Millions For Your Mortification

Like so much of our culture these days, game shows are getting mean.

I was watching Deal or No Deal the other night - fine, I'll try to get out more - and I started wondering whether I was watching a game show of a finely tuned act of public humiliation.

As I watched one of the contestants throw herself on the floor in agony over the choice she was presented - with the pneumatic-breasted case bearers watching from their stadium seating, family and friends shrieking, and Howie Mandel presiding over it all with his imp of Satan grin, I started to think about the Middle Ages.

There was nothing like a neighbor in the stocks to give the family something to do on a rainy afternoon. The event was held in the most public place in town, and throwing refuse was strongly encouraged.

Of course, Deal or No Deal is really just a variation on the recent trend of mean TV.

What is the draw for The Apprentice? Is it watching those who succeed, or is it squinty-eyed Donald screwing his face into a parrot's beak and saying: "You're Fired." What is the best part of American Idol? Is it the talent or the withering scorn meted out by Lord High Executioner Simon Cowell?

Televised humiliation may have moved to a new intensity - agony, actually - with the show Moment of Truth. While attached to a lie detector, the young wife of a New York City policeman told 8 million viewers she slept around and really wanted to wed an old boyfriend. The young husband said they came away with no money, their lives exposed, and a broken marriage. That is a pretty steep price for your 15 minutes and a shot at some cash.

Sometimes the cynicism is breathtaking. A memo circulated in the offices of ABC's Extreme Makeover - Home Edition was obtained by The Smoking Gun. It is a shopping list of ideal people to feature on the show: a family with multiple children with Down syndrome; a child with a rare condition that causes rapid aging and death and a mom who has been diagnosed with ALS. The producers, as The Smoking Gun put it, were "not content with humdrum poverty, heartache and distress."

But there is a special kind of malice at work on Deal or No Deal's sound stage of dreams. Riches are dangled before the contestant's eyes; grasped for an exhilarating life-changing moment, then snatched away by the unforgiving, unseen "Banker"-retribution for the contestant's own greed and failure to calculate the most basic of odds.

I might be overstating the need to calculate odds. One critic compared the skill level to "Guess how many fingers I have behind my back."

It's Americans being American. It might be a useful requirement for those studying for their citizenship test to watch five episodes of Deal or No Deal. It's all there: the brief tango with fame, the fast-money dream of rolling up to work in a Benz to telling the boss where he can put those accrued vacation days, and for the multitudes watching, the elevation that comes with the right to say: "You couldn't pay me enough to do that."

There are certainly redemptive moments of acceptance and forgiveness. After making an incredibly stupid decision against the screaming, pleading advice of the family, there is a tearful embrace and assurances they are loved and appreciated for doing their best. I wonder what it's like on the ride home.

My curiosity aroused about Deal or No Deal, this prime time pageantry and pathos, I did a little digging. There are places where you can go for tips on how to make the grade. Hey, if you want a B-list TV personality, Vegas comedian and the former voice of Gizmo in Gremlins to mess with your head in front of the world, you gotta work for it.

It takes a video of you and your on-camera supporters, plus passing a 50 question test. Some actual publicized tips from the producers: dressing like a gorilla won't help. Neither will filming naked. Make sure you are actually on the tape - apparently they get videos of people who film their lives, but neglect to include themselves.

Another suggestion from the producers: watch the shows and see what there is about yourself that is similar to the contestants who made it on.

That would include very large shaved-head man in a kilt; a high school teacher who brought along the school's cheerleaders; an Eskimo who brought snow; roller skating sisters and one man who tended to erupt in a stream of curses in his native Italian.

Said host Mandel in an interview: "This is the rawest, purist form of humanity that can be seen on television."

What scares me is: I think he might be right.

Comments

[butch5]

I would disagree that Deal Or No Deal is "the rawest, purist form of humanity that can be seen on TV". It's "Moment of Truth". This show tops "Springer", Maury Povich, Ricky Lake, Jenny Jones, et al. I saw the show last week when that young woman (can't call her a lady) trashed her husband, her family and herself on national TV. I watched in utter amazement as she answered the most personal and degrading questions I think you could legally be asked on TV. I could not believe someone would subject themselves and loved ones to this for money. Her mother and young sister were the only ones in the whole group who appeared to have some shame. They wanted her to stop long before she did. Her father and so-called husband kept telling her "go for it". Even the moderator tried to get her to stop, telling her that he felt very uncomfortable looking at upcoming questions, and that it was going to get real bad. She said she wanted to go on. At one point she said that she wasn't doing it for the money, that she wanted to get some things out into the open. The next day she was quoted in the NY Post as saying she was after the money so that she could leave her husband of two years and start new.
Yes, I will continue to watch the show. I know it's trash but I have always been intriqued by the so-called reality shows. As a senior citizen I am still amazed at people's behavior. Yes, these types of shows are low rent and devoid of any positive atributes for our society at large, but neither are the behaviors of many of our present day politicians, expecially the Bushites.

[NedFlanders19]

Just as the Romans had their events in the Collosseum(sp?) and had more and more during the final days of the empire to feed the national bloodlust, we see the 21st century version unfolding right before our eyes.

Shows have to go farther and farther to stimulate the crowd who has seen so much carnage and debasement of people. We are in the last stretch of this empire, this great experiment called the USA. While its been a fun couple hundred of years, we can see that greed and other low vibrations have decimated the country - just look at the jokers running the country(into the ground).

Not to worry though. Though the skies are dumping rain, who knows, tomorrow the sun may come out. Eventually the clouds will part and people will wake up from the nightmare that threatens to end the human race. Either way, its great to be alive.

Dum vivimus vivamus.

[sawdustinhershoes]

I'd do Deal or No Deal in a heartbeat . Even if I walked away with $20,000, I'd be ahead of the game.

However, since I can calculate their odds, I think they'd reject me.

[jalowe1957]

I tried out as a contestant for "1 vs. 100." I took the written test in January 2007, then was called in for a callback audition on July 2007. There they announced the top three scorers in the mock version will have their videotapes played for the NBC brass. I was one of the top three scorers in the mock version, but perhaps I was rejected by the brass for being too old, too big in the physical sense, and too brainy and intellectual.

Unfortunately, those possessing conspicuous intelligence seem actively unwelcome amongst game show contestant coordinators.

[JScott]

I'll suspect your're correct-ah corporate media I tried out for a game show (yeah at the time that's what folks do when they are unemployed at the time) of course I could answer all the screening questions but I wasn't selected. Deal or No Deal is the ultimate game show you don't have to do anything with skill or intellengence like guess a price or answer a question as a question or give/take a clue or pick a door you just have to pick where the money is, I guess it could be interesting to watch for a while but I find it DULL kinda like watching people play slot machines.
Heck they could just get monkeys as contestants and pay em in bananas not money if people watch-corporate suits would greenlight it because it would probably be EXTREMELY profitable.

[Phaedrusnyc]

This is no secret. The honest truth is that the only game show that adheres strictly to test scores and actual game play (rather than subjective notions of personality and demographic-shuffling) when casting contestants is Jeopardy. How do I know? I got on that show- whereas I have passed the "Millionaire" test at least four times by my last count and have never made it past the "interview." It's not just about being anti-intelligence, so don't let it get you down- it's just that the prodcers (and the PA's who really do the selecting) are usually looking for some ineffable characteristic of 'good television" that you and I are not privileged enough to understand.

[larry278]

Could appearing upon mean gameshows be called bargain debasment?