Tuesday, January 8, 2008

Walking into a Reality Show


Dropping off some drycleaning I saw some velour track-suited women, cell-phones in hand, a TV camera pointed at them entering the nail salon: the Kardashians. I know they have a reality show on TV which I've never seen, and I know that their step-father is Bruce Jenner, and I do have fond memories of his Wheaties box gracing my breakfast table as a kid (and the OJ trial reference as well). I'm pretty sure these ladies do nothing all day but get their hair and nails done, and Isa was curious about the large camera, so two signed- waivers later, Isa is at the manicurist's table, and I am trying to sit somewhere so I am not in the shot, and the reality camera is rolling.
Bruce Jenner's wife comes in with a round of hellos. There's a lot of cell- phone usage, and the apparent planning of a wedding, and some seemingly-pseudo arguments about candles for said wedding, but no one seems to have the energy to really pull a 'contentious moment' together. I realize quickly that there is no witty banter, no clever repartee, and after thirty minutes not a single person has made another crack a smile, let alone laugh. These people are all about talking about objects: candles, appointments, polish, bikinis, clothes. It's enough to make one feel sleepy.
I find myself unwittingly in many of the shots, so I do just that, prop my hand against my cheek, and close my eyes. No, I'm not getting my nails done. The old lady across from me is visibly agitated by the scene; however, and keeps waking me up to get my thoughts on the matter.
Her manicurist is the boss, or owner perhaps, and she's made him move to the back chair, so she's away from the action. She's loudly complaining about the liability of letting these people in here. In a soft tone, the Vietnamese man gently tells her that it's okay, he knows them, that they are good, decent customers, so he agreed to the filming.
"But what about liability?" she howled in his ear and then looked at me to make sure I was listening.
"WHAT IF THEY BREAK SOMETHING?"
We all looked over at the four women getting their nails done, with a camera pointed at them.
The manicurist spoke in his softest tone.
"Really, I think it will be OK. I don't foresee a problem."
The old lady shifted in her seat and harrumphed and mumbled something about whether anyone had insurance or not. I was hoping someone would point the camera at her. Then she waved at me again and yelled, "I can't BUFF! They won't let me BUFF!"
She gesticulated her red nails everywhere and the poor nail salon owner/manager winced.
"They won't BUFF ME because the machine is too loud because THEY are in here!"
I felt sad for the nail salon people, proudly displaying their Pamela Anderson signed photos next to their health certificates. I realized I had nothing to offer Isa on the Bruce Jenner connection, and we took our leave. I told her maybe if we watched the episode and she could see how the editing process whittled that down to three minutes (or added a fake storyline that never happened) could help her see how reality TV worked. But, we won't watch it. Transformers Anime; however, has Isa hooked!

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10 Comments:

Blogger frank b. said...

I thought the "Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader?" debacle would have turned her off to this sort of thing permanently.

January 9, 2008 4:01 AM  
Blogger Chris said...

There may be nothing better in life than the inappropriately angry patron caught unwittingly in a TV shoot. To me there is something deeper going on there. It's almost like the person resents that there are these clearly unimportant people getting all this attention from the cameras while they get ignored. It seems like a thou does protest too much kind of thing to me.

What do you think? Am I attributing too much emotional baggage to what could simply be just a grouchy lady pissed that she can't get buffed?

January 9, 2008 9:00 AM  
Blogger Chris said...

By the way, I've watched a few minutes of the show, and I have to say that your description of them just never getting to anything of any substance or mustering any true contention is spot on. At least Ozzy was genuinely a befuddled character who was amusing to watch, and Nick & Jessica had their "Lucy & Ricky" vibe going.

I can't believe I'm saying this but... man, reality TV has really fallen.

January 9, 2008 9:04 AM  
Blogger Robert said...

Bernie, why do you say you won't watch that episode? You're always coming up with cool real-life lessons for Isa - why wouldn't you pull the editing process lesson out of this?

January 9, 2008 9:11 AM  
Blogger John Levenstein said...

chris, somehow i pictured the woman working there. we need clarification. frank should be getting back from a mirthless lunch about now.

January 9, 2008 11:55 AM  
Blogger Chris said...

John, I do believe it was another customer based on this line: "The won't BUFF ME because the machine is too loud because THEY are in here." The customer is always the buffee and the worker the buffer, no?

January 9, 2008 1:49 PM  
Blogger John Levenstein said...

all right, i returned to the text, and you're obviously right. bernie, we don't need you for this anymore.

January 9, 2008 2:04 PM  
Blogger Bernie said...

Here's why we won't watch. When getting the pic for this post, I read that the mom has a stripper pole in her bedroom and on one episode, the nine year old daughter is dancing on it, threatening to flash her breasts, because her mom is on the phone with Girls Gone Wild's Joe Francis in jail.
Potential salacious content: totally unnecessary for Isa to watch. And me, no, I don't need to watch myself sleep.

January 9, 2008 4:13 PM  
Blogger Bernie said...

Chris, I think you have a point about the angry lady. I was thinking, you knew this disruption was happening, you could have easily gotten your nails done later or another day, but instead you made the captain move to the back and yelled as loudly as you could about how horrible it all was.
Sit and wait for the buff, lady. We all know you're not busy.

January 9, 2008 4:15 PM  
Blogger Chris said...

Bernie, I like the phrase "wait for the buff." I think it's a great metaphor for many things in life. If we all just sat and waited for the buff at times instead of getting all out of sorts, perhaps things like wars wouldn't happen. Bush should've waited for the buff.

January 9, 2008 9:51 PM  

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