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taking over the airwaves? Embarrassing Illnesses, the Bodyshock series, Supersize vs Superskinny? A quick look at the TV schedules reveals a huge number of these formatted documentaries with channels such as BBC3 and More 4 leading the way. The rise of these programmes could be seen as part of a more general trend in modern television: the rise of reality TV. The X Factor, Come Dine With Me and Britain’s Got Talent all revel in public humiliation. The producers find the freaks and the rest of us watch and laugh from the comfortable distance of our seats. Until that is, I became the subject of one… I had watched some episodes of the first series
of Freaky Eaters and was stunned that there were other people out there that seemed to have the exact same phobia of trying new foods as I did. Following this, my vegetarian girlfriend Beth decided to contact BBC3 to put me forward for the second series.
Pre-production On 14th May I got the call from a researcher
for the programme. An hour later I had given her my life story and answered every question she could possibly have about my peculiar eating habits. This was the first time I had discussed my freaky eating in such detail with anyone, let alone a stranger. It did not yet occur to me that this was only the first stage of the process and there would be a lot more questioning and explaining to do in the future. The researcher asked me to make an audition
tape and send it to the production company as soon as I could. My interest (as a Media lecturer)
and the potential to be involved in such a project spurred me on and I quickly shot a series of interviews with my family, Beth and her family and myself and sent it off. A crew consisting of the researcher I had been speaking to and a camera/soundman came round the next day. They filmed a series of interviews to make sure they got the back story from Beth and myself. They also asked me to try some foods that I did not eat. Strawberry, tomato and carrot. I suppose this was to determine how I was going to react on camera during the making of the programme when faced with new foods. They got what they wanted. The cherry tomato popped as I bit into it and virtually made me sick. The researcher actually laughed. It didn’t take a genius to see how other people might react to my strange food phobia. The fear of how I would be portrayed set in.
Production Shooting began on 2nd September at Beth’s
parents’ house where we were living at the time. Two days before I had met the producer/director and assistant producer of my episode. I had also signed a contract so I could not back out from this point. On the first day of shooting Beth and I got a real shock. We were given a shooting schedule for the day
which included the following scenarios: –
–
Peter cooking normal breakfast meal in morning – dressing gown & eating in bedroom alone – Beth still in bed
Peter cooking evening meal (different clothes)
english and media centre | December 2009 | MediaMagazine 33
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– – – –
– –
Beth begins to prepare her evening meal Peter looks on
Beth and Peter walking by the river Interview Beth
Travelling set up – looking through photos
Peter chicken bucket style shot on driveway
Interview Peter Evening – general views I was immediately stunned that I would be
‘produced’ and that the filming was structured and tightly planned. Being naïve, I had assumed that in reality TV shows they just filmed the subjects going about their normal lives as they normally would. As you can see from the schedule this is not exactly the case. The majority of these shots were for the introduction of the programme. There would be a voiceover introducing me for the viewers with a montage of clips showing my normal life. However, my ‘normal life’ had to be reconstructed for the cameras as they could not have followed me around all day every day. These series of shots and the accompanying voiceover set up my character, the programme format and the beginning and disruption to the narrativised documentary. The voiceover (written and recorded much later in post-production) stated: Pete is 26 years old… has a normal life… normal girlfriend… normal job… BUT IS ADDICTED TO MEAT!
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