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Another variation on the reality theme is ABC's Those Amazing Animals, a sort of Games People Play for wildlife. Host Burgess Meredith runs footage of such wonders as two-headed snakes, spiders that square-dance and cannibalism among rats in overcrowded cages. While some of the reality shows are going strong, others are suffering from TV's penchant for overexploiting a popular idea. After four weeks, CBS last month dropped No Holds Barred, billed as a comedy series highlighting the "crackpot side of modern life" through the "oddball characters that make America unique." That's My Line, a remake of the game-show classic What's My Line?, also fizzled.
Broadcasters trace the development of such shows back to the appearance of NBC's persistently popular Real People, an hour of sometimes amusing interviews in the heartland. A recent show followed A. J. Weberman, a "celebrity garbageologist" who among other feats has retrieved memos from Richard Nixon's trash can and empty Valium bottles from Gloria Vanderbilt's. ("The best thing I ever found," he says, "was Jackie Kennedy's pantyhose.") While Real People, which gets more than a third of the audience in its Wednesday prime-time slot, spawned a series of other "entertainment news" shows like NBC's Speak Up America, it also turned TV executives on to the fact that low-budget programs produced without costly sets and high-priced talent could be hugely successful. While the tab for producing a half-hour sitcom might come to $300,000. the bill for an hour of reality programming may be $250,000 or less. Another spur to such shows has been the 2½-month actors' strike, which made the filming of dramas and sitcoms for the new season impossible at any price.
Reality-show producers admit that their aim is to be sensational. "The goal is a spectacular piece of film," says That's Incredible! Creator Alan Landsburg, 47, a veteran TV producer whose credits include the series In Search of . . . and the Jacques Cousteau specials. Landsburg will schedule any story "as long as we decide that the audience reaction will be 'Wow! That's incredible!' We opt for subject matter that is startling."
Or downright appalling, many critics would say. The thrill shows appeal and cater to the viewers' infantile instincts. Film Professor Richard Sklar of New York University compares these programs to a circus sideshow. "The grotesque aspects of popular culture—burlesque, vaudeville variety and pulp magazines—are finding expression on TV today. Television does not go out on a limb; it trails what is happening in society." Some of the toughest condemnations of the shows come from broadcasters. Morley Safer of 60 Minutes blasts such programming as "the worst brew of bad taste yet concocted by the network witches."