A Quote by Steve James

One of the differences between real documentaries and reality television, besides the artificial construct of reality television, is that the people who are recruited to be on those shows, and the people who are interested in going on those shows, basically want to be famous. Or maybe they can win a million dollars or something.
Reality television is to television what marble and gold are to real estate. The point is to dispense with the idea of taste. It's all id. The more unrestrained the better. We all know that 'reality' in reality television is not real. That anybody who would participate in reality television is a fake. But pretending otherwise makes them real.
When television became popular, reality shows started coming up and with such reality shows, people got a platform to show their talent.
Reality TV now doesn't feel reality TV when it started. The line between reality and fiction is blurred. So many of these people are phony or shallow, in their own right. If you've ever watched any of The Real Housewives, or those types of shows, they're all performing. Even though they're real people, they're performing.
I think musicians should stay off television generally. I get asked all the time. Those shows are just promoting insipid comedies. Who watches those shows? And whoever does I don't think my music would speak to those people. I don't even want those people to hear what I'm doing.
Reality television hasn't killed documentaries, because there are so many great documentaries still being made, but it certainly has changed the landscape. There is this breed of gimmicky documentary that is basically a reality show.
The good thing is that I really think that American television is in kind of a second golden age. Even though there's a lot of reality and all those contest shows, which aren't my kind of shows, the scripted stuff that's going on is so good right now because of basic cable. Everyone has stepped it up and realised that people like quality.
I have lots of favorite shows, but not reality! I don't like reality TV so much. I'm saddened by people who don't show respect to each other and to themselves. It's horrible. Unfortunately, that's demonstrated a lot on reality television.
The reality television shows are a big hit with the masses with their Bollywood songs. Even if these TV shows are scripted, people are watching them.
Maybe they'd use biological or chemical weapons instead. Maybe they'd crash the world economy. Maybe they'd turn every program on television into one of those reality shows." "That's mostly done already, Harry." "Oh. Well. I've got to believe that the world is worth saving anyway.
We're all trapped. It's always 1734. All of us, we're stuck in the same time capsule, the same as those television shows where the same people are marooned on the same desert island for thirty seasons and never age or escape. They just wear more makeup. In a creepy way, those shows are maybe too authentic.
I used to watch those syndicated, black-and-white Country Music Television shows from the '60s with my dad. And all of those people that played on our television set, they just felt like family to me. And I believed in my heart, as a little kid, that I would be doing that someday and I would know all those people and we would be friends.
Reality television paints a simple black-and-white world of good characters and bad characters; people we want to root for and people we want to see ruined. There is none of the gray ambiguity that colors real life. I no longer watch a lot of reality television, but sometimes I can't look away from 'Honey Boo Boo.' I just can't.
For one year, I want to do this thing where I guest-star on as many television shows as I possibly can. I love television. The fact that television ultimately made me famous was very gratifying for me.
Reality shows are for reality stars. Celebrities do, maybe, Dancing With The Stars, maybe they might do Celebrity Wife Swap, but dealing with strangers, with people you don't know, in a real situation? People say it's fake, it's based on what they tell other people to do but won't tell you, but you still have a gut reaction, you know.
There's just something, maybe it's the authenticity. I think that's the appeal and why people choose to watch really unpolished and unprofessional videos on YouTube over these multi-million dollar television shows.
This whole thing about reality television to me is really indicative of America saying we're not satisfied just watching television, we want to star in our own TV shows. We want you to discover us and put us in your own TV show, and we want television to be about us, finally.
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