The titillating scandals and heart rendering stories of triumph that are so synonymous with reality television have completely swept the world over, allowing viewers everywhere to embrace their inner "guilty pleasure" lover. Chinese viewers are apparently no different—for the past decade or so, it seems that you couldn't go five minutes flipping through channels without some sort of reality television show popping up. It's particularly interesting to see what works and what doesn't here. Which major reality hits are big both in the West and in China? Why do they succeed or fail? What kind of circuses will be welcome in China in the future?
The successes
For years now, singing competitions such as American Idol, X Factor, and The Voice have reigned in viewers all over the Western television-watching world with little more than a three-judge panel—generally consisting of a token "jerk", "sympathizer" and "hipster"—and a couple dozen contestants with dreams of making it big. And these same basic ingredients have been the recipe for television success in China as well—following China's opening up in the 1980s, performance culture (which has always been prevalent in China) was quickly embraced by the TV viewing public; the advent of this "reality competition" model immediately became a massive hit with Chinese viewers.
In case you haven't seen one of the wildly popular television programs, each season's competition goes something like this: blind audition, battle rounds, knockouts, and, lastly, a spectacular live performance by the surviving finalists. Contestants are chosen based on their vocal talent by the judges who are already well established within their respective country's music industry. These contestants then join teams with their fellow competitors, and go through numerous rounds perfecting their vocal chops and getting private training from famous musical faces.
Despite the original show debuting in a country vastly different from China, The Voice(中国好声音)—which normally airs Friday evenings at 17:00 on Zhejiang Satellite TV—has become an ever-popular presence on Chinese televisions. And even though it's somewhat sickeningly similar to every other reality singing competition out there today, The Voicestill commands a huge viewership, regardless of culture, ethnicity, nationality, etc. The show also places far more emphasis on discovering and nurturing "fresh talent" than similar shows that emphasize creating a personality or look. Perhaps this focus gives it more credibility or authenticity with viewers, with the competition being considered as more a legitimate process of cultivating raw talent than as a simple reality program ripe for drama and scandal.
The failures
When Super Girl(超级女生), China's female only version of American Idol, was cancelled at it's peak of popularity—fetching nearly 400 million viewers per episode—questions arose from viewers as to why such a well-received show would be cancelled. The official reason for the sudden cancellation was because the series had "ran too long". Nevertheless, mumblings of censorship were quickly perceived as the real reason for the show's downfall. Previous comments by conservative former culture minister Liu Zhongde, who described the show as ‘vulgar', ‘insulting of education' and ‘poison to the young people' only confirmed this opinion. Despite such criticisms, one of the major selling points of the show was that it encouraged women to pursue their dreams and be *super* in their own individual way. Li Yuchun (李宇春), the daughter of a working class family turned singing superstar, is Super Girl's biggest success story. Not only did this singing sensation overcome a lack of opportunity and encouragement; once she became famous, she continued to keep her unique style (which originally inspired much criticism) and inspire others to stay true to themselves.
Several years ago, You're the One (非诚勿扰) was singularly China's hottest dating show of the new millennium. However, soon after coming on the air, the show came under major scrutiny from a variety of groups and brought a storm of official and public disapproval, most notably after the famous "crying in a Mercedes over laughing on a bike" comment from female contestant Ma Nuo (马诺). Chinese authorities accused the show of spreading the ‘wrong values', while, the public was concerned that their emotions were being toyed with by cheap ploys, such as "secret" love affairs and surprise eliminations, which were constructed by witty producers and planted contestants.
After the majority of the heated accusations subsided, If You're the One changed from a flashy platform of sexy flirtation and excessive riches into a more psychologically and mentally grounded show with "morally guided" questions. The producers went as far as to add Huang Han (黄菡) as a judge—a Party school psychology teacher whose main purpose was to "balance" the show and add more legitimacy to the program.
While it's impossible to see Ifas a complete failure, its neutered form is nowhere near as popular as the earlier version.
The shocking
While not all reality shows in China are as wonderfully welcome as The Voiceor If You're the One, other enjoy abundant viewership by being a bit more experimental. For example, in the United States, The Swan shocked audiences by having "ugly duckling"-esque women endure a variety of cosmetic treatments, surgeries, and mentally painful encounters with specialists all in order to compete in the "Swan Pageant" finale. Contestants underwent startling transformations that turned average looking women into plastic, shellacked beauties. The show wasn't really seen as anything other than an hour of shock value, vanity, and raw self-esteem inducing entertainment. Despite the "novelty" of the idea, the series was cancelled in 2005.
Although the American series was a major flop, China wasn't too far behind in its own boundary-breaking beauty show. Lovely Cinderella, a 2007 show produced by Changsha TV, featured 14 contestants who go under the knife to participate in a similar type of beauty competition. After several elimination rounds, a winner was chosen from the remaining seven to receive the grand prize of 50,000 RMB and a trip to Hawaii. While in contestants in both shows underwent cosmetic surgery and extreme makeovers to win the pageant, Lovely Cinderella diverged from The Swanbythe type of footage that was used. In the Chinese version, audiences saw firsthand footage of women moaning in pain from liposuction, facial reconstruction, and post-operative bruising; a major departure from The Swan, which showed more of the mental process of becoming a "swan" as opposed to the physical process. While the show was meant as entertainment, the social commentary side of the Chinese series was blatant and a prominent part of the show's success. The show was eventually canceled and is no longer viewable via Chinese TV, however several other similar shows have taken on a similar topic and are still fairly popular amongst Chinese audiences.
The future
As for what Chinese audiences may be ready for (or for what they find offensive), the answer does not necessarily lie in demographics and viewer numbers as much as in official motives and opinion. While it seems that Chinese "reality" audiences enjoy occasionally scandalous, but ultimately moral and heartwarming scenarios, the unscripted nature of many of the West's most popular reality television shows are nowhere to be found on Chinese television screens. Perhaps for now the teen moms, substance abuse interventions, wedding disasters, and Big Brother shows that allow audiences a voyeuristic look at unscripted emotion are still too much for China.
Yet, as China's development continues to move forward at breakneck speeds, viewers may begin to clamor for shows that include more audience participation, racier topics, and shocking stories. For now, only The Voice provides any such platform for participation. And according to CSM—a company that measures TV audience preference—many of the shows that were so popular the previous year are now being criticized for their lack of originality and for being blatant copies of Western shows. Only the future will tell if less scripted and more unpredictable content will become a common feature of Chinese reality television.
