I recently ran across an article entitled “Access’ Top 10 Reality Romances Gone Wrong” (written by Allyson Dailey for Access Hollywood on Yahoo’s website, datelined Los Angeles on Friday July 24, 2009), and I decided to add in my three cents’ worth of observations.
As you could have guessed, her Top 10 included all the usual suspects (Brittany and K-Fed, Hulk and Linda Hogan, Jessica and Nick, Jon and Kate, Carmen Electra and Dave Navarro, Hugh Hefner and a covey of ladies) plus four other couples whom I had never heard of.
But in my defense, I’d be willing to give odds that the audiences for “reality romance TV” are overwhelmingly female so there’s no shame in a guy (me) having a real life with real romances instead. No need for me to spend my time experiencing other people’s relationships with them via TV.
Allyson sums up the situation succinctly:
“What do these former celebrity couples have in common? They have all fallen victim to the reality romance curse! While these couples start off as love stricken stars, things quickly turn and the love fizzles. We could argue that the couples would have never lasted, but it seems to be a consistent trend, that once you take your love to the airwaves, the reality romance curse is bound to set in!”
My take? Actually, I would argue that these couples would not have lasted anyway.
Marriages tend to be tough to
keep going even for normal people
No doubt you’ve seen the statistic about one out of every two marriages ending in divorce. But are the 50% that do not end up in divorce successful marriages?
I’d suggest otherwise. I can tell from personal experience (my own marriages as well as those of several other people I have known well enough to see glimpses of how they interact when out of the public eye) that not every couple who stays together is enjoying their relationship.
In fact, I was quite surprised the last time I got divorced that the people around me who knew me were stunned to hear that I would be getting divorced soon. When I asked them why they’d be stunned by me getting a divorce, several of them said “Because you were the only couple I know who seemed to be happy together”.
Happy indeed! Au contraire … we were miserable together!
“…
it was as if a heavy weight had been lifted from my shoulders
…”
Enough so that once the divorce was final I felt a hundred pounds lighter. It was as if a heavy weight had been lifted from my shoulders.
How could so many people who otherwise knew me and/or my wife quite well get it so wrong?
Simple … like most couples, we didn’t “air our dirty linen” in public. We put on our public face and treated each other civilly when others were around. But we were each slowly dying inside.
That was some time ago, before the advent of Reality TV. But suppose that we were still married today and were well enough known to have a Reality TV show, with cameras set up around our house ready to record all that transpired between us.
If so, those who watched would have gotten a very different picture (especially if we had the sorts of bizarre fights that my wife used to start with some frequency). There’d be no mistaking that this was a marriage headed for a cliff. You could watch it slowly self-destruct before your eyes.
For that reason, you’ll see things happen between Reality TV couples that you wouldn’t see your friends do (as many of your friends would be more likely to have their worst fights in private).
And all ten couples mentioned
in this article are show business couples
They’re used to being in the spotlight. They’re used to fans adoring them (many of whom would be delighted to put out if asked). The opportunities to cheat on their mate are practically limitless.
And their mate would know this. Therefore, they would be under constant suspicion (whether they’d actually cheated or not). And that’s one of the most common topics that couples fight over.
What percent of Hollywood marriages eventually fail? I don’t know the exact percentage but it’s got to be closer to 100% than 50%. Some do endure (I can name several of long duration that I expect to “go the distance”) but most will have a short half-life. And of the ones I can envision enduring, I can’t picture those couples doing a Reality TV show about their relationship.
For example, look at it from a programming executive’s perspective. His job is to attract eyeballs … lots of them. The industry lives and dies on ratings points.
So he’ll get those ratings
So what sort of couples would be given the opportunity to do a Reality TV show to begin with? Not the best-adjusted couples, that’s for sure. Nothing would be more boring to their (largely female) target audience than two people who each had their head on straight, who were both highly respectful of each other, who treated each other civilly at all times … as entertainment goers, that would be the ultimate disaster.
And therefore programming executives seek out celebrity couples who would be most likely to become a train wreck in slow motion. The fact is that conflict equals ratings, so that won’t be left to chance. And going “ten for ten” (reality romances gone wrong) here was not a coincidence.
There’s no Easter Bunny. There’s no Santa Clause. And there is no “reality romance curse”.
It’s artful design.
Stay tuned,
-Mack Doppler
