The Real World slogan: “This is the true story…of seven strangers…picked to live in a house…work together and have their lives taped…to find out what happens…when people stop being polite…and start getting real…The Real World.“
As I mentioned during my presentation on Tuesday The Real World is where the reality TV industry first began. Even since that fated day in 1992 that we were introduced to the first 7 contestants that would be living in a crammed in NY reality tv has taken the world by storm.
Although The Real World initially did live up to its slogan by tackling controversial issues such as prejudice, sexuality, AIDS, substance abuse etc… on the media as time has gone by and the seasons continued it has become less and less real. The focus of the show was more on entertainment than it was on reality. Things became more dramatized and they began choosing contestants that they knew would clash – they were now forcing conflict rather than allowing it to naturally happen.
The following attachment is a clip of Joel McHale, star of Community and host of The Soup on Conan as he discusses reality tv and how it has become the car crash of the tv industry that is just to hard to look away from. Starting around 50 seconds he describes how the reality tv industry really began taking off after the introduction of The Real World.
Enjoy! Joel McHale Loves To Hate Trashy Reality TV – CONAN on TBS