What about me? Identity, subjectivity and reality TV participation Winnie Salamon Submitted in total fulfillment of the requirements of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy November 2010 School of Culture and Communication University of Melbourne 2 Abstract This thesis examines first person accounts of former reality television participants who have appeared on Australian versions of Big Brother , Australian Idol and The Biggest Loser . While scholars have researched audience responses to a wide range of reality shows, little research has been conducted on the participants themselves. My qualitative research study involving 15 semi-structured one-on-one interviews with reality TV participants addresses this gap, using these accounts to explore broader issues surrounding late modern identity and subjectivity. 3 Declaration This is to certify that 1. the thesis comprises only my original work 2. due acknowledgement has been made in the text to all material used 3. the thesis is less than 100,000 words in length, exclusive of bibliography Winnie Salamon 4 Table of Contents Acknowledgements Introduction 6 Chapter One 15 Reality TV and our collective selves: a history and review of the literature Chapter Two 52 Qualitative research and reflexivity: interviewing through an ethnographic gaze Chapter Three 77 ‘There’s no reality in reality TV’: performing the real in a ‘reality flavoured’ universe Chapter Four 110 What about me? Reality TV and the self-governed citizen Chapter Five 149 Brand new world: reality TV and the branded human Chapter Six 179 Reality is a bitch: expectations and disappointments in reality TV participation Chapter Seven 212 Hijacking the branded self: reality TV and the politics of subversion Conclusion 239 Appendix 1: The interviewees 245 Appendix 2: Interview questions 249 Bibliography 252 5 Acknowledgments This thesis would not have been possible without the tireless support, encouragement and guidance of my supervisor, Dr Carolyne Lee. I must also give a huge thank you to Dr Scott McQuire whose insight and comments on the final two drafts have helped improve this work tenfold. Juggling new motherhood with a PhD is no easy feat and I must also give thanks to those who helped care for my daughter while I worked. Thank you Dad, Lea and my good friend Michelle who all did an amazing job caring for Ivy – she is lucky to know you and so am I. Of course, a huge thank you must go to my brilliant husband Paul who offered nothing but support, patience and love throughout this entire process. I dedicate this thesis to you. 6 Introduction In many ways, research for this project began several years before its official commencement. In 2003 I was asked to cover the first Australian Idol auditions for popular Australian tabloid magazine, NW . My role was to arrive at the Melbourne-based auditions before sunrise and interview contestants, many of whom had camped out overnight to audition for a program that most people in Australia had not yet heard of. Some were professional musicians, most were not. While some auditionees turned up, tongue firmly in cheek, dressed as Michael Jackson or Elvis or a sex-kitten of some sort, it appeared that for the majority of this group of thousands, this was yet another potential opportunity to catapult themselves into a career in show-biz, to show the world a talent that participants would often describe as a ‘gift from God.’ For me, this was the first of many reality television show auditions I would attend as a media professional, and the beginning of a series of interviews I would conduct with reality television hopefuls and participants, some of whom would go on to achieve subsequent career success courtesy of their program of choice, while others, arguably most, would experience first-hand the reality television cliché of fifteen minutes of ‘d-grade celebrity’, and not a single second more. During these years working as a journalist for various entertainment magazines I would go on to interview participants on family reality show, Wife Swap , copious Elvis and Roy Orbison impersonators hoping for a spot on Star Struck , potential male strippers on Strip Search , young women embarking on a journey of decorum on Australian Princess; and I would be commissioned to be the exclusive TV Week reporter on the Idol-like talent show, X Factor , which was such a flop I was eventually advised to give up reporting on the program 7 because nobody cared about the contestants, not even while the show was still on air. During this time, I also continued to interview contestants from subsequent series of Australian Idol as well as the then Queen of reality television, Big Brother . For a journalist, interviewing reality television participants just before, and during, the peak of their success was in many ways inspiring. While I cynically understood the ‘reality’ that most of the people I interviewed would not be able to maintain the level of fame and career ‘success’ they were currently experiencing, and that most would probably not be able to utilize their reality television experience as a springboard to become famous musicians or media personalities or actor/models, it was difficult not to get a little caught up in the youthful joy of their overnight success, especially when they talked about how much more exciting their lives had become now that they didn’t have to work at Target, or shear sheep or simply go to high school. Looking back over my interview notes from that time, phrases such as ‘grown in confidence,’ ‘character building’ and ‘more than I ever dreamed of’ appear repeatedly. Of course, this discourse of life-changing personal transformation resides at the core of reality television programming and it is, at least in part, what makes such programming so appealing to audiences, myself included. At the same time, the confessional aspect on which such programming is based is also what makes good tabloid magazine copy. Professionally speaking, interviewing reality television contestants was relatively easy. Unlike more experienced celebrities, most reality television participants were more than willing to reveal the kinds of personal details about themselves that a more media-savvy television personality would be likely to keep quiet. While there was the odd occasion when a participant would insist on a three-way conversation that included the presence of his or her 8 manager or publicist, the interview experience was usually unhindered by bossy gatekeepers censoring half the questions on my list. This is not to say the interview direction was entirely up to me. Prior to such interviews, editors would often shamelessly admit that they were not interested in reality participant’s relationship with God, their talents, career aspirations or their journey of self discovery. If I did submit a piece that talked about a participant’s love of music, for example, it would be described as boring and I would be required to resubmit a piece that explored a more ‘appropriate’ angle. Sometimes I would even be supplied with a list of potential ‘hot’, or ‘interesting’, topics on which to focus. These would include issues such as weight problems, drug issues, relationship dilemmas, romance or conflict with fellow reality contestants, serious family problems such as suicide or jail sentences or overcoming hardship such as the death of a loved one or mental illness. More than once I was instructed to ask an interviewee for an old ‘fat photo.’ Despite the openness with which most reality television participants would talk, it would usually take at least an hour of conversation to get the kind of copy requested by my editors. By that time I had inevitably developed a rapport, and a respect, for the person I had interviewed and, more often than not, I would keep much of the salacious information to myself, knowing that the context in which it would be presented would probably not be favorable. In this sense, perhaps, I was not a very good journalist. When I began researching this thesis in 2006 I knew I wanted to tell the stories of former reality TV participants, using their words as extensively as possible, in a way that has not been done before either in the mainstream media or academic scholarship. While very few former reality TV participants have the opportunity to discuss their experiences publicly post-reality TV, I had a feeling that these stories involving self-improvement, career 9 advancement (or not), struggles with self-esteem, body-image, identity construction, fame, relationships, health, success and failure could tell us about more than simply what it’s like to appear on a reality TV show. While the participants interviewed for this study appeared on Australian versions of Big Brother , Idol and The Biggest Loser , the internationally franchised nature of these programs suggests that such programs, and therefore presumably experiences, are not unique to Australian television programming. While there are no doubt some cultural differences unique to each country that produces their own version of the programs I have studied, many of the issues raised by reality TV participants arguably confront, and shape, the ‘journey of the self’ within 21 st century western capitalism. For these reasons I wanted to use the stories of former reality TV participants as a springboard to further explore broader issues surrounding late modern identity and subjectivity. This thesis has therefore been divided into seven chapters that examine various facets of late modern identity and subjectivity. Chapter One provides an overview of current scholarship concerning reality TV, talk shows and other forms of lifestyle programming. It also looks to the work of various identity theorists and sociologists (Allen and Malhotra 1997; Bauman 2000, 2007; Bauman and Vecchi 2004; Beck and Beck-Gernsheim 2002; Beck, Giddens, and Lash 1994; Beck and Willms 2004; Foucault 1978; Foucault and Rabinow 1997; Furedi 2004; Giddens 1991; Goffman 1959, 1968, 1981; Goffman, Lemert, and Branaman 1997; Illouz 2003, 2008) in order to set up the theoretical framework that was used to analyse the first person interview data that provided the primary material of this project.