How is 'reality' manipulated on reality TV?

How is 'reality' manipulated on reality TV?

Mark Cronin (Founder & Producer) gives expert video advice on: Do reality show writers ever invent stories that didn't really happen?; How is 'reality' manipulated on reality TV? and more...

I think it's pretty much acknowledged that they're telling, in general, a true story on a reality show, but there is a lot of creative leeway with the editing, with how you amp up the emotion of the story that you're telling. This is not just through simple things like music, but also through a careful choice of interview bites, even manipulation of interview bites to help tell the story. When we produce the reality shows, we don't just let people sit in front of a camera and decide what they want to say and do, because it would be actually like taping real life, and it wouldn't be interesting. What we do is we set up a situation where the people have to perform, basically. For example, we'll give them a challenge that you must beat this other team at this game or else you will be eliminated tonight. Once you set that up, you put things in motion. It's something they wouldn't do normally. If we just put cameras on people they wouldn't compete normally in silly little games and obstacle courses and photo-shoots; they would just sit and talk to each other. Instead, we basically force the hand of action and we map out a path or an obstacle course of tasks for these people to accomplish, using all kinds of different methods: either they want to win money, or they want to be America's next top model, or whatever it is - there is some reason to keep propelling things forward on a reality show.