A Companion to Reality Television

Laurie Ouellette

• Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781118599747
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Media & Performing Arts
• Subtopic: Television History & Criticism

International in scope and more comprehensive than existing collections, A Companion to Reality Television presents a complete guide to the study of reality, factual and nonfiction television entertainment, encompassing a wide range of formats and incorporating cutting-edge work in critical, social and political theory.

• Original in bringing cutting-edge work in critical, social and political theory into the conversation about reality TV
• Consolidates the latest, broadest range of scholarship on the politics of reality television and its vexed relationship to culture, society, identity, democracy, and "ordinary people" in the media
• Includes primetime reality entertainment as well as precursors such as daytime talk shows in the scope of discussion
• Contributions from a list of international, leading scholars in this field

Part One

Producing Reality

Industry, Labor, and Marketing

1

Mapping Commercialization in Reality Television

June Deery

It hardly seems necessary to point out that commercial media are commercially driven, but reality television provides particularly strong examples of contemporary forms of commercialization: commercialization referring to the process of turning something into a commodity in order to generate a profit and, attitudinally, to a prioritization of this process. The reality producer's often aggressive strategies make conspicuous the fact that most media are, at base, cultural devices for selling things and that, though multiple agents as well as agendas are involved, it is the commercial nature of their activities that is the most inescapable aspect of what they do.¹ Not surprisingly, both the production and content of reality television reflect broad socioeconomic trends related to accelerated commercialization: most notably, neoliberal privatization (the prioritization of profit over public service goals); personal-image management (the need for individuals to market themselves as brands); nonunionized outsourcing and other budget-cutting strategies; and an interlocking expansion in the areas of celebrity production, public relations, and various forms of oblique or indirect advertising. The purpose of this overview is to examine as many as possible of the commercial strategies found in reality programming, some of which I and others cover in more detail elsewhere (Deery, 2012).² Commercialization is also itself a topic in several reality formats (e.g., those involving businesses and trade) and, indeed, one of reality television's strongest claims to realism may actually be its acknowledgment that, today, commercialization is a growing presence in an increasingly branded and mediated life, to the point where it is becoming difficult to distinguish the commercial from the noncommercial or to conceive of meaningful experiences that don't have elements of both.

This chapter will at times generalize about all of reality television and at other times pinpoint features of specific formats. In both cases, I am interested in the commercialization of content and of the viewing experience, whether it be a revival of techniques, as in product placement, or the emergence of something new, as in dynamic relations between viewers and television texts. For any media scholar, reality programming is worth monitoring because it has in many instances spearheaded advertainment (the merging of advertising and entertainment programming) in a convergent, postadvertising era and therefore provides a useful vantage point from which to gauge television's present and future role in a new media economy (Deery, 2004a). Reality television can be seen as emblematic of a wider cultural conflation of commercial and noncommercial agendas in an era of viral marketing, brand pushing,³ astroturfing, and numerous other forms of advertising disguised as something else. A fairly predictable effect of emphatic and endemic commercialization is a dampening of the overtly political and investigative approaches of the documentary. As Graeme Turner has underlined, reality television, like other media forms, must be understood as single-mindedly commercial and as ideologically casual, meaning that the primary aim of its producers is not to make an ideological point but to generate popular and profitable programming (2010, p. 63). Indeed, it can be argued that the one (being casually ideological) follows from the other (commercial pressure). The ideological import is there – perhaps inevitably, even when not intentional – and it ought to be identified. But the commercial foundation precedes everything else. For example, while there is much talk of amateur participation in contemporary media, corporate participation needs our attention too. On reality television (as in national politics), ordinary participation is showcased and capitalized upon, but circumscribed. Employing nonprofessional actors is a commercial rather than a deliberately political strategy, the aim being to attract viewers and cut production costs, not give voice to the powerless. Of course, not all media production is strictly for profit, yet a global trend in the past few decades has been a weakening of noncommercial, public service systems and pressure on those that remain to imitate many of the practices of commercial competitors in order to attract viewers and justify the expenditure of public funds in a deregulated and often transnational market. Heightened television commercialization is therefore also a result of national policies of deregulation and privatization.

Paid Programming: The Branding of Broadcast Content

Media producers have always assumed that the audience's attitude to advertising is, at best, one of tolerance and, when possible, avoidance. So, rather than relying only on the interruptive commercial break, reality programming has experimented with more integrative models in which advertising becomes vital and necessary, enabling on-screen experiences rather than distracting from them. One major form of commercial integration is product placement, the practice of embedding brands or products in media content for a fee or in some form of barter, as when producers defray costs by receiving free props or services. Examples of television placement can be found as early as the 1940s (and before that in film since the 1920s), but it was not a significant practice until the end of the 1990s; it then more than doubled at the beginning of the twenty-first century (Thussu, 2007, p. 55).⁴ In recent years, placement has really taken off, appearing not only in an increasing number of programs but also more frequently within those programs (Magder, 2009), and most especially in reality programs: for example, in 2011, nine of the 10 prime-time shows with the most product placements in America were reality television formats (in descending order, American Idol, The Biggest Loser, Celebrity Apprentice, Dancing with the Stars, The X Factor, Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, America's Got Talent, America's Next Top Model, and The Amazing Race) (Nielsen 2011). Product placement suits the current technological environment because it counters the evasive viewer actions of channel hopping or watching DVR recordings, and it bypasses the increased clutter within traditional commercial breaks, producing a better recall rate than television commercials (Jacobson and Mazur, 1995, p. 69). Hence, placements are now tracked by Nielsen and by companies such as iTVX, which attempt to measure the effectiveness of brand integration.

The density of product placement on reality television may be attributed to a variety of factors. For one thing, the lack of detailed scripting means that products can be inserted with little need for motivation or advance notice. Reality television's peculiar status as a staged actuality combining the planned and the spontaneous offers considerable flexibility, as do the attitudes of participants and producers. In many instances, placements are welcomed as positive additions rather than being merely tolerated; for example, products can appear as prizes (gamedocs), rewards (talent competitions), romantic gifts (dating/mating shows), or aid (makeovers). Products can also create a dramatic affect when participants are otherwise commodity-starved, as in the Spartan environment of Survivor (Deery, 2004a). Indeed, some featured placements rise to the status of essential element since without their presence there would simply be no show (e.g., some makeovers). In other instances, the location can constitute a product placement, as when Top Chef producers command fees of several hundred thousand dollars to locate the next season in a particular city or state. Makeovers are a particularly fertile ground for placements since their constructive contexts offer advertisers an integral and positive role and the programs' dramatic arc imitates the “Before-and-After” binary of much advertising. Other placements borrow the aura of an intense or ritualistic event, such as a wedding. Or programs may borrow the aura of a professional celebrity, which is essentially the use of one media product (the star) to boost another (the television show), and vice versa. While reality television does not usually hire professional performers, these can appear as “mentors” (in talent shows) or volunteers (in home makeovers) and be compensated with positive publicity.

Competition formats allow some placements to become a central thematic element, as in the products or services that contestants are charged to use or promote. For example, on Top Chef, contestants are required to use a placed product in the concoction of their next meal; those vying to be “The Apprentice” are asked to come up with a marketing campaign (sometimes subsequently adopted by the sponsoring company) to promote another placed product or service; and Tyra Banks's protégés typically compete to pitch a beauty product in a television commercial (America's Next Top Model). These “performative placements” elevate a product's status from object to event, making its integration more critical and therefore more memorable (the ultimate goal). Some products may even become a character of sorts, either during the regular program or in designer advertisements created for interstitial commercial breaks (e.g., Ford cars on American Idol spots). Corporations appreciate having their products appear in a program with which viewers have a relationship rather than in an interruptive commercial break. An hour-long episode provides enough time for the empathetic identification that shorter advertising forms simply cannot manage. Indeed, some makeover formats resemble the longer form of the infomercial (Deery, 2004a, 2012; Palmer, 2011), employing the same formula of identification of the problem, offer of a solution, and empirical proof of the desired transformation. As in infomercials, the results are guaranteed for real or ordinary people who resemble those on camera who testify to the product's worth.

When polled, some viewers report that spotting placed products on reality television is just part of “the game” and that they have a higher tolerance for placement here than in other television genres (Hill, 2005; Jenkins, 2006, p. 88); this may in part be because they have lower expectations about the integrity and craft of these kinds of productions. It may be that reality producers are less inclined to wring their hands over art versus commerce than, say, serious film directors; indeed, identifying product placement opportunities can be a selling point in a show's pitch (Caudle, 2011, pp. 195–204). However, other media professionals are more concerned about the shaping of events to suit advertisers' needs; for example, in 2005 the Writers Guild of America (West) launched a “Product Invasion” campaign to protest this manipulation of content in all programming. One problem specific to reality television is a potential conflict between the genre's selling point (being real or authentic) and its promotion of other brands. For example, on style makeovers, viewers cannot be certain whether presenters really do like featured products and have to wonder whether they are cultural or corporate intermediaries. Paid-for recommendations can potentially, or maybe even necessarily, weaken the whole premise of a show and therefore its ability to attract audiences for advertising of any kind; in other words, commercial forces may be in danger of undermining themselves. In many European countries there are regulations or outrights bans, though these have become more relaxed since 2010. In 2006, the European Union decided that its member states could authorize product placement but with genre restrictions: placements could not appear in news, current affairs, or children's programming (Thussu, 2007, p. 40). Each country is also able to add its own restrictions: hence, in France, placement is allowed on fictional but not on reality programming and fines have been imposed for unlawful placement (Dauncey, 2010, p. 314). In Britain, product placement was banned outright (2008–2011) and then reinstated with significant restrictions: unhealthy products are still banned, placements must be editorially justified and not unduly prominent, and when placements do occur the broadcaster must display the letter “P” for three seconds at the start and end of the program.

“Made possible by”

One of the earliest models for monetizing television programming was sponsorship, a technique television inherited from early radio. The practice diminished after the quiz show scandals of the 1950s and in subsequent decades became mostly a backdoor strategy for companies banned from direct advertising on television (e.g., tobacco), which could sponsor, for example, a broadcast sports event and in this way get their brand on air. Today, there has been a revival of sponsorship in certain types of reality television, not for reasons of legal regulation but because of changing technology and viewer agency, most notably the viewer's ability to zap through advertisements when viewing a DVR recording. As in the past, sponsors usually pay up front to help finance a show and have varying degrees of influence, sometimes shaping content from the show's inception (e.g., The Restaurant) or even producing it themselves from scratch (Ford's Escape Routes). Examples of deep and long-term sponsorship include Coke and Ford on American Idol and Sears and Ford on Extreme Makeover: Home Edition. Naturally enough, sponsors intend their association with a show to strengthen their own brand and so Sears's sponsorship of home makeovers makes sense since the company has for generations been selling people the means to build, repair, and furnish homes. Similarly, Coke, as always, seeks a youthful demographic. Detailed figures are not disclosed to viewers, but the sponsors' financial support is overt because they want their magnanimity to be recognized. Today's packages usually involve special announcements before or during shows, regular spots in commercial breaks (some being designer advertisements that link to a particular series), and product placement. Some companies pay for naming rights in order to become part of the mise-en-scène, as in “the Kenmore Pro kitchen” (Top Chef) or the “L'Oréal Paris Makeup Room” (Project Runway). Because reality formats often have distinct segments, they can also attract partial sponsorships: for example, contestants might use the sponsor's product during a particular challenge (e.g., Bertolli oil on Top Chef) and then win an associated prize (trip to Italy). Products can be designated as “official brands” (Top Chef) or even official “partners” (Top Chef: Just Desserts). Broadcasters can also sell packages of advertising across diverse media in what Michael Curtin terms a “matrix-media” strategy (2009, p. 15), and so sponsorship can be extended onto an associated web site or part thereof (e.g., the Top Chef site at Bravotv.com).

Contemporary makeover formats have made a distinct contribution to monetizing television by elevating sponsorship into donorship, a practice that may enhance the status of commercial support in general (see also Ouellette and Hay, 2008 on Charity TV). The difference between a donor and a sponsor is not entirely straightforward (donors may or may not also be sponsors), but, while sponsors offset production costs, donors offer goods to individuals on screen that are kept by these recipients rather than functioning as background props. While not unprecedented (e.g., Queen for a Day, Strike it Rich), soliciting donations has not been a common practice on popular television programming and is still comparatively rare. One prominent example, Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, relied on pre-established capital networks but asked businesses to perform aberrantly within a middle realm of ambiguous discourse that is neither strictly commercial nor noncommercial. By amalgamating gift and market economies, a donation can produce appropriately targeted product placement (items people really need) as well as generate good publicity for the donor. Both of these can be expected to lower audience resistance to the advertising involved and it may appear almost a matter of politeness for viewers to give the don...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title page
• Copyright page
• Notes on Contributors
• Introduction
• Part One: Producing Reality: Industry, Labor, and Marketing
• Part Two: Television Realities: History, Genre, and Realism
• Part Three: Dilemmas of Visibility: Identity and Difference
• Part Four: Empowerment or Exploitation? Ordinary People and Reality Television
• Part Five: Subjects of Reality: Making/Selling Selves and Lifestyles
• Part Six: Affective Registers: Reality, Sentimentality, and Feeling
• Part Seven: The Politics of Reality: Global Culture, National Identity, and Public Life
• Index