Sarika 1 Wiriya Sarika COMM 4390 Dr.

Babbili April 9th, 2013 The Success of American Reality Television Programs Television has been a significant part of the American culture for a long time. According to Nielsens data in 2011, 290 million Americans own at least one television in their homes (Fox, 2012). Additionally, Americans over the age of two spends more than 34 hours a week on average watching live TV, and another three to six hours of taped programs (Hinckley, 2012). There is a vast variety of TV programs, especially on Americans television where there is a great mix of culture within. This paper will be an analysis of how American reality television programs gained their significant success, and how it will influence the future of the television media. By 1970, most of the larger and mid-sized nations import their over half of their programming contents from the United States, while 30 percent of those came directly from Hollywood (Tunstall, 2008). It is clear that the United States had been the leading nations of creating and exporting media contents, while it was also strikingly successful within the United States itself. MTV, for example, was a successful media producer both in the United States and overseas. American household basic cables typically offer up to 30 to 40 channels, including local network channels. The cost is relatively affordable to most Americans, ranging from $10 to $25 per month (Torabi, 2009). Different types of programs scattered throughout different channels, such as reality shows, drama, situational comedy, and fictions. Most of these shows are set in somewhat real-life settings to make them more plausible and relatable to the viewers.

Sarika 2 Reality TV had become very popular among Americans in the past decade. Reality TV, a television programming in which there are no writers, actors or scripts. Instead, the shows focus on "real" events or situations (Perritano, 2011). Though recently captured media attention, reality-based TV programs had been around since the 1970s. According to the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS), the first broadcast of An American Family, which is a 12-hour documentary series of a day-to-day life of the Loud family, created the reality TV genre (PBS, 2002). Many American reality shows nowadays still focus around the same principle, though they usually involve casts that have no recognizable acting or performing talents. For example, Jersey Shore centrals around a group of Italian-Americans young adults who drink and party everyday and cause fights or do something overly dramatic. Despite how tedious the show sounds, it was MTVs most watched series telecast ever and the casts earned millions of dollars and fame. Jersey Shores season three premieres drew in over 8.45 million viewers (Gorman, 2011). Nicole Snooki Polizzi, one of the casts of the Jersey Shore, currently has over 6 million twitter followers and was paid $32,000 to give a speech at Rutgers University in 2011 (Ali, 2011). The top-three casts reportedly make $150,000 per episode in season six, which resulted to almost $2 million for the entire season (Tereszcuk, 2012). Another reality show worth mentioning is Keeping Up with the Kardashians, a show about the Kardashian family whose are famous for over-the top behavior, drama, and one of the sisters Kim Kardashian. The show had been on the famous E! Network for over 7 years, getting regular showtimes on a Sunday evening and additional re-run marathon during the week. The 7th season premiere of Keeping Up with the Kardashian delivered close to 3 million viewers (Kondolojy, 2012). The Kardashians became more than just TV personalities; they expand their businesses to cosmetics, clothing and accessories, books, and many more. The Kardashians

Sarika 3 reportedly has a net worth of $65 million income in 2010, from entrepreneurship such as selling their photos to magazines, endorsing tweets, and the television shows itself (Zakarin, 2011). To analyze the success of these reality shows, we need to uncover the aspect of why do people watch these shows. Is it because viewers can relate to these people, or mainly just because it is pure entertainment? According to Steven Reiss, the psychologist of Ohio State University, some people watch reality TV because it makes them feel superior, while some watch because they want to see other people humiliated (Perritano, 2011). The fact that people portrayed on the shows seem to just be doing day-to-day activities, reality TV creates a false sense of realism that has never been brought to television before these types of show existed. On the irony, the more dramatic or unrealistic their lives seem to be, the more famous the shows become. Viewer spends hours and hours watching the lives of the casts; they develop the sense of belonging as if they are a part of the portrayed life. Additionally, regular TV shows (non-reality) are tailored and edited in a storytelling format, while reality TV basically shows everything in a perspective as if the viewers are there. On the other hand, a great number of people despise this type of reality shows and for them; these shows are the lowest form of entertainment and an insult to our collective intelligence (Perritano, 2011). Interestingly, some of these people cannot avoid coming across reality TV and some ended up watching and criticizing at the same time. I am one of the people who at first, thought that reality TV is nonsense, and cannot make of why people are so into it. However, I watch these shows quite often and while I still think they are nonsense, I actually enjoy them. This effect happens to a lot of people who watches reality TV. They think that it is just a show, and basically acts as their guilty-pleasure instrument. Once people start watching reality TV, they start talking, and the show becomes more and more popular. Since the U.S.

Sarika 4 exports a great deal of its media to other countries aforementioned, U.S. reality TV programs became well-known in other parts of the world as well. Reality TV tends to have a strong fan base, with a somewhat love-hate relationship from its viewers, though create more fame to the show no matter how it was perceived as. It is possible for a reality show to fail, and they are those ones that have nothing interesting or unrealistic events happening throughout the story. It is, however, one way of story-telling and not very much reality. While viewers enjoy relating with the casts, they actually enjoy seeing these people do things they do not get to do in the real, mundane lives. There are a huge number of reality TV being broadcasted nowadays, ranging from competitions like The Bachelors, or something like The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills. Some of the reality TV made me wonder why it was created and who on earth would watch them. I could not really argue as I enjoy watching them once in a while just to laugh at them and criticize the shows with my friends and colleagues. Reality TV had become a way of getting instantaneous fame and tabloid attention. It has become a popular culture material that people discusses in everyday lives, and some would rather go home and sit in front of a TV to watch other people live their lives. The success of reality TV is undeniably explosive and had become part of the American culture, it does not seem to be going away any time soon. When real people are involved, viewers will watch with the same addictive appetite as those who are hooked on soap operas, said an article on the TV Writers Vault. As long as we continue to be fascinated with the human condition, and have an appetite for entertainment, there will always be some evolving format of a reality show (TV Writers Vault).

Sarika 5 Works Cited Ali, Aman. "Rutgers University Defends Snooki's $32,000 Appearance." Reuters. Thomson Reuters, 01 Apr. 2011. Web. 05 Apr. 2013. Fox, Zoe. "Even in 2012, More Americans Own TVs Than Cellphones." Mashable. N.p., 6 Jan. 2012. Web. 05 Apr. 2013. "The Future of "Reality" TV." TV Writers Vault. N.p., n.d. Web. 05 Apr. 2013. Gorman, Bill. "'Jersey Shore' Season Premiere Draws Record 8.45 Million Viewers; 4.2 Adults 18-49 Rating." TV by the Numbers. N.p., 7 Jan. 2011. Web. 06 Apr. 2013. Hinckley, David. "Americans Spend 34 Hours a Week Watching TV, according to Nielsen Numbers." NY Daily News. N.p., 19 Sept. 2012. Web. 05 Apr. 2013. Kondolojy, Amanda. "E!'S 'Keeping Up With The Kardashians' Season Premiere Delivers Nearly 3 Million Total Viewers, Besting Previous Season Premiere By 16%." TV by the Numbers. N.p., 21 May 2012. Web. 06 Apr. 2013. "Lance Loud: A Death in an American Family." PBS. Corporation for Public Broadcasting and Public Broadcasting Service, 2002. Web. 04 Apr. 2013. Perritano, John. "What Is Reality TV's Influence on Culture?" HowStuffWorks. N.p., 11 Mar. 2011. Web. 05 Apr. 2013. Tereszcuk, Alexis. "All That Partying Pays! You Wont Believe What The Jersey Shore Cast Earns." Radar Online. N.p., 12 June 2012. Web. 05 Apr. 2013. Tunstall, Jeremy. The Media Were American: U.S. Mass Media in Decline. New York: Oxford UP, 2008. Print. Zakarin, Jordan. "The Kardashians' $65 Million 2010 Income: How'd They Do It?" The Huffington Post. N.p., 17 Feb. 2011. Web. 06 Apr. 2013.