By now we are all in on the secret that so-called reality television isn’t real. Everything about the shows is manipulated to keep the viewer hooked. The Washington Post was one of many media outlets that blew the whistle on this years ago.
In the story “Reality Is Only An Illusion,” reporter William Booth dared to peer behind the curtain and reveal practices such as “frankenbites” where clever editors patch together several clips from “contestants” to make them sound better and practices such as feeding jokes to the judges and even placing lines with contestants. Now web sites and chat rooms delight in seeing if they can find the “unreal” moments in various shows.
Daniel Petrie Jr., president of the Writers Guild of America-West, which represents 9,000 scribes working in Hollywood film and television, commented:
We look at reality TV, which is billed as unscripted, and we know it is scripted. We understand that shows don’t want to call the writers writers because they want to maintain the illusion that it is reality, that stuff just happens.
The Reality of Reality TV
Wonder what life is really like for people in the reality TV business? In 2007 the Writers Guild of America commissioned “Harsh Reality” a study of the working conditions of writers in reality TV. The report makes the business sound like some third-world sweatshop:
Working Hours
• 91% of reality TV writers receive no overtime pay.
•88% of reality TV writers work more than 40 hours a week.
•On average, reality TV writers on a broadcast network (ABC, CBS, CW, FOX, NBC) show work 60 hours per week.
• Reality TV writers on a cable show work an average of 55 hours per week.
Benefits
• 86% of reality writers were not offered health insurance by their employer.
• 18% of respondents currently have no health insurance.
• Very few reality writers are offered any retirement benefits. Only 5% were offered a 401(k) and only 1% were offered a pension.
Meal Breaks
• 73% of respondents work through their meal break at least once a week.
• Only 43% of reality writers always receive a meal break of at least 30 minutes.
The report notes that reality program production now accounts for 46% of all Los Angeles Area television production and nine of the top 15 network shows at that time were reality programs.
In a system where there are no rules, writers are routinely robed of their overtime pay. The report notes:
Based on an average weekly rate of $2,000, writers are losing $1,200 per week in overtime pay. If the average writer works 32 weeks per year, he or she loses $38,400 in overtime pay, annually.
In January of this year the WGA won a $4 million settlement against several TV networks for violations of California labor laws. Emma Leheny, a lawyer for the plaintiffs, said:
We really found pervasive violations. It seems to be a system based on the underpayment of workers in an industry where employers are looking to save money and speed up production, create very profitable shows, and the people who are shortchanged are these employees.
Union Wars
For several years, a behind the scenes a war has taken place between rival unions over reality television. The American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (AFTRA) has taken a hands-off position. Joan Weise, AFTRA’s national director of entertainment programming stated:
We get calls from people wanting to know if (reality shows) are union. We do not consider what they are doing to be performing.
Meanwhile the Screen Actors Guild and Writers Guild have been trying to organize reality show workers. The feud became more public when actor George Clooney released a letter asking for both AFTRA and SAG to work together:
I’ve been very lucky in my career, which has put me in the place that I don’t need a union to check on my residuals, or my pension, or protect my 12-hour turnaround. I used to need that, and may again … but right now I don’t. That means it’s my responsibility to look out for actors who are trying to stay afloat from year to year. Anything less is irresponsible of me.
One of the issues at the heart of that dispute is reality television.
The Union Busting of Reality
I’ll bet you didn’t know that by watching reality television you were aiding and abetting union-busting, but that is what it amounts to. By not hiring regular actors and actresses they are putting a real dent in the income of those who are trying to make a living in Hollywood. One online commenter knows the score:
One of the reasons for the enormous number of reality shows on the air is that they’re cheap to make. And one of the reasons they’re cheap is because by pretending they’re unscripted, they don’t have to pay the writers the union wages demanded by the Writer’s Guild. So, by lying, reality show producers get to do some union-busting and fatten their profits. I wonder how many Joe Sixpacks realize they’re crossing a (virtual) picket-line when they turn on their favorite shows.
Hope I didn’t lay the guilt on too thick…
Back in 2005 the New York Times pointed out that reality shows may offer may offer $1,600-$2,500 a week for a field producer while the minimum rate for a union writer on a thirteen-week scripted show was $3,500. As nonunion workers everywhere know, these television reality workers also received no benefits and had no say in their hours.
The Screen Actors Guild (SAG) has been plotting the impact of reality television on union jobs. In 2005 it reported that employment in episodic television fell by ten percent, or 3,523 roles, as reality primetime programming increased from an average of 15 to 22 hours per week in 2004. By 2007, the Guild had created a new category in its annual survey for “nonepisodic TV” which covers reality shows and productions such as “movie of the week.” That year the Guild reported:
Non-episodic television, which is the lowest contributor in terms of roles, fell substantially from 2005 to 2006. Likely contributors to this drop off were the broadcast networks’ wholesale abandonment of so-called “Movies of the Week”—by 2006, the format moved primarily to basic cable—as well as the increase in “Reality Television” programming.
In these tough economic times we also are aware that reality television, like the rest of America, is a response to the depression. Reality shows save money by using “real” people rather than paying Screen Actors Guild Wages. Ditto for writers. As one executive who did not want to be named admitted:
Prime-time reality is a nice little business — if it is nonunion.
A Strike?
Looming behind all this is a threat by the SGA to strike if their demands are not met. Such a strike would be unprecedented, shutting down production of major films and putting not merely actors out of work, but others involved in the productions. Needless to say, this has caused a major rift in Hollywood with some feeling that highly-paid talent like Clooney can afford a strike while bit part players might not be able to survive it.
If there is a strike, it will depend on the solidarity of the big-name talent, for only they can truly shut down a production. If Julia Roberts or Tom Hanks will not cross the picket line, then the movie won’t get made. You can find substitutes for the others in the film, but not for the stars.
So far SAG seems to be trying to keep its options open, but the studios are playing hardball. When the union offered to make concessions over new media, the studios turned them down. On the SAG website a Q and A about a potential strike states:
Why should we vote to authorize a strike?
We need to show management that we are willing to fight to preserve our ability to earn a living as union performers; otherwise, management will take that away from us. Nearly half of our earnings as union performers come from residuals, but management wants us to allow them to make programs for the Internet and other new media non-union and with no residuals. This means that as audiences shift from watching us on their televisions to watching us on their computers and cell phones our ability to earn a living will go away and future generations of actors may never be able to earn a living through their craft. This change will happen faster than you think.
The Nature of Reality
Reality shows are not merely an insult to reality itself with their artificiality; they are a slap in the face of every working person in America. The reality of reality tv is that is nothing more than union busting. The shows exist because TV executives find them a clever way to get around not only union rules but labor laws themselves as the California suit testifies.
But there is more to it than that. By saying that their definition of reality IS reality, media corporations are designating themselves the arbiters of what is “real” and what is artificial. If reality on television is a nonunion reality, then why can’t the so-called real world follow the same course? If we can replace professional actors with people off the street, then why can’t we replace you and your job the same way?
This playing around with the very nature of reality and making labor the center of it conditions the American people to view the scab as star, because that is exactly what those actors and actresses on reality television are–scabs. They are taking jobs from union workers, taking bread from the mouths of professionals who work years to break into television. If we accept the scab as star on Survivor how long will it be before we accept the scab as star in our own workplaces?
The most interesting aspect of this scary plot is the main theme of most of these shows which is that people are willing to do anything to get on television, including making utter fools of themselves. The theme of people willing to sell their souls for fifty seconds of fame is an old one in television land, but these reality shows put a new twist on it. It is what they are selling their souls for. They are selling their souls to become scabs. And who are they selling those souls to–corporate America.
This is the real threat of this new reality–a glorification of scabs who do it for nothing but some camera time. A hundred years ago a scab was more often than not someone desperate enough for money that they would cross often-violent picket lines. Today the scabs are cheered by millions of television fans.
The Implications
The fight over reality programming and new media may seem like a minor controversy compared to the situation faced by workers at the major auto makers or at a manufacturer or business near you. The climbing unemployment rates are now becoming alarming.
I have termed this the “Pull Tab Depression” because no one knows where the next layoff is coming. There seems to be a random quality to it so that your neighbor can be hit with a pink slip, have their home foreclosed and disappear while you retain your job and your home.
At the heart of this, though, lies the future of the union movement in America, for it is only by organizing that workers can protect themselves against the vagaries of a “Pull Tab Depression.” In fact I would maintain that one reason for the randomness of this depression is that so few workers are unionized. Without the protection of a union, corporations can lay off anyone they wish.
Layoffs may be based on the fact you are an older worker and cost more or that your boss doesn’t like you or that other workers don’t like you or merely by the equivalent of throwing darts at a board. Without a union you have no rights.
This is why the issue of reality television and the unions is so important. After the recent settlement of the California Writers Guild lawsuit spokesman Jeff Hermanson acknowledged:
We’re just the tip of the iceberg. There are literally thousands of people suffering the same abuses,” he said. “Not only do they not receive overtime and meal breaks, they don’t have health insurance or pensions, credits or residuals.
So the next time you tune in to one of those reality shows think about the implications of what you are doing. If in the bigger picture of things they can turn “reality” into “unreality” and then treat the magicians who pull this off like wage slaves, what does that say about what they can do to the rest of us? Besides don’t you want to see Julia Roberts and George Clooney walk the picket line?
The problem with reality TV is not that it isn’t real, but that the illusion is based on immorality. Perhaps that is why the subplot of so many of these shows focuses on betrayal, only it is we who are being betrayed and we who are doing the betraying.
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