So last night I was watching this show called “Top Design” on Bravo. It’s like a competition for interior decorators. Each week, they’re given a project (design a child’s bedroom, design a hotel room, design a room using garage sale finds) and then each project is judged and someone is voted off the show. During a commercial break, Bravo ran an ad for their latest “competition” show, “Shear Genius.” This one will consist of a group of hairstylists, who will, no doubt, be given some sort of hairstyling challenge each week before one of them is voted off.
Seeing that ad made me realize that this whole “I wanna be a (fill-in-the-blank) and this show is my chance to get my foot in the door” genre has really gotten out of control. We’ve got American Idol, Project Runway, America’s Next Top Model, Top Chef, Top Design, and now this new Shear Genius show. I even saw part of a show a couple weeks ago where the owner of the Coyote Ugly bar was looking for a new Coyote Ugly girl, and she was having a competition to find one. The requirements pretty much consisted of being able to dance on a bar without falling off, and knowing how to make a vodka tonic (I can’t remember what goes into a vodka tonic! This is sooooo hard…). I could even throw Dancing With the Stars into the mix – which, while not a way for no-names to make names for themselves (although saying all the dancers are “stars” is a bit of a stretch…), is still the old “vote ‘em off” model.
It seems like every time I switch a channel I see one of these shows. We have singers, dancers, models, chefs, interior designers, bartenders and now – hairstylists? I think once you’ve reached the point where a haircut is the focal point of your show, you’ve pretty much run out of ideas. I’ve been to a styling salon… it isn’t exactly a hotbed of captivating excitement. I didn’t even like that movie “Edward Scissorhands” very much…
So I have to wonder what’s next. Who will the next “vote-off” show be voting off? Accountants? Lawyers? New York City pretzel cart vendors? How about “Beverly Hills’ Next Top Plastic Surgeon”? Every week, the wannabe plastic surgeons would be assigned people with big noses and flat chests, and they would transform them and parade them in front of the judges. And each week, someone’s plastic surgeon dreams would be shattered when they were asked to turn in their scalpel and go home.
I want to know when someone will create “America’s Next Top Writer.” Because c’mon – I could totally kick the butts of my competition. I’d be writing my way to the grand prize, and they’d all be writing their way into oblivion. Okay, maybe not. I may be slightly exaggerating my abilities… And anyway, I have to admit that a show about writing would be even less interesting than a show about haircuts. If, for instance, anyone were filming me right now (as Rick insists he does, with hidden cameras all over the house), they would simply see a girl standing at her computer, casually chewing gum and sporadically typing sentences… she occasionally hits “backspace” to delete a word or phrase, and now and then consults dictionary.com to check spelling or look for synonyms (even though she’s not sure she can trust dictionary.com anymore, what with the whole “comfortability” fiasco…). In other words – what I’m doing here does not make for compelling television programming…
But wait… I think I have an idea for a new show – America’s Next Top Chocolate Eater! Each week, contestants have to eat lots of chocolate. And for some reason, most of them get voted off. I’m not sure why. I haven’t worked out all the details yet. But there’s definitely chocolate, and I would definitely get to eat it. And the rest really isn’t all that important. Besides, people will watch ANYTHING if it’s on TV…
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