Reality tv

Thursday

Cockburn

The irony of Kim Kardashian and Ivanka Trump’s friendship

Cockburn was amused by the recent spectacle of Kim Kardashian’s law school triumph (after three “baby bar” exams and a grueling 5,184 hours of study) and the subsequent Instagram gushing from her BFF Ivanka Trump. “My favorite law school graduate!” the First Daughter cooed, cementing what must surely rank among Washington’s most peculiar alliances. This improbable friendship between America’s reality TV queen and Trump has flourished over a decade, evolving from perfunctory Met Gala pleasantries to intimate three-hour lunches at the Beverly Hills Hotel’s Polo Lounge. The pair reportedly bond over “motherhood” and “shared experiences” – Cockburn assumes the shared experience of juggling billion-dollar empires while tolerating men with problematic Twitter feeds.

kardashian

Friday

Cockburn

The Baldwins reality show announced ahead of manslaughter trial

Alec Baldwin is a family man through and through. The poster for Baldwin’s eponymous new TLC show — featuring the actor surrounded by his wife and gaggle of kids — is proof. The heartwarming scene almost made Cockburn forget that Baldwin accidentally shot and killed a crew member for the film Rust back in 2021.   On Tuesday, Baldwin and his faux-Spanish wife Hilaria announced their upcoming show via Instagram, inviting viewers into their home to see the “ups and downs, the good, the bad, the wild and the crazy.” The fifty-second promo features the couple's seven kids, all under ten, screaming in their sterile, white New York City apartment — music to Cockburn’s ears.  https://twitter.

baldwins

Monday

Tristan Justice

My 600-Lb. Life: the end result of ‘body positivity’

Imagine a movement of alcoholics wanting to glorify alcoholism. They’ll claim alcoholism is normal, even healthy. They’ll charge anyone who says otherwise as infected by a societally instilled form of methyphobia, the abject fear of alcohol. The movement will be sponsored by the alcohol industry, eager to gin up sales with the advent of “alcoholic positivity” promoting their addictive beverages. There will even be conferences around the country featuring activist alcoholics selling alcoholism as beautiful. The same movement is happening today with food.  TLC’s My 600-Lb Life returns with season twelve on Wednesday. Each episode offers a painful illustration of the consequences of extreme food addiction glorified today by activists for “body positivity.

my 600-lb. life

Tuesday

Cockburn

Judge Judy endorses Nikki Haley

Reality TV heavyweight "Judge Judy" Sheindlin endorsed Nikki Haley for president on Tuesday. "I'm proud to endorse Nikki Haley because she is whip smart, has executive credentials and was a superb governor," Sheindlin said. "She has international gravitas as ambassador to the United Nations. She is principled, measured and has that elusive quality of real common sense. I truly think she can restore America and believe she is the future of this great nation." Haley is undoubtedly excited to have the support of her own reality-TV star to leverage against Donald Trump’s Apprentice fame. "Judge Judy is a no-nonsense lady who has earned the respect of millions of Americans from her courtroom by being thoughtful, fair and honest,” Haley said in a press release.

judge judy

Thursday

Kara Kennedy

The Real Housewives of the Picket Line

When TV is in trouble, it runs to one group. They usually have big hair and even bigger silicon boobs. They also possess filthy mouths, drink rosé like water and have rich husbands. They are the Housewives — and in dry spells, on Sunday afternoons, or in the middle of a writers’ and actors’ strike, you will see their ilk plastered on your screen more than the news. There are plenty to choose from: there are eleven Real Housewives franchises in the US, twenty international versions and twenty-seven spin offs.  But will the Housewives continue to be the entertainment executive's solution to a strike-induced content drought? Or are they set to join the picket lines? The simultaneous Hollywood writer and actor strikes which started in May are gaining traction and glamor.

real housewives picket line

Tuesday

Alexander Larman

Kirstie Alley, the woman left out in the cold

Towards the end of her life, the Cheers and Look Who’s Talking star Kirstie Alley, who has died of cancer at seventy-one, did something that made her a pariah among her Hollywood associates: she tweeted support for Donald Trump. On October 17, 2020, Alley wrote, "I’m voting for @realDonaldTrump because he’s NOT a politician. I voted for him 4 years ago for this reason and shall vote for him again for this reason. He gets things done quickly and he will turn the economy around quickly. There you have it folks there you have it." The public response was swift and merciless. Writer and director Judd Apatow remarked, "Shelley Long was way funnier than you"; the actress Patricia Arquette announced, "Well my vote for Biden canceled yours out. I have done my civic duty of the day.

Monday

Cockburn

Prince Harry’s travails in cougartown

Prince Harry’s life has been as dramatic as an episode of the Real Housewives franchise over the past few years — yet now it has resurfaced that he once dated an ex-cast member. Catherine Ommanney, who once featured on The Real Housewives of DC, appears to be so small-fry that she doesn’t even justify a Wikipedia page. In fact, when Cockburn was searching her name, a he noticed she periodically flashes up from time to time to rehash the sordid details about her fling with the prince. Maybe that’s his type: a woman that can’t keep schtum.

catherine ommanney prince harry

Monday

Christopher J. Scalia

Reality bit

If a single television genre defines the twenty-first century so far, it is the reality show. These relatively low-budget and therefore lucrative unscripted programs often feature people competing to survive in the most hostile environments imaginable — and those are just the series about the Kardashian family. Many such shows are lowbrow entertainment at its most bingeable, the visual equivalents of a bag of potato chips: “I can’t believe I watched the whole thing.” Danielle J. Lindemann, a sociology professor at Lehigh University and an avid reality television fan, would probably agree with at least some of that description, but she would add that these shows are also quite instructive.

reality

Friday

Cockburn

Can China save us from Prince Harry?

Cockburn is a traditional sort. He is favorably disposed toward anything that has existed for a long time, even things that don’t deserve it, like the United States Senate or the Washington Post. He therefore bears no ill will towards Britain’s vestigial royal family. There’s something admirable about any family that can do so little, possess so much and avoid a guillotine. But Cockburn does grow a tad cross when he is persistently made to weigh in on something those vestigial royals do or say. royal news is even worse than most celebrity news. If Kanye West says something insane, well, at least Kanye has made some albums people liked. But Prince Harry?

prince harry victim

Wednesday

Freddy Gray

Resistance reality TV has jumped the shark

Comey. Cohen. Strzok. Page. Blasey Ford. Kavanaugh. Mueller. Taylor and Kent. Are you fed up yet? It sometimes feels as if the last three years in politics have consisted of a series of show testimonies or hearings. All have been furiously hyped by the media. All have proved tedious, the possible exceptions being Blasey Ford and Kavanaugh. Those became fascinating in a disturbing way. The rest have just been dull. Governmental enquiries and hearings generally are. Idiots on Twitter LOL and snark at the silly ‘popcorn’ moments. But nobody really cares. We all move on and look ahead the next ‘blockbuster’ moment, which never materializes. It’s odd. We are told, disapprovingly, by anti-Trump voices that this is the reality TV presidency.

reality tv