How real is ‘real’? Acting reality on and off the screen

Reality is something we experience every day: it is the mundane, the usual, the tiresome things that surround us. We are so used to it that often we do not even realize that we have no clue where it begins and ends, where the boundaries of the reality are, if there are any in the first place. Then suddenly we come across something that makes us question our perceptions of what is real and what is fake, artificial; and then we wonder whether what we experience every day is real and whether reality can be measured by our experiences and feelings. Without going in too deep, I will be talking about reality TV and the feeling of realness in life, which is so easy to disturb.

The Real L Word is the reality TV show, or rather, a phenomenon in which mediated reality repeats a TV show. It does get confusing. In their introduction videos the heroines (or shall we say, the ‘real’ characters?) of the reality TV drama depicting lesbian life all are at pains to emphasise the notion of ‘realness’ of this project. This is real life, we do real things, - they say, - we are real. Being ‘real’ characters in the reality TV product, they seem to be less real than the fictional characters of the original L Word (a TV series depicting lesbian life in Los Angeles). Even though the idea they promote is that the reality TV heroines are what the characters of the L Word are ‘loosely’ based on, they will always be considered that which came after the L Word – hence the copy or a different version of the original (the real). It does seem that in this journey through the fake and the ‘real’, the original is lost and we, the viewers, are tangled in the twisted web of representations without the originals, of copies and different versions of a reality. Without getting too Baudrillard-like, let us move on to the shallow discussion of the reality.

It is time we talked about the concepts. The real as a concept might stand for that which is the first, the original, not removed from its essence, one of a kind experience of life, the nearness of the existence that gives us a feeling of something substantial. The real is what we take for granted in life: the people we meet, the material environment that surrounds us, our first-hand experiences. But do we really know what real is? Does it really matter, these days? We can get relatively similar satisfaction having a conversation in the virtual chat room or via text messages, compared to the face-to-face conversation with a living person. And then again, where does Skype video conversations (and alike) stand in the spectrum of the ‘realness’ of human interaction? We may talk to our family member who happens to be overseas and have a casual conversation about mundane every day things. We see their facial expressions, hear their voice, yet the conversation itself is mediated by technology and physically we are nowhere near the person. How can we distinguish between what is real and what is not? Clearly, not by watching a reality TV show. Even more so if its title mentions ‘realness’ in any way. As much as the participants try to convince the audience that they are not being fooled and that there is no acting, the question remains, what is a real person anyway? A real character? If all that we are is just a mix, a clash of pieces of other people’s habits and ideas, the only unique thing that our personalities have is the combination in which these pieces come together. The soil that we grow in, the environment in which we thrive, and thus our essence (on the level of our personality – I am not talking about our souls here), are those combinations of combinations.

So, back to the real then. Our longing to experience something real in this artificial world, even by seeing something one does not have direct access to (for example, other people’s lives), must have played a great part in the rapid development of the reality TV and the forms that it took. We, as viewers, want something real, we are tired of acting. Tired to the point where the entire world seems like a big act, yet we try to escape it by...tuning in to some ‘real’ drama on reality show, merely to be fooled again. Reality TV is no more real than a film or fictional TV series. It is still as far removed from reality as any other cinematic production, it is staged, acted, filmed, cut, produced and only available to view on a lifeless TV screen. Whatever we see on a screen, is a representation. The only thing that is real, is the screen itself (and we – those who are watching it). However, the cast of The Real L Word would disagree and would claim that they do not adopt different personas on the screen, that they just are themselves living their usual lives in front of the cameras. That is precisely what the L Word characters would argue, were they accused of being fake.

There is no way of measuring, therefore there is no guarantee that the roles which people play in real life are much different or more real than the ones actors play on screen. It is all relative, regardless of what side of the screen you are on. We play this game, we follow the rules, we sometimes change the script to then change our character, we follow, we lead and we explore the reality without certainty of what real is. We very often long to be told what is real though, hence the reality TV, which sells the idea of having a glimpse at the real people, real emotions, and real life. It works – we buy it, because we need it, we need the assurance that there is something real. That makes us feel more real, too.

16.10.2010 er