My big fat redneck headache

[MichaelPaul]

Weirdest day of our film shoot so far. Had our location crashed by a reality TV crew showing up to shoot an episode of "My Big Fat Redneck Vacation." The frustration aside of getting our shots while they kept getting in the background, I was shocked to see such a large crew for a reality show. I had no idea. Where is the reality in any of it? I mean I always assumed it was rather contrived but this all looked wholesale faked. Anyone work on a reality set? Not a big budget LA one, but something on one of the cable channels. Think this was for CMT.

Not to mention th bizarre odds of us shooting right next to each other. In LA sure, but this was a short street in small town Iowa and it looked like their crew was all up from Florida and Atlanta by the license plates. Curious what the budget is on a show like that.

 

[David.rhsc]

Yes. I have worked on cable network "reality."

It's all fake.

Most of the time the "talent" is wearing an earpiece that is invisible to camera so the "producers" can tell them what to say/do from video village.

The only time those shows come close to being "unscripted" is if there is some sort of competition involved. Then it is only as contrived as legal is certain that production can get away with without being sued. Which is still pretty contrived.

 

[MichaelPaul]

We watched them do multiple takes of some of the stuff. Had never expected that level of fakery. I always heard about the Producer coaching/manipulation, but ear pieces is pretty extreme. I thought this was supposed to be cheaper than scripted television. Where is the cost savings? They had a big crew and this was a CMT show.