HOW TO DO (ALMOST) ANYTHING - WITH A LITTLE HELP FROM REALITY TV
A big, bottomless cookie jar we know we should walk past, but that just keeps offering us things we never knew we needed.
| 10 Jul 2007
Oh reality TV – you're so naughty. We know we shouldn't get involved with you, but we just can't help it. You're a big, bottomless cookie jar we know we should walk past, but you just keep offering us things we never knew we needed. We should just give in. You know what we want…
So you want to: show all your friends how, like, totally better than them you are.
You need: My Super Sweet Sixteen (MTV).
Ah, the naivety of youth – back when life was simple, a child's love could be bought for the price of a lucky bag and a copy of Look-In. Times have changed, my friends, and nowadays your parents simply don't love you if your birthday party doesn't include an appearance by Pharrell, a pre-party outfit-shopping trip to Paris and a tricked-out Hummer as your main gift.
The archetypal Super Sweet Sixteen party, brought to you by the letters "M" and "E", and governed by the gods of unbridled egotism, is essentially a big, fat sign brandished aloft reading: "Look at me! I'm richer, prettier, and intrinsically better than you!" As well as having parents who run record labels and multinational conglomerates, the kids of MSSS have in common a bigger budget than your average local authority; utter contempt for humanity; and an irritating habit of referring to themselves in the third person (e.g. "Amberly doesn't like what Amberly sees, Daddy"). This heady combination makes for attention to detail that would put the MTV Awards to shame, and at least one tantrum per episode involving a $150,000 car. Forgive them because they're only sixteen, and then condemn them for the same reason; but take notes for your next bash.
So you want to: believe that the A-Team could really happen, whilst indulging your passion for '80s haircuts.
You need: Dog the Bounty Hunter (Bravo)
Take the hair of old-school Michael Bolton, merge the wardrobe of the cop and the leatherman from the Village People, add Chuck Norris' ear for a cornball catchphrase, and you've got the Dog. Dog the Bounty Hunter (real name: Duane Chapman) is the pride of Honolulu county: a snarling one man Mod Squad, ridding the state of bail jumpers and fugitives, all in the name of social rehabilitation and macho fun in tight jeans.
You have to hand it to him, Dog's got a look, and by god he's faithful to it; furnishing his office with a team of similarly tattooed, muscled, and tank-topped bruisers, and going home at night to his lookalike wife and mini-me kids (acid blonde mullets are non-negotiable in this family, even for the eight year-old). Indeed, with such a set of trademarks and a deadpan sense of crime fighting purpose, you get the impression Dog's life has been screaming out for a TV crew for years. The arc from pre-bust smack talk, through high octane raid, onto inexplicable post-arrest 'crime doesn't pay' counselling session is all a bit A-Team. Just as Mr T's really a pussycat, Dog the Rottwieller turns out to be just a big, helpful St Bernard in pimp's clothing.
So you want to: ruin the happiest day of your life by orchestrating your own humiliation, set to music.
You need: First Dance (UKTV Style)
Set in such glamour hotspots as Brighton and Crewe, First Dance follows couples who clearly believe that what merits the most thought in organising a wedding is not the vows or ensuing decades of matrimony, but the crucial three minutes and forty-four seconds it takes Elton John to croon his way through your first dance as husband and wife.
Subverting the longstanding tradition of the pre-nuptial waltz class, this new breed of couples aspire to the moment in every dance movie in which the crowd moves back to make a circle (always, inexplicably, the exact size of the routine) around the leading man and lady. You're quite correct, madam: the depth of your relationship is clearly best communicated through the medium of dance, in a poorly lit hotel function room in Swindon.
The routines themselves are frankly terrible, including a jive that involves mainly kicking, punctuated only by snapping fingers a la Wham circa 1986. That said, the programme is worth your half hour if only for watching the wedding guests' expressions shift from instinctively horrified to polite 'ok, we'll play along' as the couples take up their starting positions. Look out in particular for the bride who wants to re-enact the entire Dirty Dancing closing sequence – including the lift.
So you want to: revive your ailing relationship and raise your self-esteem.
You don't need: Trinny & Susannah Undressed (ITV1):
A prime example of the 'expert' gone stratospheric and of the reality show's tendency to spread exponentially – see the expansion of La Cowell's evil empire for a further example – Trinny and Susannah have let all that exposure (mainly of middle-aged women) go to their heads. Having fitted a few women with the right size bras on BBC1, T&S have defected to ITV1 having, presumably, undertaken quickie PhDs in cognitive behavioural therapy and marriage guidance in the interim. Because there's no way they'd be allowed to do this sort of thing without qualifications, is there? Oh, wait, sorry – this is ITV, so they'll have been enrolled in classes at the Jeremy Kyle School of Inappropriate Public Counsel, won't they? Silly me.
Admittedly, a woman who wears only her husband's clothes and hasn't had a haircut in nine years probably isn't making the most of herself, but is the most effective therapy really playing naked shadow puppets behind a gauze screen whilst giving a running commentary to two screeching banshees? All the usual tit-grabbing and changing room scolding is present and correct, but the deluge of intimate information and disturbing invasiveness of the T&S freight train into every aspect of a family's life is frankly unnerving. If you really want to crank up your self esteem, the answer is a snake-hipped, bespectacled South-East Asian stylist who'll enthusiastically jiggle your fleshy bits whilst making his happy noise – in a platonic way, of course. Every girl needs a Gok Wan in her handbag – so turn over and watch How to Look Good Naked (Channel 4) instead.
So you want to: show all your friends how, like, totally better than them you are.
You need: My Super Sweet Sixteen (MTV).
Ah, the naivety of youth – back when life was simple, a child's love could be bought for the price of a lucky bag and a copy of Look-In. Times have changed, my friends, and nowadays your parents simply don't love you if your birthday party doesn't include an appearance by Pharrell, a pre-party outfit-shopping trip to Paris and a tricked-out Hummer as your main gift.
The archetypal Super Sweet Sixteen party, brought to you by the letters "M" and "E", and governed by the gods of unbridled egotism, is essentially a big, fat sign brandished aloft reading: "Look at me! I'm richer, prettier, and intrinsically better than you!" As well as having parents who run record labels and multinational conglomerates, the kids of MSSS have in common a bigger budget than your average local authority; utter contempt for humanity; and an irritating habit of referring to themselves in the third person (e.g. "Amberly doesn't like what Amberly sees, Daddy"). This heady combination makes for attention to detail that would put the MTV Awards to shame, and at least one tantrum per episode involving a $150,000 car. Forgive them because they're only sixteen, and then condemn them for the same reason; but take notes for your next bash.
So you want to: believe that the A-Team could really happen, whilst indulging your passion for '80s haircuts.
You need: Dog the Bounty Hunter (Bravo)
Take the hair of old-school Michael Bolton, merge the wardrobe of the cop and the leatherman from the Village People, add Chuck Norris' ear for a cornball catchphrase, and you've got the Dog. Dog the Bounty Hunter (real name: Duane Chapman) is the pride of Honolulu county: a snarling one man Mod Squad, ridding the state of bail jumpers and fugitives, all in the name of social rehabilitation and macho fun in tight jeans.
You have to hand it to him, Dog's got a look, and by god he's faithful to it; furnishing his office with a team of similarly tattooed, muscled, and tank-topped bruisers, and going home at night to his lookalike wife and mini-me kids (acid blonde mullets are non-negotiable in this family, even for the eight year-old). Indeed, with such a set of trademarks and a deadpan sense of crime fighting purpose, you get the impression Dog's life has been screaming out for a TV crew for years. The arc from pre-bust smack talk, through high octane raid, onto inexplicable post-arrest 'crime doesn't pay' counselling session is all a bit A-Team. Just as Mr T's really a pussycat, Dog the Rottwieller turns out to be just a big, helpful St Bernard in pimp's clothing.
So you want to: ruin the happiest day of your life by orchestrating your own humiliation, set to music.
You need: First Dance (UKTV Style)
Set in such glamour hotspots as Brighton and Crewe, First Dance follows couples who clearly believe that what merits the most thought in organising a wedding is not the vows or ensuing decades of matrimony, but the crucial three minutes and forty-four seconds it takes Elton John to croon his way through your first dance as husband and wife.
Subverting the longstanding tradition of the pre-nuptial waltz class, this new breed of couples aspire to the moment in every dance movie in which the crowd moves back to make a circle (always, inexplicably, the exact size of the routine) around the leading man and lady. You're quite correct, madam: the depth of your relationship is clearly best communicated through the medium of dance, in a poorly lit hotel function room in Swindon.
The routines themselves are frankly terrible, including a jive that involves mainly kicking, punctuated only by snapping fingers a la Wham circa 1986. That said, the programme is worth your half hour if only for watching the wedding guests' expressions shift from instinctively horrified to polite 'ok, we'll play along' as the couples take up their starting positions. Look out in particular for the bride who wants to re-enact the entire Dirty Dancing closing sequence – including the lift.
So you want to: revive your ailing relationship and raise your self-esteem.
You don't need: Trinny & Susannah Undressed (ITV1):
A prime example of the 'expert' gone stratospheric and of the reality show's tendency to spread exponentially – see the expansion of La Cowell's evil empire for a further example – Trinny and Susannah have let all that exposure (mainly of middle-aged women) go to their heads. Having fitted a few women with the right size bras on BBC1, T&S have defected to ITV1 having, presumably, undertaken quickie PhDs in cognitive behavioural therapy and marriage guidance in the interim. Because there's no way they'd be allowed to do this sort of thing without qualifications, is there? Oh, wait, sorry – this is ITV, so they'll have been enrolled in classes at the Jeremy Kyle School of Inappropriate Public Counsel, won't they? Silly me.
Admittedly, a woman who wears only her husband's clothes and hasn't had a haircut in nine years probably isn't making the most of herself, but is the most effective therapy really playing naked shadow puppets behind a gauze screen whilst giving a running commentary to two screeching banshees? All the usual tit-grabbing and changing room scolding is present and correct, but the deluge of intimate information and disturbing invasiveness of the T&S freight train into every aspect of a family's life is frankly unnerving. If you really want to crank up your self esteem, the answer is a snake-hipped, bespectacled South-East Asian stylist who'll enthusiastically jiggle your fleshy bits whilst making his happy noise – in a platonic way, of course. Every girl needs a Gok Wan in her handbag – so turn over and watch How to Look Good Naked (Channel 4) instead.