{"id":626719,"date":"2026-10-10T21:08:11","date_gmt":"2026-10-10T21:08:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/626719\/"},"modified":"2026-10-10T21:08:11","modified_gmt":"2026-10-10T21:08:11","slug":"when-reality-tv-becomes-too-real-and-why-we-cant-look-away-life-and-style","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/626719\/","title":{"rendered":"When reality TV becomes too real \u2013 and why we can\u2019t look away | Life and style"},"content":{"rendered":"

Good morning. This week my social media feed has been filled with people expressing shock and even betrayal following the news that fitness influencer and former Bachelor star Sam Wood has been charged with domestic violence<\/a>. His lawyer said in court on Thursday that Wood denied the allegations. To understand the specific attachment we form with romance reality stars, I\u2019ve spoken with Dr Rebecca Trelease \u2013 Alyx<\/p>\n

The regularsWe can\u2019t stop talking about: The Bachelor<\/p>\n

Dr Rebecca Trelease is a senior lecturer at Auckland University of Technology\u2019s school of communication studies in New Zealand, and during the first year of her PhD, she was also a participant on The Bachelor New Zealand. She\u2019s been a \u201cmassive fan\u201d of reality television since the early Big Brother days, and believes many fans engage with popular culture in a critical, scholarly way \u2013 regardless of their formal qualifications. But of her time on camera, and the media coverage surrounding it, she says: \u201cIt was really fascinating to see it first-hand, but it was also really awful at times and I wouldn\u2019t recommend it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Alyx: Tell me a bit about the media cycle surrounding romance reality shows, and the connections that viewers are encouraged to develop with the cast?
Rebecca: In romance reality, in some shows we want to see a main hero looking for love across the season, while in others, we want to see two individuals come together and follow them from meeting at the altar, to \u201care they gonna stay together at the end?\u201d.<\/p>\n

But we\u2019re watching a person who\u2019s put their face and their voice to a character that they don\u2019t have a lot of control over, because you have a story producer with more power who is going to present what you do. Then you have an audience, and the way they perceive your story as well. So you have the participant, you have the audience and you have the producer. For a show to be believable, those three angles need to align.<\/p>\n

Alyx: I\u2019d love for you to talk to me a bit about what we as viewers don\u2019t get to see.
Rebecca: It depends on the filming setup. The show I was on, and you could put something like Married at First Sight into the same category, the contestants or participants are having conversations with producers in the moment. In those interviews where they\u2019re saying \u201cright now we\u2019re on a date\u201d, you have people and a camera crew and lighting set up, and we don\u2019t see any of that in the show.<\/p>\n

Having someone with a giant camera in your face has to have an impact on participants. Whereas watching something like Love Island is amazing, because you\u2019ve got those surveillance cameras and you have the mics around their necks. They\u2019re wearing them 24\/7, so I can imagine it would be much easier to forget that you\u2019re actually being recorded.<\/p>\n

Alyx: Can you tell me about the reaction from viewers after the cameras stop?
Rebecca: When a show is about a fundamental human thing, like falling in love, how you were presented is going to stick around for a very long time. From my experience, as a participant, there were viewers who would tell me who I was. Even men sending DMs who believe that you would be their perfect partner, because of what they saw of you on a show. It\u2019s very strange, but that\u2019s what happens.<\/p>\n

When you watch 40 hours of something across a season \u2013 it\u2019s a long time. You as a viewer have invested so many hours and you believed this. And so if you were wrong, would you want to blame yourself as the viewer for getting it wrong? Would you blame the show for presenting it in the wrong way \u2013 which isn\u2019t encouraged by production because the show has a lot of money on the line?<\/p>\n

Alyx: What advice would you offer to people who are upset about what has happened this week?
Rebecca: I don\u2019t think I have any advice to offer, but to keep in mind that when you have one man who is ultimately positioned as the hero of an entire season, you are, as a viewer, meant to be invested in his journey. Producers tell you he is so worthy, and he is so swoony and romantic \u2013 it is a really massive pedestal to put someone on.<\/p>\n

Your week ahead Photograph: Marcus Cooper<\/p>\n

What to watch | Speaking of reality TV, Wendy Syfret\u2019s Stream Team column on House of Stassi<\/a> (Disney+) had me so immediately addicted to the Vanderpump Rules spin-off \u2013 about insanely watchable hyper-villain Stassi Schroeder \u2013 that I almost took a fake day off to binge it. \u201cYou don\u2019t need to be a reality TV producer to understand what this show was supposed to be,\u201d Syfret writes. Reader: it does not go well \u2013 Steph Harmon, culture editor<\/p>\n

What to play | \u201cThere seems no reason whatsoever why Troye Sivan [pictured above] should still be a relative cult figure within pop, rather than an actual multiplatinum star,\u201d writes Alexis Petridis, in his rave review of Sivan\u2019s latest album She\u2019s the Best<\/a>, which is responsible for the worst lyrics and best film clip of the year<\/a>. But counterpoint: \u201cIf he were a huge star, would he be allowed to be as loudly, unapologetically queer?\u201d \u2013 Steph<\/p>\n

What to read | How about the behind-the-scenes account of one of the greatest love stories of our time? That\u2019s right, Niles and Daphne from Frasier. Actors Jane Leeves and David Hyde Pierce spoke to Hollie Richardson<\/a> about shaping the best romance to grace a sitcom and how they both landed hot husbands in real life. She calls him \u201cdevastatingly sexy\u201d; he calls her \u201cthe best loon in the business\u201d. It is everything you could want \u2013 Sian Cain, deputy culture editor<\/p>\n

What to cook | There\u2019s no stirring, barely any chopping and cheeses in the plural. Which is to say, Alice Zaslavsky\u2019s shortcut beetroot risotto<\/a> will have you tickled pink \u2013 Yvonne C Lam, deputy lifestyle editor<\/p>\n

What to book | It\u2019s not every day our theatre critic Cassie Tongue goes with a full five stars \u2013 but A Room with a View, adapted by Grace Chapple and directed by Hannah Goodwin for Belvoir St theatre in Sydney<\/a>, \u201ctouches the divine\u201d. \u201cThis play is alive, and it\u2019s a gift,\u201d she writes \u2013 and it\u2019s on in Sydney until 1 November, when it transfers to Melbourne on 14 November, and heads to Perth from 5 March \u2013 Steph<\/p>\n

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Ease your Sunday scaries with the best of Guardian Australia\u2019s culture and lifestyle journalism.<\/p>\n

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Wishlist Photograph: Etsy \/ Mayfieldhousevintage<\/p>\n

A combination of learning the recent Dior show<\/a> featured murano glass buttons and realising one of my jackets would be enlivened by finer fixings has sent me scrolling through hundreds of vintage buttons lately. I\u2019m not a connoisseur, so I can\u2019t tell you whether this 1930s goldfish bowl button<\/a> is good value at $30; but it is fun to look at teeny tiny works of art and imagine them on your clothing. I\u2019ve been particularly impressed by the range and prices at Carola\u2019s Choices<\/a> Etsy store \u2013 Alyx<\/p>\n

Open tabs<\/p>\n

This great read has graphs<\/a>! They chart the grim downward trajectory that Americans are on (double-digit declines) when it comes to socialising over the last 30 years. We\u2019re talking sporting events, going to a bar, playing cards, volunteering. And they definitely don\u2019t throw dinner parties. The Atlantic\u2019s Derek Thompson asks why \u2013 Sophie Black, associate editor, features, lifestyle and culture<\/p>\n

Sink into your couch for this part book-review\/part-long form essay. David Schurman Wallace<\/a> reflects on the work of lauded nature writer John McPhee and the \u201cvanishing privilege\u201d of long form nature writing in a world where our attention spans, and the natural world around us, is rapidly diminishing \u2013 Sophie<\/p>\n

Tell us \u2026 Photograph: Sophie Black\/The Guardian<\/p>\n

Do you have a treasured old biscuit tin full of buttons on the shelf at home? A glass jar full of them? Maybe that\u2019s a relic of a byegone era. I\u2019ll admit that I struggle to sew a button on, let alone keep a collection. I do, however, own my mother\u2019s old sewing basket \u2013 one that she lined and decorated herself, complete with matching pin cushion. She\u2019s an expert quilter (and yet failed to hand down a skerrick of that talent to me). Send a photo of your button collection if you have one, or at least a single favourite button, by replying to this email or contacting me via savedforlater@theguardian.com \u2013 Sophie<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Good morning. This week my social media feed has been filled with people expressing shock and even betrayal…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":626720,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[156,111,139,69,437],"class_list":["post-626719","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-entertainment","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-tv"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/626719","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=626719"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/626719\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/626720"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=626719"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=626719"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=626719"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}