(Not for submission to community highlights until I have covered the entire thing in 3-4 blog posts and gone over it a final time. My memory is strong, detailed but works in mysterious ways. Once done, there will be links on top of the posts leading to the others, and the next blog post is due in a few weeks due to artist's melancholy (musician) kicking in, and a lot of medical paperwork and testing being done. I'm also completely out of alcohol.)
Q: Why would you want to take part on a reality show?
A: I was bored out of my skull back then and wanted change, and I thought it could help get me a job. (it did)
Introduction
With that out of the way, hello. If you are a Swedish Screened.com user and have watched Kanal 5 in the last six years, chances are that you've seen me on television. Since my last appearance (reruns in 2008 2009) I have lost over 25 kilograms of weight, grown my beard out, shaved my balding head clean, shaped up both dress code and my act and people still recognize me as "that big faced fella from tv". My home town that was grateful to have a local television celebrity besides the one infamous for sexing up every episode of Big Brother and making Paris Hilton look like intelligent and thoughtful, but even in other cities people will remember my face. Which honestly is a quite unique and easy to recognize face.
In the Christmas day 2011 episode of Rambling Rorie, Matthew spoke about the strange feeling of seeing himself on video. I remember a strange feeling of hearing myself playing around with a boom box and tapes as a child, then seeing myself with the family VHS camera (I got into video capturing early), it wasn't exactly that I hated seeing myself, but I was not 100% comfortable with it - in a very strange unexplainable way. This feeling actually vanished in a short time between signing the contract detailed later on in this wordy blog post and seeing the first trailer for the show on the air. I like to describe it as "the amazing ability to not give a damn". I have a theory that it was the realization that there was no stopping the ball that started rolling that led to it, the fact that everybody would soon see everything from bald spot to toes (will write about the toes in a future blog post in this series, hope you're not that squeamish).
If you appear on television you become a public person. People will recognize you, there will be random greetings, signatures to sign and pictures taken, many of them just flipping a phone camera at you for a second from the distance and that's that. There will also be a lot of people who hate everything about you that they learned from television. The editing that's done in all reality shows can turn the nicest of people into monsters, and socialites into introvert shy people. The camera adds ten pounds, and if the editor feels like it, it can also cut you down to half of your IQ. You will put yourself and your image in the hands of the editors when you sign the contract, this is something not many people are informed of, so even today people of a vulnerable psychological state end up taking their lives after seeing themselves on television.
If you need medicine because of what's going on in your mind, then an appearance on television might not be for you. If you could end up losing your nerves from seeing yourself essentially made fun of or grossly misrepresented by the editing process, it is definitely not for you. If you're simply not used to social activities it could be a learning experience, but if you're willing to take the plunge because anything is better than the dull old life you're experiencing - go for it!
This is the start of a wordy narrative-heavy series of blog posts I'm writing about my experience before, during and after shooting a Swedish reality show about ten nerds living together and trying out manly cool things, hoping to at least provide you an interesting read when everything else has been caught up with. Here is the recruitment poster used, and a quick translation of it:
Black header:
Would you rather use brains over brawn? Are your interests role playing games, computers, politics, physics, strange objects? We're looking for guys ages 20-35 who want to take part in a new TV-series
White column:
Kanal 5 presents a new series
Do you have more than enough courage?
Do you dare to try what you have never done before?
All for one - one for all. The red string of the series is co-operation
But at the same time it requires that you dare to push your existing limits to entirely different levels
Friendship, excitement and new experiences await you who dare take on the challenge
..and naturally, a good lump of cash to the winners
Signing up
2005 was one of the worst years of my life, I spent most of it in great poverty and one week without anything to eat at all sent me into a quarter year long fever that I still haven't recovered from. It was also the year that I started experiencing great pains in and around my right leg socket and hip, which gave me trouble later on in the TV series (took until September 2011 to get at test showing it was Fibromyalgia that I had been carrying for right now eleven years). Things were horrible and I would gladly see change, let's put it at that.
It was a day or two after Christmas 2005, seeing this particular ad with a post-it note clad figure regularly for a weeks time had me intrigued, and finally I caught it while my television wasn't muted. It turned out to be asking for people for a new reality show, males between 20-35, into unusual hobbies or just plain nerdy and not the most manly types, and that was me. I looked up the teletext page (European thing, google it) associated with it and wrote an email with the short personal description they wanted, the very next morning I had a reply asking for my number and that phone call was the highlight of that year, they were interested in me and wanted me over for an initial interview.
Previous knowledge of reality shows for me stretched back to the original Real World series, and up until that point of new years 2005-2006 most of the shows in Sweden focused on headlines and scandals and the participants being the most messed up nutters with a hunger for sex, drugs and becoming a celebrity. Know what I wanted to do instead of being paraded around night clubs in the country? I wanted to hold speeches against bullying at schools around the country. I wanted to do something useful with the inevitable fame, because the public image of somebody known from a reality show was a heavy drinking partying drug-using nitwit, as much as I love a few of their personalities, that's what they are.
A change by chance
The new year came and went like any other, on the second day I took off by train to Stockholm where the company studio was located, a beautiful Scandinavian winter graced my path all the way from my door to theirs and as much as I felt happy and hopeful to get called in for something like that, I felt nervous. What if they'd reject me, what if that show concept they gave to me turned out to be something completely different in practice? I was afraid of heavy physical activities because of my condition and I sort of had a thing against breaking a sweat back then.
I rang their electronic door bell, asked for my contact, walked up a long set of stairs and presented myself. Received a little pamphlet to fill out and a contract to investigate, even if I was not to be part of the program. What always hits people on their first visit to that or any other studio office is that it's huge, airy, great looking, and their bathrooms stalls have mirrors on their walls. While working on that pamphlet Aija Saijoona walks by to talk to a few studio employees and suddenly I found I would be perfectly fine if this was all I was going to get. She's a human being like you and I, but what a helluva human being she is.
soon enough my contact person hailed me and took me to a more isolated room, rigged up a camera to shoot me while answering her questions. Figure that's some way to check people out, see if they've got character for television, and more importantly to see if the truth is being told or not. Remember to not lie on interviews like that should you face one, it's easy to spot. Everything that makes sense was asked about, from the time in school to the family to spare time business, and most importantly, why I wanted to participate. Nothing about religion, sexuality or politics. She gave me the "Why", and I grew a wide smile , I finally got to say what I had been waiting for.
"Nothing happens in my city, or my life, 2005 was hell from start to finish so I want a change from that, and this might also help me get a job"
We wrapped up nearly two hours of interview on good terms, and that night my bed felt more warm and comfortable than ever before. I was thinking positive for the first time in almost a year. (2005 was that bad)
Geeking out
A phone call from another lady at the studio congratulated me for passing the initial interview, and welcomed me over for casting interviews at a later date if still interested, and I certainly was. I carried on grinding in World of Warcraft while she and I spoke for some 90 minutes with extra interview questions, more detailed and deeper than the ones form the first interview, but still not about religion, sexuality and politics (yeah, nailed that down), and once that was done I was emailed codes for another batch of train tickets.
The studio had tens of candidates arranged into several smaller groups, we talked as we waited and came to find almost all the Scandinavian nerd archetypes were in place. We had our measurements taken and weight measured for reasons that came clear later on. I made sure to bring up a little worry I had regarding the contract that asked that the participants were able to swim at least 25 meters, but I was told not to worry.
The big interview had one studio person I had seen before, and someone who seemed to be a psychologist type hired for profiling and inspecting participants. The casting interviews were on the psychological level, are you a leader or a follower, what would you do in this and that situation? A more entertaining little test had me presented with polaroids of the workers in the studio, and I was given just as many terms to connect to these people. Who was a momma's boy, who was 'queer' and such. I wrapped up that test telling them I thought it was weird, because I do not judge people at first glance like that, but dealt out the designations to the people as their visual archetypes saw fit.
We went my over previous interview results, and from that my love of music, they asked and I ended up singing the theme to Thunder Ball in the way of Mike Patton. I brought a bunch of Mr Bungle bootlegs along on my mp3 player for the train trip and that was probably the most acceptable, recognizable tune of the lot, though I would have liked to have sung The Girls of Porn.
The participants wrapped up one after another and were collectively driven back to the central station in Stockholm, we shook hands and hoped to meet again for the shooting.
Stressing out
In the media, no matter its form, print, radio, television or internet, there is a lot of stress. You might have to do a lot of work on a very short notice. You need to pull a helluva effort sometimes, make miracles. It took two weeks for them to go through the applicants from the casting interview and give me the congratulating call. Another few days pass and I get a big envelope in the mail with all the extra information they need, EKG data for their insurance plans, pictures from when I was a baby up until my late teenage years, and then a home video introduction shoot that can only be accepted on tape. And a paper detailing my criminal background, or lack of one, and to send it all in the mail.
The photos were no problem, still have them around and dear lord was I a cute kid. For the video, I had to pull many a string to get a Hi-8 recorder, and then make a stupid video where I show off my arcade cabinet, classic camera collection, talk a little about what I do on my days and such. I did this with no cuts and the camera running at all times, so I adjust the angle a bunch and ramble on, re-take and of course, the people cutting material for the show made use of this. Took a while to accept how brain-dead they made me look.
For the EKG, you know how Medicare works outside of the US right? You step in line and wait, and then it's like $20 to see your doc. I was given a week of wait, and I needed the papers yesterday. Drove around town, checked the yellow pages, stressed out my parental unit driver until I finally found a $150 solution of a private clinic emergency-drop in. My EKG value turned out to be like that of a shut-in fatty on a diet of heat&eat pizza, which is what I was, but at least I had the papers now. The police papers showing I was a nice law abiding Devin Townsend-skullet guy arrived the day after. I was set, and the only thing left to do was to wait, becoming more nervous and also eager day by day until I eventually started having trouble sleeping.
That marks the end of the first write-up, coming up next is the first episode for a single post, and then begins batches of episodes until I wrap this up. My memory still has most of this in store. I might spice up my writing a little as I did my appearance on the show, sorry for that, and if you think I should Wall of the Words less, nnn.. maybe, I'll look into it. I can give you a biblical amount of words for the tiniest little subject matter, I can make it into the least possible amount of words containing the maximum amount of information and knowledge.
The name of the show was SuperNördarna, I don't think the concept was licensed abroad, but I would like to see it done again, I could even see myself going on to take part in leading a show like that because it was a feel-good show like no other when every other reality show was glitz and glamour, botox and plastic surgery, sex and drugs. I'll just say it right here; It tanked in the ratings and was moved from prime-time Thursday to evening Sunday after a few episodes because of all this.
Questions that arise I will answer as time goes on, and if perhaps another Screener has in front of the camera experiences for film or television, I'd like to see another persons take on their time and what they thought of it. Added this to the TV forums, hope nobody minds that.
