It’s hard now to imagine that we ever lived in a time where shows like “The Newlywed Game” and “The Dating Game” were, with their moderately sexual banter and occasional off-color innuendo, considered skirting the borderline of good taste.
This was, of course, before reality television got “real” and there was nothing that someone out there wouldn’t say or – better yet – do to get on television. And maybe even win a few bucks.
Today’s entry into the how-low-and-distasteful-can-you-go sweeps, game show edition, goes to a new show on TLC called Labor Games.
The concept: Expectant parents try to win prizes by answering trivia questions in a delivery room while the woman is in labor. While the woman is in labor. Presumably “Cash Cavity,” in which root-canal patients answer questions while being operated on by a dentist, was rejected because potential contestants couldn’t make themselves heard. (Source: NY Times)
Well, like Scarlett O’Hara’s maid Prissy, ‘I don’t know nothin’ ‘bout birthin’ babies’, but I also don’t know any woman who would want to be in labor – no matter how early on – and have the experience packaged up and televised.
I realize that the world has changed, and there are any number of reality shows that do bring us childbirth up close and personal.
Why, the Duggars alone could have a weekly series devoted to the baby-birthin’ of the Duggar matriarch, her daughters, and daughter-in-law.
But to combine it with a quiz show... “Labor Games” is breaking new ground there.I think of myself as someone with a pretty darned high threshold for things appalling, but this manages to cross it.
And – let’s hear it for cable – there are even more goodies out there for us:
Last week, at its upfront presentation, the History channel announced a new digital series called “Shotgun.” The description: “It’s a game show on the road! Contestants try to answer questions while riding ‘shotgun’ in a high-performance racecar that’s flying around a track at top speed.”
…[and] just wait until May 19. Nat Geo Wild is promoting a “mini-series event” beginning that night called “Are You Smarter Than ...,” in which people compete against animals.
By the way, my sister Trish’s reaction to hearing about a quiz show called “Shotgun” was:
… “ok, when I read this and saw that there was a quiz show called "Shotgun" I thought the contestants were going to have to answer questions with a shotgun pointed at them. We're probably not too far off from that - Mad Max anyone?” (Source: e-mail from my sister Trish)
Everything doesn’t have to be “Downton Abbey” and other high-brow-ish fare, of course. And this last one – “Are You Smarter…” actually sounds like fun. (Although scary fun. Who wants to have the world find out that you’re not as smart as your poodle?)
But “Shotgun” is just one accident away from infamy. And as for “Labor Room”…. I do suppose that the show’s producers would have the good taste not to run an episode where something bad happened to a couple and their baby. (Of course, there’s no guarantee that this would stop the parents…)
This all reminds me of something that I believe Chuck Barris – the inventor of “The Newlywed Game”, “The Dating Game”, and “The Gong Show” – said.
In discussing the downhill progression of game show concepts, he noted that, one day, there might be a game show in which players would be asked to do something awful – like kick the crutches out from under an old lady – with the show’s host upping the price until someone was willing to do it. (I suppose you could just televise the Milgram experiment, in which subjects were ordered to increase the voltage on the electric shock they were giving someone even after it went well beyond the pain point. About two-thirds of the Milgram experiment’s participants were willing to carry out orders that would have fatally shocked someone.)
Where could this all be heading?
How about “Last Laughs”, in which actively dying patients would be asked questions about various death rituals. (“How many days do people sit shiva?” “In what country do widows throw themselves on a funeral pyre?”)
How about “Doctor’s Orders”, which would be a take off of the old “To Tell the Truth,” in which three people claimed to be something or other – a custom accordion maker, the mother of four sets of twins – and the panel would guess which one was telling the truth. In “Doctor’s Orders,” three individuals – only one of who is a real doctor – would dispense medical advice. And – get this – you’d have to follow the advice of the one you picked. (On second thought, maybe this one could be called “You Bet Your Life.”)
Then there could be “ICU” in which you had to answer trivia questions in order to get your pain meds or one of those sponge lollipops with the ice water.
There’s just no end, is there?
How low can you go???? I suspect we haven’t plumbed the depths quite yet.
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