2022-05-17
53 分钟Sirin Kale and Pandora Sykes explore how the rise in cosmetic surgery collided with reality TV, and laid the foundations for our current preoccupation with self-improvement. Featuring interviews with The Swan's show creator and contestant, and many more. Producer: Hannah Hufford Executive Producer: Pandora Sykes Executive Editor: James Cook Content Producer: Hannah Robins Technical Producer: Giles Aspen Archive credits: The Swan, Galan Entertainment What Not to Wear, BBC Friday Night with Jonathan Ross, Hot Sauce Parkinson, BBC
BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, podcasts.
The dumbest genre in entertainment or the one that tells us the most about ourselves.
Since its conception, reality TV has divided its viewers.
But we think it's possible to enjoy it whilst also questioning the ethical foundations upon which it was built.
I'm journalist and broadcaster Pandora Sykes.
And I'm investigative journalist Shirin Kahler.
And a large part of our friendship has been spent discussing Reality Team.
We've both been fans since we first watched Big Brother as preteens and we've spent a fair amount of time defending reality TV when people are snobby about it or dismiss its importance in our wider culture.
But we've also been troubled by the exploitation, the lack of aftercare, the impacts of sudden fame.
In this 10 part audio documentary for BBC Radio 4, we'll be bringing an analytical eye to a genre that influences almost every walk of life.
Celebrity, music, fashion, beauty, dating and even politics.
Over the last six months, we've rewatched hundreds of hours of reality TV and spoken to over 60 show creators, producers and iconic reality stars in order to chart reality TV's evolution and explore the ways in which the format needs to change.
This is Unreal.
A critical history of reality tv.
Please note there will be strong language throughout the series.
Good evening, I'm Amanda Byram and welcome to the Swan, the most unusual competition ever devised for television.
Tonight, two average looking women will go head to head in pursuit of their dream to become a beauty queen.
Now, thanks to the best plastic surgeons in the country, these two women are about to experience the most radical transformations ever attempted.
You're listening to a clip from the Swan, a plastic surgery competition and beauty pageant that started on Fox TV in 2004.
16 ugly ducklings.