courtesy of Mitchell Haaseth
Maybe They’re Crazy—Probably
the unrealistic antics of prime time have some viewers reaching for the remote
Print“I can’t be normal. If I’m normal, I’m boring. If I’m boring, I’m not a movie star. If I’m not a movie star, I’m poor! And poor people can’t afford to pay back the $75,000 in cash they owe Quincy Jones!” screams Tracy Jordan (Tracy Morgan), one of the main characters on NBC’s 30 Rock. Tracy, a mentally unstable comedian, is one of the wackiest characters on television, but he’s certainly not the small screen’s only overly exaggerated personality. It seems that every sitcom currently on TV includes at least one outrageous presence like Tracy, and the popularity of these eccentrics means that executives are eager to keep including similar characters in their series. But colorful characters don’t always help a show: sometimes they drive viewers away because their antics are just too unrealistic.
Since the dawn of reality TV, shows have tended to focus more on the extreme than on the lifelike. Contestants on shows like Flavor of Love often resemble skanky cartoon characters rather than actual people. As reality spinoffs like Daisy of Love and The City get launched and renewed at an incredible rate, scripted shows without elements of the extraordinary have begun to seem like an endangered species. To ward off the extinction of these programs, 30-minute shows like NBC’s The Office and hour-long dramas like FOX’s House and 24 are relying more and more on absurd plots and characters.
Those extreme but essential presences are given distinctive personalities—they tend to lack social skills, common sense, or both—and are placed in peculiar situations. What ensue are outlandish, and usually hilarious, moments that lead to an array of responses from the rest of the cast. Such characters keep viewers on the edge of their seats, wondering what these oddballs will say and do next. Take Dwight K. Schrute (Rainn Wilson), one of the protagonists of The Office, for example. When asked in Season Three to share a story about a deceased loved one, he proudly states that he “resorbed the fetus” of his twin brother in the womb. “Do I regret this? No,” he continues. “I now have the strength of a grown man and a little baby.”
Those kinds of one-liners can provoke eye-rolling as easily as they incite laughter. For disbelievers, it is characters like Dwight who turn audiences off from a television show. “It’s hard to stay interested in a show when you can’t believe what’s going on,” says Anthony Testa, CC ’12. Viewers want to feel connected to the programs they watch. If they can’t relate to the implausibility of certain aspects of a show, the connection is lost and the audience estranged.
It is crucial for networks to strike the right balance for their shows: exposing viewers to new, exciting people who wouldn’t and couldn’t exist in the real world, but at the same time being careful not to completely remove the premise of the show from reality. Desperate Housewives, for one, straddles the line with grace: The show ties in the ordinary struggles of suburban life with a slightly incredible amount of secrets unfolding from behind closed doors. Viewers watch Edie (Nicollette Sheridan) repeatedly deceive the other Wisteria Lane residents to get what she wants, but the show counteracts her outrageous antics (like faking her own suicide to win over a man, whom she later blackmails so he’ll accept her marriage proposal) with visible signs of her humanity. Despite her hard exterior, Edie isn’t impervious to heartbreak or isolation, especially as the perpetual outsider of the show’s core group.
Desperate Housewives, now in its fifth season, finds its lasting power in the honesty at the core of its heightened reality. Housewives proves that scripted programming doesn’t need to be wacky or flashy to succeed. When it comes to mindless entertainment, caricatures like Flavor Flav and his successors may always be the gold standard—but viewers still sometimes prefer shows that resemble the real world, with a generous helping of Hollywood-style drama on the side.
******
TV’S BELIEVE IT OR NOT
Television can sometimes seem like a funhouse in which characters are so distorted that they’re barely recognizable as human. But sometimes those figures are so interesting that viewers can’t avert their gazes, despite the characters’ unrealistic nature. These three are implausible, improbable, and irresistible.
House—Dr. House
Gregory House (Hugh Laurie), head diagnostician in the Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital, is an irreverent, controversial doctor who trusts no one, least of all his patients. Always sarcastic, skeptical, and rude, House has a knack for frustrating coworkers, patients, and almost anyone who gets in his way—actions he certainly wouldn’t get away with if his diagnoses weren’t always right.
How I Met Your Mother—Barney Stinson
Suit-wearing, womanizing Barney Stinson (Neil Patrick Harris) is more or less the fifth wheel in his close group of friends. Refusing to settle down with one woman, Barney follows a strict “Bro Code” and is known for telling elaborate, outrageous tall tales that he always follows with a trademark “true story.” His variations on the high-five and the way he describes his “awesomeness” are what make his show, and Barney, legen—wait for it—dary.
Gossip Girl—Chuck Bass
Multi-millionaire and complete jerk Chuck Bass (Ed Westwick) is a vicious anti-hero who alienates friends and family with his love of blackmail and ruining lives. Known for his promiscuity, Chuck frequently sleeps with hired women and has attempted to hook up with each of GG’s female leads. Using his money as a manipulative force and constantly finding himself in situations barely suitable for men twice his age, Chuck is definitely not your typical 17-year-old.
26 March 2009
vol. 6, issue 7
More ARTS
Questioning Narrative Conventions
Jesse Ball's The Way Through Doors defies the strict classifications of genre—although it appears to be a novel, its dizzyingly complex narrative structure resembles poetry more than prose.
I didn’t consider running away from home until halfway through the third grade, when my mother bought me E.L. Konigsberg’s From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler.
Everything about Amelie Nothomb's Tokyo Fiancee defies convention - its portrayal of romance, its genre, and, most of all, its language.
Comments
We're looking for comments that are interesting and substantial. If your comments are excessively self-promotional, or obnoxious you will be banned from commenting. Consult the comment FAQ and legal terms.