How long does it actually take to film reality shows? They make it seem like it's for months!
—Phalen, Richmond, Virginia
The B!tch Replies: Congratulations. You've caught me in a foul December bluster of a mood, and I don't find your question to be all that dazzling, so here comes the answer that always pisses me off when I hear it. Now you get to have it—here.
It all depends.
Yes, that's the truth. It depends on whether it's a competition show with eliminations, like I Love New York, or a slice-of-life show, like Snoop Dogg's Father Hood. Depends on whether it revolves around personal transformation, like Wife Swap, or romance on the fly, like Hell Date. Each reality-show format has its own rhythm, producers tell me.
Satisfactory? No? Oh, you succubus of a human being. These additional facts come courtesy of Thomas Kline, who, with partner Denise Contis, produces reality television as TKO Entertainment, soon to be renamed 22 Entertainment.
Competition shows with eliminations are usually filmed over a one- to three-day period. Project Runway takes three days of filming per episode. So, roughly, does Top Model, I hear.
Each episode of a reinvention show like Wife Swap or Kitchen Nightmares takes one to two weeks—just long enough for, say, Gordon Ramsay to sweep in and berate some fragile young chef into shoving snipped chives into his eyes.
Slice-of-life shows like The Real World tend to be a little more complicated.
"It's like a soap opera," says Kline, who has produced The Real World in the past. "Probably within a month, maybe three weeks, of filming, you start to see what is happening, and you begin to get a storyline."
The biggest time suck for reality producers comes after shooting. In fact, I am told, it takes a veritable strike of lightning each and every week to get all the postproduction details closed up in seven days or less.
- NEXT QUESTION: Is there a deviated-septum epidemic?
- GET MY PODCAST: It's on iTunes!