This article originally appeared in T&S Issue 42, Summer 2001.
How do we explain the extraordinary popularity of recent TV programmes like Big Brother and Popstars? Are they, like soap opera, directed primarily at women, dealing in stereotypes and trivia — or do they attempt to extend the democratic pretensions of television, embracing lesbians, single mothers and other ‘ordinary people’? Carol Morley decodes reality TV.
In 1994 the trade paper Television Today reported a new idea for a British TV programme entitled Divorce Me which would feature real life divorcing couples on a quiz show, competing for the contents of their own home. The chief executive of the production company explained, ‘We’ve had reality entertainment shows with programmes like Beadle’s About and Surprise, Surprise, and reality crime shows. I think the new mood in entertainment will be for reality game shows’. Another trade paper from the same time quoted a TV executive as saying, ‘I see reality TV as a form of television democracy’.
Reality television (RT) has become more than a passing trend; it seems to have become a significant part of the television schedules. RT claims to have an authenticity that other TV genres can’t capture, but of course it is heavily mediated and constructed, from the starting point of selecting characters to the finishing point of editing footage. The continuing drive of television has been to appear democratic, inclusive and representative, showing all views all of the time. RT relies heavily on the inclusion of so called ‘ordinary people’ — those previously outside of the TV world — and that is where the claims of democracy begin. Is RT democratic? Does RT really offer possibilities for challenging attitudes about gender, class, race or sexuality? Or does RT merely work to reinforce existing stereotypes because they are a quick way of presenting characters in the constructed world of performance? What do we find when we apply these questions to two recent and extremely popular reality programmes, Big Brother and Popstars? Moreover, how was it possible both to revile them and enjoy watching them at the same time?
Big Brother and the pseudo world
With a nod to Orwell’s 1984, the reality TV show Big Brother became a much talked about phenomenon. Part fly on the wall docu-soap, part quiz show, part talent contest, part psychological investigative study, the show even had an interactive element where the viewing audience could ring in and vote to evict. Starting with ten contestants, every week one of the participants was evicted from the show. The reward for appearing was instant celebrity and, for the final survivor, seventy thousand pounds. Broadcast several times a week, the show became a hit for the production company and Channel Four.
The contestants were enclosed in an artificial space, a pseudo house, that they were not permitted to leave. Whether through judicious editing, and/or through the selection of particular participants, issues of great weight or controversy were on the whole never raised. There was one notable occasion when a contestant took George Michael to be a paedophile because he was homosexual and this turned into a heated discussion, but generally opinions vanished, the outside world and history were reduced to personal anecdotes.
While we can look at Big Brother as a show where the contestants appear to explore nothing of any great significance, this doesn’t mean that Big Brother as a programme is not significant. A comparison to the soap opera form is useful here. Soap operas are often derided and seen as trivial, and were once considered unworthy of serious attention in academia; yet soaps have come to be seen as important in terms of exploring issues that women have been deemed to have some authority over, i.e. the home, the family, and emotional problem solving. Big Brother operated on soap opera principles; it emphasised the relationships between people; it was a drama that unfolded in a domestic space; it was ongoing and it provided a multitude of story lines.
It could be claimed that Big Brother is part of a female genre, and, if not deliberately targeted at women, is performing some of the work that soap operas have been seen to do. While male genres have been seen as action, man conquering the big wide world (the Western), women’s genres have been seen as domestic and interior (the melodrama/the soap). Of course these genres initially arose in order to locate men in relation to the world, and to keep women inside in an attempt to disempower them, but research and analysis of female spectators show that women can feel an enormous sense of pleasure by seeing even limited representations of themselves. One of the noted pleasures gained from soap opera has been seen as the shared experience with other women of the plots and the characters; the discussions female spectators have around soap operas tie into gossip, an activity largely gendered female and enjoyed by women.
Big Brother was, on the whole, tedious, in the sense that nothing much happened, but, if my own and my friends viewing of it, the TV ratings and press reactions were anything to go by, it was compulsive viewing. It entered the realm of gossip and became much discussed. Everybody had an opinion. If I was meeting somebody for the first time, in that sometimes awkward moment when silence falls, I would mention Big Brother and would be guaranteed a smooth and easy conversation that could last for hours (even if they had never watched it). The show became shared experience, and in becoming gossip, Big Brother became feminised, in the sense that gossip is attributed to the female realm. A description on the internet of an episode of Big Brother, reported that the ‘girls shared late night girlie chats’, reinforcing the relationship of women to gossip, to a world men consider themselves outside of, if not excluded from, and may ultimately have worked to trivialise and demonise because of their exclusion.
In taking the audience inside the house, into domestic space, into the world of gossip, you could argue that Big Brother actually feminised its audience, but it also could be argued that the show was constructed with masculine intent. Big Brother was premised on voyeurism, on our pleasure in watching the contestants without them seeing us. The cinema has been theorised as voyeuristic and as reproducing a male gaze, and Big Brother seemed to work to consolidate and reinforce the male gaze, as all seeing, as insidious and, above all, as controlling. After all, even with that post-modern ironic wink, the show was still called Big Brother, and there has to be a recognition that the name in itself is not just a reference to Orwell, but also that it reinforces and underlines the power of patriarchy.
The idea of a constant access to the surveillance of the Big Brother household on the internet offered the spectator a degree of power over what was seen, keying in again to notions of voyeurism and to the male gaze. Big Brother was streamed on the web 24 hours a day, offering open-ended access. The show was predominantly consumed through the television, with complaints that the internet version was too small, blurred and on the whole difficult to view. New technology and new media have been characterised as male, as boffin, as nerd, as lads in anoraks, and it is probable that the average logger on of the internet site was male. If women did log on, it could be argued that the act of looking at the site tied into the male/active theories around cinema. Laura Mulvey argued that we had to adjust our position to that of the male spectator in order to identify with the representations we were given, so perhaps the act of logging on to survey an occupied house means that we have to shift identification to that of the voyeuristic male.
The spectators of television now have a chance to appear on it, but they are still chosen by TV professionals and they are being selected not only on their ability to bring along a realistic model of the everyday world, but also on their ability to play the TV game. Every week the contestants on Big Brother sang a song they had penned themselves ‘it’s only a game show, it’s only a game show’, and here was their group acknowledgment of what their lives had been reduced to as 24 hour quiz show contestants. It highlights how all participants on reality TV shows or docu-soaps are required to ‘fit into’ the programme. It is a prerequisite that they conform within the programme to the needs of the programme makers. They are featured, and are encouraged to want be included, but only within the boundaries of the programme. So called ordinary people, those that have greater claim to the real world, can appear on TV nowadays, but only within the confines of what is on offer in the first place. It is perhaps more credible if we look at the contestants and participants of RT as social actors, who auditioned for the show, and were selected on the basis of what they could offer and how they would fit in.
The five female and five male contestants on Big Brother arrived through a rigorous audition process, competing with thousands of other wannabes to appear. While the diversity in the house didn’t stretch to age or size, we had a black woman (Mel), a black man (Darren), a lesbian (Anna) and a cross section across class. Definable characters emerged that we could follow, just like the characters from soap operas. Even a cursory look at Big Brother showed us that the programmes were heavily edited in order to achieve a semblance of drama and conflict. It is obvious that the hours and hours of footage that were generated from constant surveillance by many cameras all over the house had to emerge into palatable chunks, with a narrative structure, that could find their place in the television schedules. In observing the rules of narrative and character development it seemed that stereotypes relating to class, gender, race and sexuality inevitably arose.
Anna, who survived ten weeks to become the runner up, revealed at the start of the show that she was a lesbian, and also an ex-novice nun. Her sexuality was discussed by the group, and later by the male contestants, who thought it was unfortunate that Anna wasn’t ‘available’ to them as she was quite fanciable. The group saw her sexuality as an area of intrigue but nobody appeared to view her sexuality as threatening. Two of the women voiced their positions as bi-curious, but were still very much interested in men.
Craig, the ultimate winner of Big Brother asked Anna what it was like to share a bedroom with four other women, and did she fancy any of them? Anna didn’t reply. Anna had a long term relationship so was unlikely to show an interest in any of the female contestants while her girlfriend was watching. (It is interesting that the programme makers selected her knowing that she was with a partner in the outside world and therefore was unlikely to become involved with anyone on the show.) Anna’s sexuality and character was largely shown as non-predatory and docile. While sexual tension appeared to brew in the house between the male and female contestants, Anna was seen as doubly non-threatening because she was not going to compete with the other women for male attention. Exclusion of male homosexuality seemed a very deliberate omission on the show, as though the presence of a gay man would have been a threat to the other male contestants, who were frequently underlining their heterosexual status.
When contestant ‘Nasty’ Nick was ousted midway through the series for breaking the rules of the game, Claire was brought in from the outside world as his replacement. As Claire arrived in the house, we saw a shot of Mel’s reaction, which was widely interpreted by viewers and in the press as a look of jealousy. After her part in the show was over, Mel talked of how what she really felt at that moment was not sexual jealousy, but paranoia, because Claire had watched them all on TV. This ‘look of jealousy’ is indicative of how Mel was constructed as a sexual predator. She was seen as overtly sexual and flirtatious. She appeared to bond with the male contestants but was wary and competitive with the female contestants. Overall, Mel was continually being presented as devious and manipulative when it came to men. There is a strong racist stereotype at work here. It seems that just as in the case of Mel B from the Spice Girls, who was dubbed Scary Spice, Big Brother Mel, who is also mixed race, was presented as embodying a threatening ‘otherness’.
It is interesting to note that in all the countries where a version of Big Brother has taken place, the final winner has always been a white heterosexual male. The winner in the UK, Craig, was presented as an uncomplicated and straightforward working class builder.
Why hasn’t a woman won? Anna almost won, probably because she came across as such an unthreatening presence. All the rest of the women on Big Brother were represented as problematic. Nicola, who wore a skimpy bikini almost always, was seen as argumentative and volatile (by the male contestants). Sada, author of a book entitled The Babe’s Bible was presented as duplicitous, one moment giving a lecture on how she would never kill a fly, the next moment shown swatting an insect between her palms with glee. She was the only woman in the house to have a boyfriend, so was therefore perceived as unavailable by the lad contestants (who spent time speculating about which woman they fancied most). Sada was the first to person to be evicted from the house. Caroline was also deemed argumentative and a troublemaker (by the male contestants), while Mel was seen as flirtatious and manipulative (by the audience and female contestants).
Before Craig won Big Brother, it was leaked to the press that he was going to donate the prize money to a family friend, a young woman with Downs Syndrome who needed a heart operation. As he left the Big Brother house to fireworks and waiting crowds, the young woman was waiting for Craig. He announced to the world, in heroic form, that he was donating all the money he’d made toward her operation. While undoubtedly a charitable act, it had the air of male saviour and hero about it. This was further compounded when Craig continued his walk through crowds, flexing his muscles to waiting photographers. It seemed that unreconstituted masculinity had won the day.
Popstars
In the 1970s we had TV talent shows such as Opportunity Knocks and New Faces. Opportunity Knocks launched the child star Lena Zavaroni, whose rise to fame, subsequent battle with eating disorders, and early tragic death have been well documented. Her eating disorders appear to have been tightly woven into her rise to celebrity. In the recent reality TV series Popstars, the formation of a pop band through mass auditions, a young woman who clearly had a very powerful singing voice and impressive dancing style remarked that she would never make it to the final round because she wasn’t thin. She was right.
Building on the new desire for celebrity, confession and the real, Popstars can be seen as the ultimate in reality programming. The premise of the shows was that five finalists would be launched into celebrity status, would be given a recording career and would be awarded one hundred thousand pounds each if their first single reached number one. The TV series followed the competing contestants’ heartaches and struggles; we were privy to their intimate confessions. Finally when we were down to the last ten contestants, we were taken into their homes and introduced to their families. We seemed to be offered everything that lay behind the scenes.
The narrative tension on Popstars was enormous. Just like Big Brother, everyone was brought together in competition and aspiration. Just like Big Brother, the only subject of conversation within the show became the show itself, while wider issues from the outside world vanished, and the audience was presented with reality, television style.
In Popstars we witness the making of a future celebrity, Suzanne. She doubts she will ever make it to the final band, though she finally does. Along the way she exhibits signs of self-loathing. She compares herself with the other women competing, finds herself not as thin or as pretty. When so much meaning is placed upon the way women look, and thinness is equated with some kind of success it isn’t surprising that she focused on her body, her appearance. Yet at the same time, the show’s emphasis on Suzanne’s insecurities seemed to be reinforcing a representation of women, yet again, as neurotic and narcissistic, reinforcing and encouraging a notion of women pitched together not in solidarity but in competition.
After Kym is selected for the final band, we learn that she had hidden from the programme makers that she is the mother of two young children. She defends her omission to Nigel the judge, saying that it would have prevented her selection. We learn from Kym that it has always held her back in the past and often been the reason she has not landed a job. Nigel chastises her; he talks of his disappointment in her and assures her that her maternal status would in no way have prevented her from being picked. The words ring hollow; just as one woman was not selected because she wasn’t thin, it is clear that Kym played the game to her advantage by holding back that piece of information. Kym’s status as a single mother would surely have raised a number of issues for the judges. They would have discussed the criticism the programme might receive in terms of absenting a mother from her children. They would have discussed her desirability and availability to fans if they were to find out she had two children. They would have talked about the ramifications of a single mother being a role model for young fans. Of course her commitment to the band and her ability to stick it out would also have been questioned, and this plays out in Kym’s ranking at the betting shops as odds-on favourite to be the first member to leave.
Kym’s decision to withhold information about herself reinforces the notion that people seeking celebrity status and the material rewards that accompany it will do all they can to fit in. Before they are even at the point of arrival, of having ‘made it’, they are already performing their role. The female wannabes are already conforming to a stereotypical image of women: they reveal flesh, they wear high heels, they are thin (weaker and taking up less room), all for the sake of appearing sexually available to men.
The celebrity body
Big Brother and Popstars have captured the spirit of a confessional age, at a time in Western culture where celebrity status and Warhol’s fifteen minutes of fame are at an all time high, where stardom and celebrity seem to be some kind of validation of existence. Last week in a restaurant, I caught a glimpse of Baby Spice, aka Emma Bunton. I noticed she was scanning the room to catch the discreet glances, to make sure that everyone in the restaurant recognised her. I was reminded of another celebrity-spotting some months before. I was going into a clothes shop when the woman in front of me tripped and turned around in embarrassment. It was Mel from Big Brother. I kept her in my sightline while I circled the shop. She was looking to see who was looking at her. Her new found celebrity status depended on people knowing who she was. She had performed her television role, and here she was seeking her reward: recognition. Mel, famous for being on a reality TV show, famous for being famous.
Both these women were so self-aware and self-conscious in their celebrity status, it seemed to me that it’s just a logical extension of what it is to be a woman, constantly objectified and constantly surrounded by unobtainable images of who we are supposed to be.
The contestants on Big Brother and Popstars are freely participating in the shows, but it is not without manipulation from a variety of sources. They are constructed and marketed, and at the end of the day they are equated with profit and reward for those that manufacture them. The contestants are so desperate to be celebrities and to participate in the star industry that they will do almost anything, and the female participants do appear to be more vulnerable. Because women are constantly objectified, because women are constantly seen in relation to men in terms of their desirability and fulfilment of a male fantasy, women seem to encounter greater struggles when they enter the star system. We only have to look at the myriad female stars that are becoming thinner and thinner, their earning power growing in inverse proportion to their diminishing bodies. I worry about eighteen year old Suzanne from Popstars; will she get too thin? I worry about the contestant from Big Brother described in a recent article (written by a man) as ‘opening her legs, showing all, desperate to cling onto any celebrity status she’d got left’.
Reality television claims to be a testimony to our ‘real’ lives, and the way we want to live our lives, but reality shows are not really democratic at all and they seem all too easily to reproduce dominant stereotypes. Despite this, there are pleasures to be found. As women, we have a history of interacting with TV programmes and film genres that may not have our interests at heart, celebrating the images presented, from the film noir femme fatale to the prisoners in Cell Block H. Illustrating this, Anna from Big Brother may not have had much of a voice within the show, but she became, arguably, a lesbian icon. The London lesbian hang out, Candy Bar, displayed the ‘vote to keep Anna in Big Brother‘ phone number and built a night around her final appearance in the show. It seems that, lacking a range of complexity in popular representations, we are prepared to make the most of what we get.
Reference
Laura Mulvey ‘Visual pleasure and narrative cinema’ Screen vol.16, no. 3 (1975) pp.6-19.