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It's SCHM-OVER! - The Finale of THE JOE SCHMO SHOW -the "fake" hit U.S. Reality... |
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Banned User
Join Date: Jul 2003
Location: Miami, Florida
Posts: 609
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It's SCHM-OVER! - The Finale of THE JOE SCHMO SHOW -the "fake" hit U.S. Reality...
Note: Here are a few articles about the finale of THE JOE SCHMO SHOW - the "fake" U.S. Reality show that's a spoof on reality shows:
Source: The Boston Globe A genuine winner in fake reality: Unwitting mark is hero of 'Schmo' By Katie Johnston, Globe Staff, 10/28/2003 In the fourth episode of the reality show "Lap of Luxury," Earl, a 62-year-old ex-Marine, is voted out of the mansion. The contestants have gotten to know and like one another by this time, and a few of them start to cry after the vote is tallied. The one who takes it the hardest is Matt, a law school dropout who questions, with tears streaming down his face, why he agreed to be on the show. "Nothing is worth this -- no amount of money . . . " he says. "It's too much pressure." What Matt doesn't realize is that Earl, the man he is feeling so much emotion for, is no Marine Corps veteran. He's an actor. They're all actors. In fact, every line, except Matt's, is scripted. Every contest is rigged. The so-called "Lap of Luxury" is actually Spike TV's "The Joe Schmo Show," which concludes tonight at 9, and Matt -- a pizza-delivery guy who refers to himself as "just a guy from Pittsburgh" -- is the schmo. And the show's unwitting hero. Matt is the only "real" contestant on this fake reality show that promises a paltry $100,000 as its grand prize. Not surprisingly, Matt is poised to win. One by one, a parade of stereotyped contestants -- the gay guy, the good girl, the rich girl, the schemer -- has been voted off the show. Each contestant is represented by a collector's plate with his or her picture on it, and when someone is ousted, Ralph, the smarmy host, gives a speech about returning to "your sad existence working for the Man" and and then hurls that person's plate into the fireplace. "Ashes to ashes, dust to dust," he says. "You're dead to us." Smash! Cue the throbbing tribal drums. The truly remarkable aspect of "Joe Schmo" isn't its cheesy send-up of other reality shows or its behind-the-scenes shots of producers gasping at unexpected events, it is the casting of Matt Kennedy Gould. Matt is unlike anyone you've ever seen on television. He's honest and open, vulnerable and humble, kind and affectionate -- the kind of guy who roots for the underdog and hugs people he barely knows, the kind of guy whose claws aren't nearly sharp enough to win a real reality show. "Terms of Endearment" is one of his favorite movies, for goodness sake. Sure, he schemes against another contestant at one point, but it's because he has a crush on her, and she likes someone else. "Like I said many times before," Matt says, "I just want a house, a dog, and a girl." The reality craze is clearly dwindling, but with its clever parody of the genre and its refreshing star, "The Joe Schmo Show" almost makes you sad to see it end. At first it's easy to feel sorry for Matt -- the poor guy's getting duped on national television, after all -- but once it becomes clear what a decent, genuine person he is, you feel sorrier for the actors. When Matt says, "I tried my hardest not to lie," they almost seem to squirm. The contests to win the red, feathery immunity robe, which protects its wearer from being voted out, are unabashedly cheesy. One requires them to model one another's underwear to see if the others can guess whose it is. In another, they smear themselves in honey and roll around in money. The worst one has to be the contest in which they each cannonball into the pool to see who can get a model's white T-shirt wet and reveal the clue beneath it. Matt's eyes frequently widen in surprise, but he seems to buy the "Lap of Luxury." Or does he? Every time an actor goofs his character's story or lets a "real" moment slip, Matt catches it. "Are you lying?" he asks one of them. After a meeting with one of the supposed network executives, Matt wonders out loud if the "executive" is an actor. You can see the panic wash over the actors' faces. They genuinely seem to like Matt, and they're nervous, worried about his reaction when he learns the truth. Will he be crushed? Will he laugh it off and hug them all? Or will he shock them all with what he knows? |
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#2 |
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Banned User
Join Date: Jul 2003
Location: Miami, Florida
Posts: 609
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Source: JAM! and Toronto Sun
Wednesday, October 29, 2003 It's Schm-over ... for our society By BILL BRIOUX -- Toronto Sun What a world we live in folks, when TV producers comb a nation for the one genuine person left in America and then shatter him on television eight minutes at a time. Matthew Kennedy Gould is not Joe Schmo. The guy who gives up his eyes and his evening, warmed only by a wonky lap top, is the real Joe Schmo. Don't cry for Matthew Kennedy Gould. Cry for ourselves. The Spike TV series concluded last night with the nine other players in the phony game show Lap Of Luxury revealing to Gould that they were all actors and he had been totally punk'd on national television. "My name's not Hutch," confessed the guy whose name is not Hutch. "I'm an actor; I live in Los Angeles." "WHAAAA?" said Gould. It was the sound of an innocent heart breaking. The 27-year-old Pittsburgh pizza delivery driver looked like he'd just been punched in the monkey testicles. "What the f--- is going on?" he said. "Someone fill me in!" Oh, he got filled in all right. For two hours, in an awkward transition between phony reality show and a "real" after show, the producers tried to atone for their sin of ruining his life by giving him a cheque for $100,00 US (half of which he'll have to fork over in taxes, the other half, eventually, to lawyers and therapists) as well as flat screen TVs and trips to Tahiti. They might as well have thrown in 30 pieces of silver. "We did this all for you, buddy," said smarmy host Ralph Garman, who genuinely is a smarmy host. The next two hours were pure Oprah, a teary benediction. How much they all loved him. What a bright future he has. How good all this was for him. "We didn't want to emotionally scar this guy," said the actor who played the "gay" character, Kip. "We just didn't take into account how big a heart he had." Yeah, it is impossible to believe anybody could still care about a fellow human being on television. Many viewers were convinced ol' Matt would step down and say, "Gotcha!" himself, that he was in on the joke all along. Instead, he had his pants pulled down and we all pointed. For weeks. His poor parents back in Pittsburgh were shown. His dad just wanted the best for him. Gould stayed in character until the bitter end. He hugged Kip, even though he wasn't really gay. He hugged the cheque, because apparently it is real and will clear. "The crew is real? Phew!" he said. In the end, he got to rub chocolate all over the one called Molly. If he didn't get to sleep with her after the series, or at least Kip, the producers should be castrated. We learned that the dog feces he was served (and refused to eat) was really liverwurst, which doesn't say a whole lot for liverwurst. Still, as Garman actually said, dog crap wasn't the only thing Gould had trouble swallowing. In the hour-long Joe Schmo: The Aftermath, he admitted that the whole scam was "bothersome in some ways." It was sinking in, and he was in shock. "I can't believe that the whole show was based around me." How close did he come to figuring it all out? "Like a three (out of 10)," he said. Then the understatement of the year: "I'm definitely a gullible type person." He admitted toward the end that he's "not a big fan of the name" Joe Schmo but indicated he could live with it. That's good, because he will, for the rest of his life. Still, incredibly, he said it was a small price to pay. "There couldn't be a better Schmo," he said, absolving everyone. That, however, wasn't the biggest shock last night. The biggest shock came during a U.S. commercial for a video game called Conflict Desert Storm II: Back To Baghdad. It showed some official calling all the generals back for another kick at Iraq. It is rated T for Teen. You want reality? There's your reality. |
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