Time to put your hands in the TV mud
Dear newsletter subscribers,
I have a new favorite comfort-food reality show—though it may be familiar to some of you, especially those who live in the UK.
If you have HBO Max—or HBO, which means you have HBO Max, unless you have Roku or Amazon Fire—you now have access to three seasons of The Great Pottery Throw Down.
It’s by the producers of The Great British Bake-Off, and there are definite similarities. Read my review, and then maybe curl up with it this weekend.
In related news, Netflix announced when we’ll be able to watch the new season of The Great British Baking Show, and I also was fascinated to learn that this season was filmed, because of the pandemic, more like ABC’s version.
Listen to me on EHG
I had so much fun as the guest on this week’s Extra Hot Great, the TV-focused podcast hosted by the founders of Television Without Pity—and not just because we had a brief moment of reminiscing about the early Internet.
During the show, I pitched Survivor’s first finale to join the canon, and recommended both this show and this show.
We also discussed self-shot reality TV shows, including Amy Schumer Learns to Cook and Ghosted and while I won’t spoil the outcome of Game Time, I hope it’s as dramatic to listen to as it was to participate in!
🎧 Listen here, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
And welcome, EHG listeners who subscribed after hearing my plug! 🎉
Dancing with Carole
I reviewed Dancing with the Stars’ season premiere, focusing on its now-obvious lie that it was going to be refreshed or reinvented.
By the way, Kevin Fallon’s takedown of Carole Baskin Dancing with the Stars appearance—which the producers, who he calls “savants of shamelessness,” saved for last—is so much more entertaining than that entire first episode of DWTS.
And while Carole Baskin is Dancing with the Stars now, she’s partnered with the producers of Mama June: From Not to Hot for a new reality show.
I’m amazed she trusts them after what Tiger King did to her.
Bad news for Survivor
Last weekend came bad news for Survivor season 41.
That’s disappointing, but probably inevitable.
However, it prompted a Hollywood trade, Deadline, tried to do some bizarrely ineffective damage control for CBS with an article I won’t even link to because it didn’t bother to a) include any actual information, other than a vague sentence saying CBS is still working on trying to film Survivor (no kidding!), and more egregiously, Deadline didn’t even credit Inside Survivor with the news that it was trying to counter with its lack of information.
Emmy and TCA Award winners—and Jeff Probst
The Television Critics Association announced the winners of its TCA Awards on Monday. There was great competition in most categories, but especially reality TV.
Meanwhile, the Emmys are ongoing this week, with the Creative Arts awards spread across five nights, and then the prime-time telecast Sunday on ABC.
I’ll have a full list of award winners on Sunday night.
The live streams haven’t exactly been pulling in viewers; last night’s, which focused on scripted shows, had just 518 views on YouTube as I write this at 7:30 a.m. ET. Monday’s, which focused on unscripted, now has 13,000 views—and that means someone watched for at least 30 seconds.
Anyway, Monday’s did have this really nice segment: "Survivor Salutes the Crew with Jeff Probst.” It has lots of behind-the-scenes photos from Survivor, plus Jeff mentioning all the departments and crew that it takes to produce this show.
In other news this week:
NeNe Leakes quit The Real Housewives of Atlanta
Halloween Baking Championship premiered (with new host Carla Hall!) and so did 17 other reality shows.
I added a bunch of new shows to my fall reality TV show premiere list, including a show based on the podcast Song Exploder, and several Halloween-time paranormal series.
I also contributed to Heavy’s What Do ‘Big Brother’ Experts Think of Season 22 So Far?
Speaking of Big Brother, last week I said I was working on a story about it —and I still am! Should be up today, now that I found my way into the story with something that happened yesterday.
So I’m going to go work on that, and perhaps a piece on RuPaul's Drag Race: Las Vegas Revue, which I find fascinating and weird. Then I’ll watch more Pottery Throw Down.
I hope whatever you watch, it’s fantastic. I’m always glad for recommendations or suggestions, so send away! Have a great weekend, and always mask up when you go out.
best,
Andy
🌄 This is Reality in Focus issue 212, first sent 18 September 2020, and the only time it ever threw pottery it resulted in something I thought I should throw away but is still in use today as a cat bowl.
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