We tune into reality TV to see well, reality. But do the stars owe us every detail?
Watching any TV is an expenditure of your time, but reality TV is a special kind of investment.
Maybe your heart pangs when "Golden Bachelor" Gerry Turner speaks of his late wife Toni, or soars when he gleefully makes a connection with one of his dates. Maybe you felt empowered just by watching an unfiltered Ariana Madix confront her cheating boyfriend merely days after finding out about his affair with their friend on the last season of "Vanderpump Rules."
“Because it's reality television and because it is allegedly authentic…it's much easier for people who watch it regularly to connect with these characters and start to invest in them,” says media psychologist Pamela Rutledge.
As my friend texted me Oct. 18 after she had a brief technical issue with Peacock: “Life really is just not the same when you don’t have Bravo,” home to several reality shows including the “Real Housewives” franchise and “Vanderpump Rules.”
Because we’re devoting so much time and emotion, fans expect an authentic portrayal of casts. It's an exchange of time for truth. So when we see reality stars actively attempt to keep aspects of their personal lives hidden, as they have of late, it feels a little bit like we're being played. Certainly reality stars should still be afforded privacy when it comes to serious matters — trauma and health issues come to mind — and revelations should not come at the cost of their mental health. What viewer would object to cameras turning off when the "Southern Charm" stars learned of the death of cast member Olivia Flowers' brother on the Oct. 19 episode?
But as these programs are billed as reality — sometimes even with the word "Real" in the title — is an accurate and depiction of their lives (with the exception of extreme circumstances) too much to ask?
“For reality TV, what I am looking for is reality,” says Andy Dehnart, editor of RealityBlurred.com. “What does separate the genre from fiction is that we are seeing real people reacting in real time — ultimately through environments that may be very artificially created and constructed around them, but we're still getting an authentic reaction in the middle of that. Without that sense of authenticity there's nothing to differentiate it, really then it’s just bad scripted TV, and we certainly have enough of that.”
So how much reality are reality viewers owed?
Now that this seasonof 'Vanderpump Rules' is over, how will I ever SUR-vive?
“Real Housewives of Miami” star Guerdy Abraira is battling breast cancer, but says she never thought of concealing her illness revealed in the show’s Nov. 1 season premiere.
“Maybe I could have walked away from the cameras (and said), ‘I don't want to do this or share, but I just couldn't do that,” she says. “It was meant for me to share.”
Housewives in the franchise are not producers, so one of the few forms of control they have over their portrayal is keeping mum about events they want to keep private by specifying to their castmates and producers what they don't want talked about on camera.
Abraira, who has completed chemotherapy and is undergoing radiation treatment, says she’s never had those types of conversations with castmembers of the "Housewives" franchise.
“I didn't know you had a choice,” she says. “I know what I signed up for, and my goal was to just be Guerdy.”
The last Beatles song,'Now and Then,' finally arrives after more than 40 years
Heated 'Housewives' break the fourth wall over on-camera relationship talk
But not every reality star is comfortable exposing every facet of their lives.
On the Oct. 15 finale of the revamped “Real Housewives of New York,” with an all-new cast, Brynn Whitfield enraged Ubah Hassan after bringing up her love interest who lives in Connecticut.
“If you mention Connecticut, I’m going to circumcise you,” Hassan told Whitfield. Hassan later explained the source of her anger. “I want to make this just between me and him, and make sure that I like this person before I parade him around people I love,” she said on Part 1 of the reunion.
In a July episode of “Real Housewives of Orange County,” Shannon Storms Beador pleaded with producers not to air castmates’ conversations about her relationship with former boyfriend John Janssen. (They split last November.)
“They're gonna start talking about my relationship? That's not OK,” Storms Beador said. “Wow! I'm done… My relationship is over if this is on the air.”
The moment made host of “Reality Life with Kate Casey” podcast wonder “‘Well, what other parts of her life is she being secretive about?’” And Casey feels like “New York” didn’t uncover the true Hassan.
“As an audience member you're like, ‘I didn't really get to know you. Who were you throughout filming?’ Because it seems like you were living a double life,” Casey says. “We love cast members that feel (like) we're watching them just live on camera," but if there's a sense we're "watching a curated version of someone, audiences hate that.”
Casey believes signing up for a series like “Housewives” means making an agreement with producers and viewers “that I'm going to completely crack myself open, and I'm going to show you all the parts of my life, which include my home life and my professional life and my life in terms of my relationships with my closest friends.”
Erika Girardi knows 'devastating things happen... and you show up every day'
Erika Girardi, who performs under the name Erika Jayne, has been a “Beverly Hills” "housewife" since 2015. She doesn’t watch the O.C. or New York editions, and doesn’t know Storms Beador or Hassan. “But in the history of ‘Housewives,’ they've always talked about personal relationships,” she says. “What did you think they were going to do, not talk about it?”
But she believes health issues should be off limits.
Viewers first met her in Season 6 as the younger wife of successful attorney Tom Girardi with her own ambitions of becoming a singer. She couldn’t predict that her now-estranged husband would be disbarred after being accused of embezzling money from clients and wire fraud.
“You expect a certain amount of conflict, and you give up a certain amount of your privacy or anonymity when you go on a reality TV show,” says Girardi. “I’m a grownup. That's fine, whatever. But when you have these really devastating things happen, you're still on the show, and you show up every day. That's a different level of pressure, and just dealing with the sadness, dealing with the grief, dealing with anger, and then having a camera in front of you: It's very hard for anyone.”
'Priscilla' review:Elvis Presley's ex-wife gets a stylish yet superficial movie treatment
The 'real discussion' and hesitation over airing 'Kardashians' fight
Ben Winston, an executive producer on “The Kardashians,” says there was hesitation about including the explosive fight between sisters Kim Kardashian and Kourtney Kardashian Barker in September’s Season 4 premiere. During the verbal battle Kim questioned Kourtney’s happiness and informed her sister of a group chat discussing her behavior. Kourtney said she hated her sister and called her a witch.
“There was real discussion about it from everybody,” Winston says. Family members are all executive producers. “I'd be lying if I said you're not thinking things like that, like, ‘Oh I hope they don't pressure us to cut it,’” Winston says. “But you're also aware you're watching (an) argument between two sisters.”
Yet Winston says he doesn’t want to exploit the family. “I don't see them as subjects of a show we make,” he says. “I see them as our partners who we really love.”
The show has been called out by viewers for not addressing a deadly 2021 Travis Scott concert attended by Kylie, the rapper’s ex-girlfriend and mother of their two children. Nor has it addressed Kourtney’s husband Travis Barker's feelings for Kim. "All their problems just made sense," “Today” points out a user wrote, referencing a possible source of tension.
“There's stuff that's spoken about them in the public eye, and it doesn't always make the show, and I think that's fair,” Winston says. “They give us so much, and they are so open and so honest with us. I always think it's fair to have a boundary on what you're doing, especially with mothers with young kids and complicated relationships at times... They have huge respect and love for their audience, and that plays into everything they do.”
Dehnart says the obligation of reality TV stars and producers is simple: “We're owed an honesty about what we're seeing,” he says, “and we're owed the knowledge that the show is a TV show, yes, but one that features real people, real emotions and real reactions. Because without that, it's not a reality TV show.”
Kris Jenner calls affairduring Robert Kardashian marriage 'my life's biggest regret'