Reality vs "Reality"

Dating Nonsense For Older People on TV

I have never been a big fan of reality TV. Sure, there are some shows that are decent but, for the most part, there’s very little that’s real about reality TV.

Part of the reason for that is the very nature of TV production. As a former TV series producer and someone who spent many years as a news anchor, I know what it takes to make a TV program.

It’s all about hurry up and wait. Lighting has to be tweaked so it’s just right, guests have to be coached and/or cued, stand-ups to camera (those spoken bits where the host speaks directly to you, the viewer) have to be word perfect or it’s “ take two” (or more).

The goal is to look and sound natural with kilowatts of lights glaring in your eyes and a director talking in your ear. It’s a little bit like smoke and mirrors. That’s why, when I was a broadcast journalist at the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, we referred to radio as the Senior Service (it was much senior) and TV as the Glitter Service.

And when it comes to reality TV, what the viewer ends up seeing is hardly real, either.

Take those horrible dating shows, The Bachelor and The Bachelorette, for example. Can we really believe that two people can find true love in a 13-week series? Ridiculous! The track record of both shows over the last 30 or more seasons proves the point. The divorce rate is staggering.

So, picture this: you and your “date” are “getting to know each other” at dinner in a fine restaurant. There are four cameras covering the entire scene from various angles, lights set up and blazing away, a floor director and a director in a studio truck outside somewhere directing the two of you.

“Let’s take that comment about his great looking body, again, Carmen. This time, say it really sexy, okay? Good girl!”

So easy to find your life partner that way. But it makes great “reality” TV.

Last season, apparently, ABC ran something called The Golden Bachelor. What a terrible title for a series but it does convey the scope of the show in three words. It’s terrible because it instantly creates a false image in one’s mind that everything is ‘golden’ and ‘real’ about dating in the later years.

Turns out it wasn’t for the eligible bachelor in the show. He did marry the lottery winner and they were divorced less than three months later. What a joke.

Now comes – wait for it – The Golden Bachelorette. And the lady who won the talent contest to be pursued by eligible ‘senior’ guys is a slim, blonde woman who looks like she stepped out of Vogue. Not a line or wrinkle anywhere (at least that you can see…), makeup perfect, her long, blonde locks curled to perfection.

That’s not a knock on her but you can’t really expect a show called The Golden Bachelorette to feature anyone REAL, can you? I mean, who’d watch?

This article in the New York Times the other day,  is closer to the truth. The reporter interviewed a number of women in their 60s and older about dating, dating apps, and the prospects of meeting someone with whom they could form a real relationship.

For most of those interviewed, it wasn’t easy; the men were often not how they portrayed themselves in their profiles (that cuts both ways, by the way, something I can attest to), their pictures were about as real as The Golden Bachelor, they flat out lied about being single, or they carried the usual amount of emotional, un-dealt-with baggage.

Now, that’s REAL. Alas.

The Times piece is not uplifting. However, I put that down to the fact that journalists often have a jaundiced view of life, to begin with.

What is uplifting about real-life dating when one is older is the fact that a lot of people get it right. It doesn’t take a damn red rose or a beachside mansion to create an artificial atmosphere of love and beauty. Because there is no TV audience watching.