Like, 0:19:00.080 --> 0:19:02.280 what was the point of setting these girls up just 0:19:02.280 --> 0:19:05.840 for the three minute payoff of saying hah, we gotcha. 0:19:05.960 --> 0:19:09.119 I think at that point they really just loved like 0:19:09.200 --> 0:19:12.040 the shock value of things, Like they realized that it 0:19:12.080 --> 0:19:15.720 was a great formula for the audience too to be 0:19:15.800 --> 0:19:17.640 surprised that this happened to them. 0:19:18.119 --> 0:19:20.480 I think they also did it to put their test 0:19:20.520 --> 0:19:23.720 subjects on edge, to make them feel like they never 0:19:23.800 --> 0:19:29.000 knew what to expect. Unpredictability can cause anxiety, and anxiety 0:19:29.040 --> 0:19:33.560 can cause people to act out. Hannah told me after 0:19:33.560 --> 0:19:36.560 the casting prank she didn't know what to expect. 0:19:36.840 --> 0:19:43.080 It was just such a strange couple of months, and like, honestly, 0:19:43.119 --> 0:19:45.560 anytime that we walked into a room after that, point, 0:19:45.640 --> 0:19:48.480 it felt like the floor was going to fall beneath us. 0:19:49.240 --> 0:19:53.320 Her feelings were justified. On Hannah Season cycle sixteen, A 0:19:53.480 --> 0:19:57.639 and TM really leaned into the psychological experiment thing. There 0:19:57.720 --> 0:20:00.359 was one more incident Hannah told me about that was 0:20:00.440 --> 0:20:03.400 so bad it didn't even air on the show. On 0:20:03.440 --> 0:20:06.720 her season, Hannah made it to the international trip to Morocco. 0:20:07.160 --> 0:20:10.000 She was one of the final three. While there, they 0:20:10.040 --> 0:20:13.760 had a challenge where the contestants interviewed locals about beauty products, 0:20:14.119 --> 0:20:17.080 except the people they were interviewing didn't speak English and 0:20:17.160 --> 0:20:20.280 Hannah didn't speak the local language. She lost the challenge, 0:20:20.840 --> 0:20:24.200 but instead of just awarding the winner a prize, A 0:20:24.320 --> 0:20:28.240 and TM decided to also punish the two losers just 0:20:28.280 --> 0:20:31.600 a heads up. The punishment was nasty, even by top 0:20:31.600 --> 0:20:35.119 model standards, and it certainly didn't have anything to do 0:20:35.160 --> 0:20:38.639 with modeling. When the challenge was over, Hannah and the 0:20:38.680 --> 0:20:41.600 other losing contestant were led to a table on the 0:20:41.600 --> 0:20:43.320 street with a tarp over it. 0:20:45.440 --> 0:20:50.400 Somebody from production pulled off the tarp and it has 0:20:50.560 --> 0:20:54.280 a cow's head that's severed and its tongue is hanging out, 0:20:55.920 --> 0:20:58.640 and that's just like one of the pieces of animal carcass. 0:20:58.640 --> 0:21:01.439 It's on the table. There's like organs, and there's like 0:21:01.440 --> 0:21:03.959 a goat's foot, and there's just like all these different 0:21:04.000 --> 0:21:07.439 like pieces of meat. And he said, you're going to 0:21:07.480 --> 0:21:09.880 pick up these animal pieces and you're gonna put them 0:21:09.920 --> 0:21:12.720 on the wagon that's attashed his donkey, and you're gonna 0:21:12.720 --> 0:21:14.240 pull his donkey down. 0:21:14.000 --> 0:21:15.280 The road to the butcher shot. 0:21:17.800 --> 0:21:21.400 So Brittany and I have to team up to pick 0:21:21.440 --> 0:21:23.760 up the cow's head. That's how heavy it was, and 0:21:23.800 --> 0:21:27.600 we're both like gagging, like, you know, because it's not 0:21:27.720 --> 0:21:33.120 like fresh, it's like griss. And we finally get all 0:21:33.119 --> 0:21:34.520 the pieces onto. 0:21:34.160 --> 0:21:36.879 The wagon and it got worth. 0:21:38.359 --> 0:21:41.520 As we're picking up the pieces and everything, the Moroccans 0:21:41.520 --> 0:21:43.719 are like around the table like watching us do this, 0:21:43.880 --> 0:21:46.679 and they're all like Moroccan men who are like ha 0:21:46.680 --> 0:21:50.480 ha ha. It felt like shame from Game of Arms, 0:21:50.480 --> 0:21:51.320 and they were like shame. 0:21:51.480 --> 0:21:51.639 You know. 0:21:51.680 --> 0:21:56.440 It just felt so demeaning and like not fashion forward. 0:21:56.240 --> 0:21:59.560 At all, Hannah told me when she looks back at 0:21:59.560 --> 0:22:06.359 that moment, she regrets not telling the producers no. But 0:22:06.440 --> 0:22:09.520 that's the thing about the great psychological experiment that is 0:22:09.600 --> 0:22:13.840 reality TV. It's designed to push you to do stuff that, 0:22:14.000 --> 0:22:16.920 under normal circumstances you'd never do. 0:22:17.600 --> 0:22:19.240 I felt like that was a little piece of my 0:22:19.320 --> 0:22:21.240 soul like kind of went in that meat lock or 0:22:21.280 --> 0:22:23.680 two as far as like not putting my foot down 0:22:23.720 --> 0:22:27.119 and saying no instead, I was like, Okay, I'll do 0:22:27.240 --> 0:22:30.199 this for the sake of the show, because if I 0:22:30.280 --> 0:22:32.159 do this, then maybe I could win the show. And 0:22:32.200 --> 0:22:34.760 I felt like it was like just a really messed 0:22:34.840 --> 0:22:38.680 up way for production and people who were writing those 0:22:39.080 --> 0:22:43.760 pieces to just exercise their control and to kind of 0:22:43.840 --> 0:22:44.600 laugh at us. 0:22:45.480 --> 0:22:48.040 A and TM found makes their hose. A Taurus told 0:22:48.040 --> 0:22:50.879 me that he and other crew members were aware of 0:22:50.920 --> 0:22:51.920 this dynamic too. 0:22:52.960 --> 0:22:56.600 You signed on to live in this bubble. The microscopes 0:22:56.600 --> 0:22:59.480 are going to be on immediately. We're going to dissect 0:22:59.680 --> 0:23:02.520 every word that you say, every step that you take. 0:23:03.119 --> 0:23:07.320 I always thought the original concept for reality TV was 0:23:07.720 --> 0:23:12.919 to just observe and see how people react to different 0:23:12.960 --> 0:23:17.520 people in different circumstances, and you document that. But as 0:23:17.600 --> 0:23:19.960 time goes on, you amp up the stress level. 0:23:20.920 --> 0:23:25.520 It turns out sticking people in unnerving and uncomfortable situations 0:23:25.560 --> 0:23:28.679 to see how they react is the very cornerstone of 0:23:28.840 --> 0:23:30.159 reality programming. 0:23:30.640 --> 0:23:31.920 Here's the candid subject. 0:23:32.280 --> 0:23:35.000 Here comes the candid count of staff, three of them. 0:23:35.040 --> 0:23:37.280 At least. 0:23:37.760 --> 0:23:41.240 To really understand where America's next top model came from, 0:23:41.560 --> 0:23:44.399 we have to go back in time, way back to 0:23:44.440 --> 0:23:48.720 the nineteen forties. That's where we're going after the break. 0:24:01.040 --> 0:24:03.600 A and TM premiered in two thousand and three, and 0:24:03.680 --> 0:24:05.959 let me tell y'all, what a time to be alive. 0:24:07.440 --> 0:24:10.480 There were the reality shows like The Osbournes and Laguna 0:24:10.560 --> 0:24:12.840 Beach that gave us a glimpse into the lives of 0:24:12.880 --> 0:24:15.160 the rich and famous to let us know there are 0:24:15.200 --> 0:24:19.280 truly nothing like us. And then there were the shows 0:24:19.280 --> 0:24:21.919 that were making dreams come true. If you wanted to 0:24:21.920 --> 0:24:24.760 be a singer but never got that big break, American 0:24:24.800 --> 0:24:28.119 Idol could make you a star. And if you wanted 0:24:28.160 --> 0:24:30.480 to know what it feels like to have twenty desperate 0:24:30.520 --> 0:24:33.840 debutantes fighting for your affection, you could go on The Bachelor. 0:24:34.520 --> 0:24:36.440 If you wanted to be a millionaire and you weren't 0:24:36.440 --> 0:24:39.760 good at trivia, you could voluntarily strand yourself on an 0:24:39.760 --> 0:24:43.560 island for weeks and play mind games with strangers on 0:24:43.600 --> 0:24:47.760 the Swan. Self proclaimed ugly people could get plastic surgery 0:24:47.960 --> 0:24:51.520 so that their inner beauty would finally be reflected outside. 0:24:53.720 --> 0:24:56.959 This is the landscape A ANDTM was born into. But 0:24:57.040 --> 0:25:00.239 reality TV didn't start in the early two thousands, and 0:25:00.280 --> 0:25:04.359 it definitely wasn't invented by Tyra Banks. 0:25:06.480 --> 0:25:09.639 My name is Amanda Ann Klein. I am professor of 0:25:09.720 --> 0:25:13.720 Film Studies at East Carolina University. I've also written a 0:25:13.720 --> 0:25:15.920 book called Millennials Killed the Video Star. 0:25:16.520 --> 0:25:19.120 Y'all know Amanda. She pretty much has my dream job. 0:25:19.440 --> 0:25:22.680 She's a reality TV historian and expert, and she's going 0:25:22.720 --> 0:25:26.160 to be our guide for this brief journey through reality programming. 0:25:28.320 --> 0:25:31.679 Reality based television wasn't really possible before the advent of 0:25:31.760 --> 0:25:36.320 handheld cameras, portable sound equipment, and fast film stop. But 0:25:36.600 --> 0:25:40.400 almost as soon as the tech was available, production studios 0:25:40.440 --> 0:25:42.960 decided to use it to make fools out of everyday 0:25:43.000 --> 0:25:44.679 people for our entertainment. 0:25:45.480 --> 0:25:50.000 So there was this post war belief that technology will 0:25:50.000 --> 0:25:53.560 allow us to uncover the secrets of kind of human 0:25:53.640 --> 0:25:57.440 behaviors that were not accessible prior to this technology. 0:26:00.400 --> 0:26:03.840 The first show to test out this theory was Candid Camera. 0:26:04.400 --> 0:26:07.440 You might remember iterations of it from the seventies, nineties, 0:26:07.440 --> 0:26:10.600 and early two thousands, but the show first premiered in 0:26:10.680 --> 0:26:15.560 nineteen forty eight, Smile You were on Candid Camera. 0:26:17.440 --> 0:26:21.080 They were like many psychological experiments, and there would generally 0:26:21.160 --> 0:26:23.560 be a mark, so someone who didn't know that they 0:26:23.560 --> 0:26:27.040 were being recorded. That was key. And one of the 0:26:27.080 --> 0:26:31.200 more famous examples involves an elevator full of people who 0:26:31.200 --> 0:26:32.360 are all part of the production. 0:26:33.400 --> 0:26:37.480 The gentleman in the elevator now is a candid star. 0:26:37.920 --> 0:26:40.359 These folks who are entering, the man with a white shirt, 0:26:40.400 --> 0:26:44.320 the lady with a trench coat, and subsequently one other 0:26:44.359 --> 0:26:46.960 member of us there will face. 0:26:46.760 --> 0:26:50.640 The rear when the mark walks in. The person who 0:26:50.680 --> 0:26:54.119 doesn't know he's being recorded. The people in the elevator 0:26:54.160 --> 0:26:57.720 all turn at once to the left, and he looks around. 0:26:57.760 --> 0:27:00.200 He's a little confused, and then he turns. 0:27:00.600 --> 0:27:04.320 And you'll see how this man in the trench car, 0:27:10.680 --> 0:27:16.600 he tries to maintain his individuality. 0:27:16.000 --> 0:27:17.480 But a little by little. 0:27:22.920 --> 0:27:25.640 He looks at his watch, but he's really making an 0:27:25.640 --> 0:27:30.520 excuse for turning just a little bit more. A little 0:27:30.520 --> 0:27:33.520 all I would try it once again. 0:27:34.359 --> 0:27:38.240 Then they all turn to the back and he again 0:27:38.400 --> 0:27:41.280 is like, well damn okay, and he turns. 0:27:41.440 --> 0:27:43.879 And this goes on for a while, everyone in this 0:27:43.960 --> 0:27:47.040 elevator just randomly turning at the same time, and this 0:27:47.119 --> 0:27:50.920 poor guy following their lead. In nineteen forty eight, this 0:27:51.080 --> 0:27:56.960 was peak television. Audiences could watch real people experiencing seemingly 0:27:57.080 --> 0:28:01.320 real dilemmas and see how they would react punped before punped. 0:28:02.119 --> 0:28:05.800 But Candid Camera's hosts Alan Funt, wasn't just playing these 0:28:05.840 --> 0:28:09.119 practical jokes for shits and giggles. He was interested in 0:28:09.240 --> 0:28:10.360 something deeper. 0:28:12.480 --> 0:28:14.360 A lot of this has to do with post World 0:28:14.440 --> 0:28:18.440 War two culture and the sense of what makes group 0:28:18.520 --> 0:28:22.000 think happen. How could these atrocities of World War Two 0:28:22.119 --> 0:28:25.680 have happened to just normal, regular moral people. 0:28:26.440 --> 0:28:30.080 Remember what doctor Stein said about the Stanford prison experiment 0:28:30.119 --> 0:28:34.000 in the nineteen seventies. Those researchers were also interested in 0:28:34.080 --> 0:28:37.760 what drove people to commit atrocities during World War Two. 0:28:38.320 --> 0:28:41.280 This guy Alan Funt was looking into it thirty years before, 0:28:41.520 --> 0:28:42.760 and he made it entertaining. 0:28:43.520 --> 0:28:46.320 So there was a lot of investigation into that in 0:28:46.360 --> 0:28:49.920 the world of psychology, and Alan Funt was very interested 0:28:49.920 --> 0:28:53.480 in that. As a result, Candid Camera was actually studied 0:28:53.480 --> 0:28:56.520 a lot in the sixties by psychologists, but. 0:28:56.600 --> 0:29:02.040 Not all reality programming was a deep psychological explorer. Some 0:29:02.200 --> 0:29:05.640 of it was a lot more reminiscent of contemporary reality TV, 0:29:06.440 --> 0:29:09.160 people laying their pain and trauma bear in front of 0:29:09.240 --> 0:29:12.520 audiences in the hopes of gaining fame, fortune, and in 0:29:12.560 --> 0:29:14.800 this case, nominal prizes. 0:29:15.280 --> 0:29:18.280 What you like to be Queen for to Day. 0:29:22.080 --> 0:29:25.280 Queen for a Day ran from the mid forties up 0:29:25.480 --> 0:29:29.200 through the mid sixties. First it was on radio, and 0:29:29.240 --> 0:29:32.000 then starting in nineteen fifty six, it goes on TV. 0:29:32.960 --> 0:29:36.160 When it comes to early reality TV shows, this one 0:29:36.320 --> 0:29:39.280 might be the most disturbing of all, and I think 0:29:39.280 --> 0:29:42.560 it tells us a lot about later prize based shows 0:29:42.640 --> 0:29:43.440 like Top Model. 0:29:44.280 --> 0:29:47.480 The premise of Queen for a Day is pretty wild. 0:29:47.840 --> 0:29:52.040 So women right into the show and they tell the 0:29:52.080 --> 0:29:56.640 producers about their sob story and it's pretty bad stuff. 0:29:57.080 --> 0:30:02.239 A woman whose son has holy and he's bedbound, so 0:30:02.280 --> 0:30:05.160 she wants a rolling bed so she can take him 0:30:05.160 --> 0:30:08.080 out into the sun. A woman who has a lot 0:30:08.160 --> 0:30:11.880 of children, she just wants wood so she can build 0:30:11.960 --> 0:30:15.680 bunk beds for them to sleep in. It's awful. So 0:30:16.840 --> 0:30:20.840 they pick four women and they're all seated in the audience. 0:30:21.400 --> 0:30:25.280 They come up, the host interviews them and at the 0:30:25.360 --> 0:30:27.800 end of the show, they place all the women on 0:30:27.880 --> 0:30:32.160 camera and the audience collapsed for the saddus story, and 0:30:32.200 --> 0:30:36.040 then the winner becomes queen for a day and they 0:30:36.080 --> 0:30:37.800 get the thing that they asked for. 0:30:38.600 --> 0:30:41.080 The show was shot in front of a studio audience, 0:30:41.440 --> 0:30:44.880 and these matronly women are escorted on stage by young 0:30:44.960 --> 0:30:48.240 models in mini dresses to meet this host who's honestly 0:30:48.440 --> 0:30:53.680 just over the top. Every episode is riddled with ads 0:30:53.720 --> 0:30:57.360 and sponsorship plugs, Like literally every five minutes they're trying 0:30:57.400 --> 0:31:00.560 to sell you some ran rap or jewelry or wash sauce. 0:31:00.600 --> 0:31:03.840 For some reason, this particular episode you're about to hear 0:31:04.080 --> 0:31:07.560 was sponsored by the egg industry, so all the contestants 0:31:07.600 --> 0:31:11.080 have something to do with eggs. The first woman works 0:31:11.120 --> 0:31:14.000 the night shift as an egg candler, which apparently is 0:31:14.040 --> 0:31:16.160 the person who takes the bad eggs off the conveyor 0:31:16.240 --> 0:31:17.480 belt before they're packaged. 0:31:17.760 --> 0:31:19.920 Well, all, my husband's been disabled for the last ten 0:31:20.000 --> 0:31:22.280 years and it's beIN up to me to make a living, 0:31:22.280 --> 0:31:24.000 and I've been very thankful that I've had a good 0:31:24.040 --> 0:31:24.720 job that I could. 0:31:25.160 --> 0:31:27.520 This woman went on the show because it was offering 0:31:27.520 --> 0:31:31.160 her something she couldn't afford. A set of adjustable stools 0:31:31.440 --> 0:31:34.080 so that she and her coworkers could sit more comfortably 0:31:34.120 --> 0:31:38.000 as they sort the eggs. These were mostly working white 0:31:38.000 --> 0:31:40.480 women at a time when only a quarter to a 0:31:40.560 --> 0:31:44.000 third of white women worked outside of their homes. This 0:31:44.160 --> 0:31:47.640 is also in an era of respectability politics, a time 0:31:47.680 --> 0:31:50.960 when you didn't air your dirty laundry, even to your neighbors. 0:31:51.560 --> 0:31:55.360 And these women are going on national television saying they're broke, 0:31:55.840 --> 0:31:58.640 and they're not doing it for fame. They're doing it 0:31:58.680 --> 0:32:01.959 because they've been promised the chance to win. You can 0:32:02.040 --> 0:32:03.760 even see it in the episode and hear it in 0:32:03.800 --> 0:32:08.520 their voices. They're nervous, uncomfortable, even like this next woman 0:32:08.720 --> 0:32:11.680 who ran a chicken farm with her husband. She had 0:32:11.720 --> 0:32:16.040 a pained, nervous look on her face. She's fidgeting, almost shaking. 0:32:16.480 --> 0:32:19.120 She doesn't even know how to answer the questions, how. 0:32:18.960 --> 0:32:20.120 Many kids you got three? 0:32:20.240 --> 0:32:20.880 How many chicken? 0:32:21.680 --> 0:32:22.680 About seven thousand? 0:32:23.560 --> 0:32:26.000 Holy boy? How many eggs did the chicken lay today? 0:32:26.680 --> 0:32:27.160 Ours? 0:32:27.320 --> 0:32:27.960 Yeah? 0:32:28.040 --> 0:32:30.000 About three thousand? Right now? 0:32:31.880 --> 0:32:34.840 You didn't hear the question, I guess how many eggs 0:32:34.840 --> 0:32:35.920 does up chicken lay? 0:32:36.080 --> 0:32:36.400 Oh? 0:32:36.480 --> 0:32:38.360 If you got one to lady seven thousand, you and 0:32:38.440 --> 0:32:39.000 I can get. 0:32:38.840 --> 0:32:41.640 Pretty rich on the average one day. 0:32:41.640 --> 0:32:43.840 I think how many roasters per Lady Chicken. 0:32:44.480 --> 0:32:49.240 None, she's new in the egg business. 0:32:49.560 --> 0:32:52.000 There's no way this woman was on the show to 0:32:52.040 --> 0:32:55.840 be famous like reality TV contestants we see today. She 0:32:55.960 --> 0:32:58.880 was on Queen for a Day because she desperately wanted 0:32:58.960 --> 0:33:01.840 to get her son expensive gift. I would like to have, 0:33:01.920 --> 0:33:04.960 more than anything in the world, a record player for 0:33:05.120 --> 0:33:10.120 my boy. You just had open heart surgery in February. 0:33:10.240 --> 0:33:11.320 I was this little boy. 0:33:11.320 --> 0:33:12.960 Fifteen, he was fifteen Saturday. 0:33:13.080 --> 0:33:13.680 What's his name? 0:33:13.960 --> 0:33:18.560 Chesterirs, Old Chester? And it only gets more sad and desperate. 0:33:19.320 --> 0:33:23.040 Woman number three, whose husband was apparently a teacher, pastor 0:33:23.240 --> 0:33:26.600 and egg man, wanted an tercom so she could keep 0:33:26.640 --> 0:33:28.120 track of her five kids. 0:33:28.520 --> 0:33:31.880 I candle eggs and the egg room quite long, and 0:33:31.960 --> 0:33:34.120 I got to keep track of the children in the house. 0:33:34.240 --> 0:33:37.360 Sure, and it's quite a waste to run back and forth. 0:33:37.680 --> 0:33:41.080 And finally there was woman number four, who maybe had 0:33:41.120 --> 0:33:43.280 the most odd but sweet request. 0:33:43.640 --> 0:33:45.080 I like to have eighty moon moves. 0:33:45.280 --> 0:33:45.400 Now. 0:33:45.440 --> 0:33:48.720 That scared me a little bit, and I too, you 0:33:48.800 --> 0:33:53.360 could use, but she wanted eighty And what a nice 0:33:53.400 --> 0:33:55.960 reason tell it. I have a daughter in Pacific State 0:33:56.000 --> 0:33:58.440 Hospital and they're going to have a blue owl this fall, 0:33:58.560 --> 0:34:01.360 and I wanted the moon moves the girls explain, if 0:34:01.400 --> 0:34:03.760 you don't mind, what is that school that your little 0:34:03.800 --> 0:34:05.280 daughter attends. It's a special school. 0:34:05.400 --> 0:34:07.600 It's a school for the pandicapped, and. 0:34:07.600 --> 0:34:10.200 They're going to have a luau. You want eighty little 0:34:10.200 --> 0:34:13.200 girls to go to this luau all dressed in moon moos. 0:34:13.360 --> 0:34:15.640 I can't think of a nicer thing for those kids. 0:34:15.880 --> 0:34:16.680 Now we're going to have. 0:34:16.640 --> 0:34:19.239 A queen right now, and here we go. Number one, 0:34:19.360 --> 0:34:20.400 missus Irma Franklin. 0:34:20.640 --> 0:34:24.680 Number one, Thank you. 0:34:25.280 --> 0:34:27.279 Number two, you want a phonograph of that boy? 0:34:27.440 --> 0:34:33.000 Number two. The crowd chose number four, the Moomoo lady, 0:34:33.360 --> 0:34:35.920 but the moon moves were not her only prize. 0:34:36.120 --> 0:34:37.920 And here's a good way to start with this handsome 0:34:38.000 --> 0:34:39.800 queen for a day watch by hell Bros. It was 0:34:39.840 --> 0:34:42.240 designed just for our queens and has two tiny diamond 0:34:42.280 --> 0:34:44.719 encrusted crowns adorning the face. Now, you put in a 0:34:44.719 --> 0:34:47.000 lot of work there, and I'm sure that the perfect 0:34:47.000 --> 0:34:49.439 way to relax the day's end will be a great 0:34:49.480 --> 0:34:52.320 comfort to you. It's with a jacuzzi whirlpool bat. 0:34:54.400 --> 0:34:57.360 She also got a canopy bed a gift certificate to 0:34:57.360 --> 0:35:00.560 shop in a catalog and you'll love this. The woman 0:35:00.560 --> 0:35:04.399 who ran an egg farm got a year's supply of eggs. 0:35:04.840 --> 0:35:10.399 What really makes the show so surreal is that not 0:35:10.440 --> 0:35:12.680 only does she get the price she asked for, but 0:35:12.760 --> 0:35:16.880 she gets all these sponsor gifts and they're completely inappropriate 0:35:16.960 --> 0:35:19.919 for the women that are going to witness. So it's 0:35:20.040 --> 0:35:25.279 like outfits for the country club. Every woman will look 0:35:25.440 --> 0:35:32.520 chic in this matching polyester tennis outfit. It's outrageous. There's 0:35:32.560 --> 0:35:36.520 this huge disconnect. So when we talk about ethics and 0:35:36.600 --> 0:35:40.799 reality TV, even back in the fifties, we were doing 0:35:40.880 --> 0:35:45.719 some pretty suspect things. This point, Amanda makes is the 0:35:45.760 --> 0:35:48.120 reason why we just listen to all of that, Other 0:35:48.160 --> 0:35:50.120 than I just wanted you to hear how ridiculous that 0:35:50.160 --> 0:35:55.520 show is. Almost from the beginning, when we decided to 0:35:55.560 --> 0:35:58.800 put real people on television to hear their real stories, 0:35:59.239 --> 0:36:01.000 the ethical life were blurred. 0:36:02.040 --> 0:36:05.200 These women were more than likely not rich. I mean, 0:36:05.239 --> 0:36:08.960 the first women couldn't even afford some stools. But producers 0:36:09.040 --> 0:36:12.520 understood that if they dangled the promise of something people 0:36:12.520 --> 0:36:15.680 couldn't otherwise get on their own, they would be willing 0:36:15.760 --> 0:36:21.400 to do stuff they wouldn't normally do. It's something we 0:36:21.480 --> 0:36:24.520 saw all the time on A and TM. Queen for 0:36:24.600 --> 0:36:29.520 a Day is an early example of how desperation became entertainment. 0:36:30.320 --> 0:36:32.640 By the time Tyra Banks and Kim Mock came along, 0:36:33.080 --> 0:36:36.759 they intuitively understood that the most desperate people make the 0:36:36.800 --> 0:36:42.440 best contestants. For a long time, Candid Camera, Queen for 0:36:42.480 --> 0:36:45.360 a Day in game shows were really the only type 0:36:45.360 --> 0:36:49.000 of reality television programming. That is until the mother of 0:36:49.120 --> 0:36:52.080 reality TV as we know it premiered in the nineteen 0:36:52.120 --> 0:36:54.960 seventies on PBS, of all places. 0:36:56.160 --> 0:36:58.200 During the next hour, you will see the first in 0:36:58.239 --> 0:37:01.280 a series of programs in time, An American Family. 0:37:02.160 --> 0:37:06.640 An American Family comes out in nineteen seventy three. It 0:37:06.719 --> 0:37:10.680 is a PBS show and it is what we would 0:37:11.000 --> 0:37:17.319 consider the first serialized form of reality TV. What made 0:37:17.320 --> 0:37:20.800 An American Family different is that it told a story, 0:37:21.080 --> 0:37:23.160 a continuous story across episodes. 0:37:23.600 --> 0:37:26.560 The series is about the William C. Loud family of 0:37:26.600 --> 0:37:32.880 Santa Barbara, California. For seven months from May thirtieth, nineteen 0:37:33.000 --> 0:37:38.280 seventy one to January first, nineteen seventy two, the family 0:37:38.400 --> 0:37:41.840 was filmed as they went about their daily routine. 0:37:42.560 --> 0:37:45.400 An American family doesn't sound like the reality TV we 0:37:45.480 --> 0:37:49.200 watched today. It just sounds like a really mundane documentary 0:37:49.239 --> 0:37:51.480 about the day to day lives of a typical family. 0:37:52.320 --> 0:37:55.200 But when you think about it, being there to capture 0:37:55.239 --> 0:37:57.719 the day to day life while happening to catch the 0:37:57.760 --> 0:38:01.800 truly unhanged drama is the base of all docusob reality. 0:38:02.440 --> 0:38:06.040 Think about the Kardashians, or the Real Housewives or Jersey Shore. 0:38:06.719 --> 0:38:11.759 An American family pioneered the whole genre. Half of Antium 0:38:11.840 --> 0:38:14.399 was the plot of the modeling competition, but the other 0:38:14.480 --> 0:38:17.000 half was about the drama in the house. You know, 0:38:17.280 --> 0:38:21.239 who'll stole my granola bar? An American family was the 0:38:21.360 --> 0:38:24.120 earliest example of this type of reality TV. 0:38:25.239 --> 0:38:28.880 It's the first time people said, come into my house, 0:38:29.400 --> 0:38:32.479 come into my life. You're inviting the camera in, which 0:38:32.520 --> 0:38:36.080 is a very different relationship with the camera. I teach 0:38:36.120 --> 0:38:39.279 it in my reality TV class, and one thing that 0:38:39.360 --> 0:38:43.520 I find interesting is how the students get frustrated with 0:38:43.680 --> 0:38:48.080 the downtime because we're so used to reality shows kind 0:38:48.080 --> 0:38:50.160 of you know, give us this, give us that, give 0:38:50.239 --> 0:38:53.359 us the reaction, whereas this was more in kind of 0:38:53.400 --> 0:38:57.800 the direct cinema documentary tradition where you might just see 0:38:57.840 --> 0:39:00.800 someone you know, their finger, I mean, on the table 0:39:00.840 --> 0:39:04.040 for a while as a boring conversation happens. 0:39:07.560 --> 0:39:13.640 Oh, just you know, a bunch of kids, Kevin. 0:39:14.760 --> 0:39:15.640 Nothing much. 0:39:17.680 --> 0:39:21.440 Here, But eventually some real life drama happened. 0:39:22.440 --> 0:39:25.200 They got a lot of crazy content out of that, 0:39:25.360 --> 0:39:29.920 because the husband and wife ultimately divorce by the end. 0:39:31.840 --> 0:39:35.520 A tense breakup unfolding before our eyes. Oh now, it's 0:39:35.560 --> 0:39:39.000 starting to sound familiar. And that wasn't the only scandalous 0:39:39.040 --> 0:39:41.400 thing happening in this average American family. 0:39:42.080 --> 0:39:46.800 Their son basically comes out as gay. It's very coded, 0:39:46.880 --> 0:39:50.000 but there's a whole episode of his mother visiting him 0:39:50.040 --> 0:39:53.600 at the Chelsea Hotel in New York where like they 0:39:53.600 --> 0:39:55.320 go to this crazy drag show. 0:39:55.680 --> 0:39:58.240 Oh now, we got some controversy, at least by nineteen 0:39:58.280 --> 0:39:59.920 seventy three standards. 0:40:00.000 --> 0:40:03.200 And it obviously caused a huge stir when it came out. 0:40:03.280 --> 0:40:05.520 Some people were like, it's the end of America, right, 0:40:05.920 --> 0:40:08.520 We're seeing an American family fall apart, where you know, 0:40:08.600 --> 0:40:11.000 we've got this guy who's clearly gay. 0:40:12.239 --> 0:40:15.360 The family son Lance later came out as gay. I 0:40:15.360 --> 0:40:18.239 don't think an American Family. Producers knew Lance was in 0:40:18.280 --> 0:40:20.399 the process of coming out when they chose to cast 0:40:20.440 --> 0:40:23.600 the Loud family, but it became the most interesting thing 0:40:23.640 --> 0:40:28.200 about the whole show. Years later, when the reality genre 0:40:28.360 --> 0:40:31.200 started to pick up, producers took a page from An 0:40:31.200 --> 0:40:35.560 American Family. The cast people who were outsiders who are different, 0:40:35.960 --> 0:40:40.800 because that brought in viewers. Even with all the makings 0:40:40.800 --> 0:40:45.000 of great reality TV, An American Family didn't really inspire 0:40:45.120 --> 0:40:48.640 any other reality programming. For a while, it was seen 0:40:48.680 --> 0:40:52.240 as an artsy docuseries, not something to be replicated season 0:40:52.280 --> 0:40:56.399 after season. After it, we had shows like Cops, which 0:40:56.440 --> 0:40:59.440 presented itself as raw reality from the perspective of the 0:40:59.480 --> 0:41:02.440 police Star Search, which I guess is a bit like 0:41:02.480 --> 0:41:06.680 American Idol and America's Funniest Home Videos, where every week 0:41:06.719 --> 0:41:09.400 a lucky family was rewarded for catching the moment when 0:41:09.440 --> 0:41:11.759 some poor dad gets knocked upside the head with a 0:41:11.840 --> 0:41:17.319 pinata sea But nothing like An American Family. That is 0:41:17.400 --> 0:41:21.400 until nineteen ninety two when MTV premiered The Real World. 0:41:21.840 --> 0:41:27.200 This is the True Story True story Seven strangers picked. 0:41:26.920 --> 0:41:28.560 To live in a lot and have. 0:41:28.640 --> 0:41:32.120 Their lives taped to find out what happens. 0:41:32.000 --> 0:41:33.560 When people stop being polite? 0:41:33.640 --> 0:41:34.840 Could you get the phone. 0:41:34.800 --> 0:41:35.879 And start getting real? 0:41:36.040 --> 0:41:36.800 The Real World. 0:41:38.400 --> 0:41:41.600 The reason why they decide to do The Real World 0:41:42.000 --> 0:41:45.680 at MTV is because the ratings were kind of flagging. 0:41:46.320 --> 0:41:49.200 They still obviously did a lot of music videos, but 0:41:49.680 --> 0:41:53.440 people were kind of losing interest, and so they saw 0:41:53.520 --> 0:41:56.879 that something that young audiences really loved was Beverly Host 0:41:56.960 --> 0:42:00.719 nine O two and zero. So MTV thought, let's do that. 0:42:00.880 --> 0:42:04.000 Let's do a scripted show. But it turns out it's 0:42:04.040 --> 0:42:08.040 really expensive, right, You need writers, you need actors, all 0:42:08.080 --> 0:42:13.360 that stuff. So instead they went for a reality TV format. 0:42:14.760 --> 0:42:16.520 If you go back to the first season of the 0:42:16.560 --> 0:42:19.520 Real World, you'll notice that everyone was an artist of 0:42:19.560 --> 0:42:21.760 some kind trying to make it in New York City. 0:42:22.239 --> 0:42:25.640 It was a group of young dancers, actors, rappers, and singers, 0:42:26.040 --> 0:42:28.000 all hoping to get their big break. 0:42:28.800 --> 0:42:31.239 They were actually led to believe that this was going 0:42:31.320 --> 0:42:33.840 to really focus on their art and kind of launch 0:42:33.920 --> 0:42:34.680 their careers. 0:42:35.400 --> 0:42:38.160 MTV's The Real World was the first time when people 0:42:38.200 --> 0:42:41.800 started using reality TV as a platform or a means 0:42:41.800 --> 0:42:45.600 to launch the career they actually wanted. At this point, 0:42:45.640 --> 0:42:48.520 there was no such thing as a reality star and 0:42:48.600 --> 0:42:51.800 for the first two seasons the show was well boring 0:42:52.120 --> 0:42:55.520 and the writings were bad. That is until the third 0:42:55.560 --> 0:42:59.640 season featured Pedro ol Zamora, an HIV positive gay man. 0:43:00.120 --> 0:43:01.840 I am a person living with age, and I am 0:43:01.880 --> 0:43:05.080 a gay man, and I am Hispanic, I'm a person 0:43:05.080 --> 0:43:07.759 of color, and this simply who I am. 0:43:08.400 --> 0:43:11.040 You know, the AIDS crisis was kind of at its 0:43:11.080 --> 0:43:15.479 peak at that time. It was pretty remarkable to put 0:43:15.520 --> 0:43:19.000 an HIV positive gay man on TV. 0:43:20.120 --> 0:43:23.600 Pedro was a sympathetic hero you could root for, but 0:43:23.680 --> 0:43:26.640 this wasn't an artsy docu series. They needed to bring 0:43:26.680 --> 0:43:30.080 the drama to stay on air. And every hero needs 0:43:30.080 --> 0:43:36.160 a villain. Enter a puck who was antagonistic and openly homophobic. 0:43:36.680 --> 0:43:40.480 Great idea, right, They put on someone who was abrasive, 0:43:41.000 --> 0:43:43.799 who didn't back down, and as a result, you had 0:43:43.840 --> 0:43:46.600 your perfect villain and you had your perfect fit. Though 0:43:46.960 --> 0:43:48.960 very melodramatic structure. 0:43:48.960 --> 0:43:54.400 That structure eventually became the backbone of reality TV. Producers 0:43:54.480 --> 0:43:57.800 understood that rooting for your faiths isn't as fun without 0:43:57.840 --> 0:44:01.520 someone to root against. That tried in true formula. It's 0:44:01.520 --> 0:44:05.080 something we see season after season on a certain reality 0:44:05.080 --> 0:44:09.160 modeling competition show. I don't think casting Pedro was some 0:44:09.320 --> 0:44:13.279 altruistic act humanizing the AIDS crisis. I think they were 0:44:13.360 --> 0:44:16.800 using his identity to stir up conflict, just like I 0:44:16.840 --> 0:44:19.319 think A and TM did when they cast Isis King 0:44:19.440 --> 0:44:24.800 as the show's first trans woman. The Real World's success 0:44:24.920 --> 0:44:27.320 was a turning point in the history of reality TV. 0:44:28.280 --> 0:44:32.840 After nineteen ninety five, new shows started popping up like Daisies, Judge, 0:44:32.880 --> 0:44:36.399 Judy Making, the Band, Big Brother, Fear Factor, The Amazing Race, 0:44:36.440 --> 0:44:41.440 American Idol, The Bachelor Survivor. And here's one big reason 0:44:41.560 --> 0:44:45.000 reality TV exploded. It's a lot cheaper to make than 0:44:45.040 --> 0:44:49.680 scripted programming. Networks realized they could get the same viewership 0:44:49.960 --> 0:44:51.960 for a fraction of the cost of a show like 0:44:52.080 --> 0:44:56.200 Gilmour Girls or X Files. There were no pesky actors, unions, 0:44:56.239 --> 0:44:58.360 no costume designers, and no writers. 0:45:00.560 --> 0:45:04.680 So this creates a perfect environment for something like reality 0:45:04.760 --> 0:45:07.759 TV because of how cheap it is, because you can 0:45:07.800 --> 0:45:12.120 avoid union labor and all of those things. The other 0:45:12.280 --> 0:45:16.200 factor is the rise of tabloid culture at this time. 0:45:16.760 --> 0:45:20.080 So you know, there were always tabloid magazines. You know, 0:45:20.080 --> 0:45:22.960 when I was a kid, my grandmother loved the inquirer 0:45:23.160 --> 0:45:25.560 and she I think she called them the scandal sheets, 0:45:26.040 --> 0:45:29.239 which is such a great, such a great term, but 0:45:30.200 --> 0:45:34.440 they really take off, and as a society we get 0:45:34.560 --> 0:45:40.000 very interested in seeing celebrities caught unawares, and as a result, 0:45:40.560 --> 0:45:44.640 you have these individuals who we called it at the time, 0:45:44.640 --> 0:45:47.520 I think we called them like celebutants, people who were 0:45:47.560 --> 0:45:50.800 famous for being famous. This was an outrageous idea to 0:45:50.880 --> 0:45:53.279 people at the time. They just couldn't believe it. So 0:45:53.400 --> 0:45:59.319 paris Hilton, Kim Gardashian, people who didn't do anything. They 0:45:59.360 --> 0:46:02.399 just kind of insisted as pretty rich girls who go 0:46:02.440 --> 0:46:02.960 and party. 0:46:04.320 --> 0:46:07.600 And this is where Reality TV History meets a young 0:46:07.680 --> 0:46:10.480 Tyra Banks, who had an idea to cash in on 0:46:10.520 --> 0:46:14.279 this newly evolved genre. And we just spent ten episodes 0:46:14.320 --> 0:46:19.320 talking about how that went. After the break, we're revisiting 0:46:19.360 --> 0:46:22.799 A and TM's worst tropes and their dark history, and 0:46:22.840 --> 0:46:36.520 then I'll be signing off for real this time. Back 0:46:36.560 --> 0:46:40.320 in episode seven, we explored the angry black woman trope. 0:46:40.680 --> 0:46:43.360 A and TM had a pattern of casting and editing 0:46:43.400 --> 0:46:49.160 contestants to fit the stereotype that black women are loud, mean, bitter, confrontational, 0:46:49.239 --> 0:46:51.640 belligerent divas. 0:46:53.520 --> 0:46:54.960 And we didn't get kicked off for hinting. 0:46:55.040 --> 0:46:56.799 Somebody yn't ask me toe up right now? 0:46:56.960 --> 0:46:57.440 Shut up? 0:46:57.680 --> 0:46:59.200 Did she not come up to me and say that. 0:47:00.840 --> 0:47:13.680 Honest competition no matter what any girl say. But A 0:47:13.880 --> 0:47:16.960 N T M didn't invent the A b W trope, 0:47:17.360 --> 0:47:27.160 They just did it really well. The trope has history. 0:47:28.400 --> 0:47:31.560 There was a radio sitcom called Amos and Andy that 0:47:31.719 --> 0:47:34.640 ran from the twenties until the early nineteen sixties. It 0:47:34.719 --> 0:47:38.680 was also briefly on television. The characters Amos and Andy 0:47:38.800 --> 0:47:41.640 were two black men who moved up north from down 0:47:41.719 --> 0:47:45.080 South for a better life. On the radio program, the 0:47:45.120 --> 0:47:48.480 two men who voiced Amos and Andy were white. They 0:47:48.600 --> 0:47:52.200 used offensive accents that were supposed to mock black dialect. 0:47:52.960 --> 0:47:59.719 The show was extremely racist and extremely popular. There was 0:47:59.800 --> 0:48:03.200 one one central woman on the show. Her name was Sapphire. 0:48:04.040 --> 0:48:07.720 The character was voiced by an actual black woman, Ernestine Wade, 0:48:08.080 --> 0:48:10.960 but it was still a demeaning caricature of black women. 0:48:11.760 --> 0:48:17.480 Sapphire didn't have any redeeming qualities. She was always loud, rude, overbearing, 0:48:17.560 --> 0:48:18.200 and angry. 0:48:18.880 --> 0:48:20.239 You are the laziest no one. 0:48:20.280 --> 0:48:21.560 You ain't never supported me. 0:48:21.600 --> 0:48:24.320 In twenty two years. You ain't got no ambition. 0:48:24.480 --> 0:48:26.720 You are the weakest, most finalss cat. 0:48:26.719 --> 0:48:28.799 I'm never miss and you ain't never done. 0:48:28.880 --> 0:48:31.440 Nothing can make a home for me, and I'm. 0:48:31.280 --> 0:48:37.719 Leaving you sound familiar. When Amazon Andy was on air, 0:48:38.000 --> 0:48:40.880 there were very few roles for black people in Hollywood. 0:48:41.320 --> 0:48:44.879 This actress, Ernestine Wade, was actually a theater trained for 0:48:44.880 --> 0:48:48.600 former singer and musician, but she was relegated to one 0:48:48.680 --> 0:48:55.160 no roles Like Sapphire. The Sapphire character confirmed widely held 0:48:55.320 --> 0:48:58.239 racist beliefs at the time about black women, and that 0:48:58.400 --> 0:49:02.239 trope took root in America entertainment. I could do an 0:49:02.360 --> 0:49:05.840 entire podcast just on the variations and evolutions of Sapphire 0:49:05.960 --> 0:49:11.440 and media. The Sapphire character never died, she just became 0:49:11.719 --> 0:49:18.400 the angry black woman. Okay, y'all still with me. Let's 0:49:18.400 --> 0:49:21.800 take a trip to a more recent history, a time 0:49:21.880 --> 0:49:24.920 when most of us were alive. Although we may wish 0:49:24.960 --> 0:49:28.000 we didn't have to live through this, I'm talking about 0:49:28.080 --> 0:49:32.320 the early two thousands, a period of rampant body shaming. 0:49:33.239 --> 0:49:36.640 Antim is in the pantheon of body shaming offenders from 0:49:36.640 --> 0:49:39.600 this era, and I want to give y'all some context 0:49:39.800 --> 0:49:43.879 about the two thousands culture that birthed top model. Jess 0:49:43.880 --> 0:49:46.680 Sims is a health writer and she remembers just how 0:49:46.719 --> 0:49:49.000 brutal the aughts were on women's bodies. 0:49:49.280 --> 0:49:51.680 America's next top model is such a tip of the 0:49:51.680 --> 0:49:54.800 iceberg in terms of what we're looking at we had, 0:49:54.880 --> 0:49:57.880 I always say A really good example was the treatment 0:49:57.960 --> 0:50:01.640 of Renees Elweger was in Bridget jones Diary. 0:50:02.280 --> 0:50:05.160 The movie Bridget Jones's Diary came out in two thousand 0:50:05.200 --> 0:50:09.040 and one and it took America by storm. The entire 0:50:09.120 --> 0:50:12.239 premise was that Bridget Jones was fat, from beat and 0:50:12.280 --> 0:50:15.200 looking for love. But Bridget Jones was no more than 0:50:15.239 --> 0:50:18.719 a size ten and weighed one hundred and thirty six pounds. 0:50:19.120 --> 0:50:21.880 Renee Zelwicker put on weight for the role and lost 0:50:21.920 --> 0:50:25.600 it afterwards. For years, she says, strangers would come up 0:50:25.600 --> 0:50:27.200 to her on the street and ask. 0:50:27.600 --> 0:50:29.640 How did you lose that weight? 0:50:30.280 --> 0:50:33.560 She refused to answer the question. Here's writer Jess Simms 0:50:33.640 --> 0:50:34.879 again in. 0:50:34.840 --> 0:50:37.440 The early two thousands, No matter what your body looked like, 0:50:37.520 --> 0:50:40.640 it was a problem. We also have Jessica Simpson. 0:50:41.719 --> 0:50:43.880 In two thousand and nine, there was a photo of 0:50:43.960 --> 0:50:47.200 popstar Jessica Simpson on stage at a concert. 0:50:47.320 --> 0:50:49.680 She's wearing these high waisted denim jeans and a leopard 0:50:49.719 --> 0:50:55.200 print belt, and it was on the news cycle for 0:50:55.400 --> 0:50:56.720 a good two or three weeks. 0:50:58.440 --> 0:51:02.920 The photo went early to thousands viral, not because Jessica 0:51:02.960 --> 0:51:06.279 Simpson was doing anything in it, but because she had 0:51:06.320 --> 0:51:11.160 gained some weight. Jessica Simpson rose to fame in the 0:51:11.239 --> 0:51:14.520 late nineties when she was a literal teenager and because 0:51:14.520 --> 0:51:16.600 she had the nerve to be bigger than she was 0:51:16.640 --> 0:51:19.440 when she was seventeen. She found her picture on the 0:51:19.480 --> 0:51:22.560 cover of all the tabloids and the subject of a 0:51:22.600 --> 0:51:29.279 lot of blog posts, blogs like Perez Hilton's. His name 0:51:29.480 --> 0:51:32.520 kept coming up while I was interviewing people for this podcast, 0:51:32.920 --> 0:51:35.880 and I'm glad I decided to interview him myself because 0:51:35.920 --> 0:51:39.680 it was illuminating. I have some more clips from our 0:51:39.800 --> 0:51:42.399 interview I'll share in a minute, but first, here's what 0:51:42.520 --> 0:51:45.400 jess had to say about Perez's role in that body 0:51:45.400 --> 0:51:46.080 shaming era. 0:51:46.960 --> 0:51:50.799 We saw people who got famous off of being cruel 0:51:50.840 --> 0:51:53.839 to fat people. I always talk about Perez Hilton, who 0:51:54.160 --> 0:51:57.919 tried to turn a new lead, which I always find 0:51:57.920 --> 0:52:01.120 to be very bizarre because he was disgusting, cruel to 0:52:01.280 --> 0:52:04.080 all women. He's such a good example of how gay 0:52:04.080 --> 0:52:09.120 men can be so misogynistic. Beyond his calls for Britney 0:52:09.120 --> 0:52:13.080 Spears to hurt herself, which he was very open about 0:52:13.120 --> 0:52:16.759 and was very persistent, his coverage of women's bodies. It 0:52:16.840 --> 0:52:20.239 was a really good example of how the media were 0:52:20.239 --> 0:52:24.360 able to make money off of discussing women's bodies. And 0:52:24.360 --> 0:52:27.560 these weren't people who were journalists who not a journalistic 0:52:27.760 --> 0:52:28.520 code of ethics. 0:52:29.840 --> 0:52:34.280 Writer Michelle Konstantinovsky also had thoughts about Perez of impact 0:52:34.360 --> 0:52:36.879 and the climate of the early two thousands. 0:52:36.640 --> 0:52:39.720 Tabloid culture was beyond out of control at that point. 0:52:39.800 --> 0:52:43.520 We all remember, you know, Lindsay Lohan and Parashltan and 0:52:43.840 --> 0:52:47.040 Nicole Ritchie either being celebrated or torn apart depending on 0:52:47.080 --> 0:52:50.879 the day. You know, in the Perez Hilton of it all, 0:52:50.960 --> 0:52:54.479 all of the bloggers who felt very comfortable not only 0:52:54.520 --> 0:52:57.799 displaying women's bodies but literally circling parts of them and 0:52:57.840 --> 0:53:00.520 magnifying them and saying what was wrong with them? But 0:53:00.600 --> 0:53:03.680 the Perez Hilton culture just kept doubling down, doubling down 0:53:03.680 --> 0:53:07.960 on how it's not only acceptable to dissect and almost 0:53:08.000 --> 0:53:12.320 like take glee in mocking women's bodies. 0:53:11.880 --> 0:53:16.080 But it's expected. That's what we do as a culture. 0:53:16.760 --> 0:53:19.759 Perez was one of the absolute worst when it came 0:53:19.800 --> 0:53:23.080 to body shaming. This is the man who said one 0:53:23.120 --> 0:53:28.080 of Bruce Willis's daughters was a fugly child. He described 0:53:28.120 --> 0:53:32.360 the OC's Misha Barton's thighs as being mar faalicious, and 0:53:32.440 --> 0:53:37.360 he once called Britney Spears fat Elvis in a headline 0:53:37.680 --> 0:53:41.560 no one was off limits. These days, though, Perez is 0:53:41.560 --> 0:53:44.520 singing a slightly different tune. He's been on a bit 0:53:44.560 --> 0:53:48.080 of an apology tour. When I interviewed him, I had 0:53:48.200 --> 0:53:51.280 prepared some hard hitting questions about the damage he caused 0:53:51.320 --> 0:53:53.520 with his post, but he came out swinging. 0:53:54.040 --> 0:53:57.120 I take full accountability for everything I did. I can't 0:53:57.160 --> 0:54:01.880 blame ignorance, and I can't blame you youth. I was 0:54:01.880 --> 0:54:06.440 in my late twenties and I was so selfish. I 0:54:06.560 --> 0:54:11.920 was incredibly selfish. I knew at the time that what 0:54:12.000 --> 0:54:15.920 I was doing was wrong, and I didn't care. I 0:54:16.000 --> 0:54:19.760 was selfish. I cared about me. I cared about the clicks, 0:54:20.200 --> 0:54:24.680 the page view. I was purposefully trying to be shocking 0:54:24.800 --> 0:54:29.120 because that worked. It got attention, it got me views, 0:54:29.200 --> 0:54:33.160 and it got me success. I was horrible and I 0:54:33.239 --> 0:54:34.480 was rewarded for it. 0:54:35.440 --> 0:54:39.040 Whether or not this Maya Kulpa is genuine. Perez knows 0:54:39.040 --> 0:54:42.400 what to say, and that's strikingly different than what we 0:54:42.480 --> 0:54:44.320 hear from say Tyra Banks. 0:54:45.239 --> 0:54:50.440 Attention is a very powerful drug, and I was an 0:54:50.480 --> 0:54:52.440 attention addict. 0:54:54.200 --> 0:54:57.440 Perez might have changed his ways, but the thing is, 0:54:58.000 --> 0:55:03.600 today there are millions of ress. When reality TV started 0:55:03.640 --> 0:55:06.840 eighty years ago, it was openly deemed a social and 0:55:06.880 --> 0:55:11.719 psychological experiment. Then it became normal, and today we're in 0:55:11.719 --> 0:55:15.319 the middle of a new psychological experiment, one that's hard 0:55:15.320 --> 0:55:18.200 to opt out of. Amanda clin again. 0:55:18.880 --> 0:55:23.920 It feels like, right now everything is reality TV because 0:55:24.040 --> 0:55:26.560 you know, first of all, of course social media, you 0:55:26.600 --> 0:55:29.960 can hate follow people online and come on, we all 0:55:30.000 --> 0:55:32.560 do it because they're drama and they put all their 0:55:32.640 --> 0:55:35.120 mess out there and you're like, oh, what's messy up 0:55:35.120 --> 0:55:38.400 to today? So like, that's your personal reality show. 0:55:38.719 --> 0:55:41.520 And we're all the main character in our own story. 0:55:41.960 --> 0:55:45.360 Amanda thinks it's changing the way we approach our daily lives. 0:55:46.000 --> 0:55:48.920 You see something happening, you pull your phone out, not 0:55:49.040 --> 0:55:52.560 because you want to remember it later, it's because you're like, ooh, context, 0:55:53.440 --> 0:55:55.600 I don't have a big social media following, but even 0:55:55.760 --> 0:55:58.440 I'm like, ooh, this is so interesting. Let me get this. 0:55:59.120 --> 0:56:03.600 We're all reality TV producers. We're all curating the world 0:56:03.640 --> 0:56:05.799 for other people, and I don't think that's a good 0:56:05.800 --> 0:56:09.120 thing because I think that's changing the way we view 0:56:09.160 --> 0:56:12.560 each other. We are viewing other people as content, so 0:56:12.719 --> 0:56:14.160 we're more prone to of you each other, I think 0:56:14.200 --> 0:56:15.080 as characters. 0:56:15.160 --> 0:56:22.240 Now, reality TV started this phenomenon of wanting to watch 0:56:22.400 --> 0:56:27.240 real people in ridiculous situations and everyday dramas, and now, 0:56:27.480 --> 0:56:30.200 in a way, we are all on a reality show, 0:56:30.520 --> 0:56:35.560 whether we want to be or not. That's all for 0:56:35.640 --> 0:56:39.600 this very special bonus episode. Thanks for listening to the 0:56:39.640 --> 0:56:44.279 Curse of America's Next Top Model. Someone once told me, 0:56:44.520 --> 0:56:47.440 in this business, the only reward you get is to 0:56:47.480 --> 0:56:49.719 get to do it again. And my team and I 0:56:49.920 --> 0:56:53.640 worked really hard. So if you want another season or 0:56:53.760 --> 0:56:56.799 more episodes, the best way to let us know is 0:56:56.840 --> 0:56:59.960 by leaving a five star rating and a glowing review. 0:57:01.360 --> 0:57:06.200 All right, brow the credits one last time. The Curse 0:57:06.239 --> 0:57:09.440 of America's Next Top Model is a production of Glass Podcast, 0:57:09.800 --> 0:57:13.680 a division of Glass Entertainment Group in partnership with iHeart Podcast. 0:57:14.360 --> 0:57:17.680 The show is executive produced by Nancy Glass, hosted and 0:57:17.720 --> 0:57:21.120 senior produced by me Bridget Armstrong. Our story editor is 0:57:21.160 --> 0:57:24.880 Monique Leboard, also produced by Ben Fetterman and Andrea Gunning. 0:57:25.280 --> 0:57:29.400 Associate producers are Alisha Key, Kristin Melciriy, and Curry Richmond. 0:57:30.160 --> 0:57:33.600 Consulting producers on this podcast are Oliver TwixT and Kate Taylor. 0:57:34.000 --> 0:57:37.880 Our iHeart team is Ali Perry and Jessica Criincheck. Audio 0:57:38.000 --> 0:57:40.920 editing and mixing on this episode by Matt del Vecchio 0:57:41.080 --> 0:57:44.360 and Dean Welsh. The Curse of America's Next Top Model 0:57:44.400 --> 0:57:48.240 theme was composed by Oliver Bains. Music library provided by 0:57:48.240 --> 0:57:52.320 myb Music. Special thanks to everyone we interviewed, especially the 0:57:52.360 --> 0:57:56.120 former contestants, and for more podcasts from iHeart, visit the 0:57:56.160 --> 0:57:59.880 iHeartRadio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. 0:58:00.480 --> 0:58:03.480 Also check out the Etglass Podcast Instagram for Curse of 0:58:03.560 --> 0:58:05.960 America's Next Top Model behind the scenes content.