March 2, 2000

My immediate inspiration for this discourse is, of course, "Who Wants to Marry a Multimillionaire?" I didn't actually watch it, mind you, any more than any of you did. (You did watch it? Shame on you!)  I only found out about it the same way all other decent, civilized, thoughtful people did -- when it led to a particularly delicious media uproar.

First, upright critics observed that the show's contestants were more or less being invited to join the oldest profession -- near the top of the salary scale, to be sure, but as George Bernard Shaw once observed, once you've said "yes," all else is quibbling over price. Then it surfaced that the grand prize for whom these ladies were competing had a somewhat chequered past, including getting slapped with a restraining order by an ex-girlfriend.

Much worse, perhaps, there are rumors that his financial statements weren't entirely in order. If you're in the market for a millionaire, you shouldn't expect a gentleman as well, but you are expecting rich: anything less is false advertising. Alas, the latest fillip is that the lucky winner was herself a tad less than honest; she wasn't really a Gulf War vet as claimed. This may not matter to Mr. Multimillionaire -- unless his particular scene involves boots and fatigues. And, who knows? Perhaps she has a heart of gold.

All of this backwash has been far more entertaining than the show itself must have been. Even the Murdoch organization had to pull back, not only cancelling the show, but ordering an internal investigation of how it ever -- perish the thought -- got approved by his network. I like that. But as with "internal investigations" by Ken Starr's office, don't hold you breath waiting for the findings. You'll turn blue.

Now, we hear, the general embarrassment is so great that doubts are being cast on other tacky "reality" shows as well. These are, notoriously, the bottom feeders of the television world. They do, however, have two virtues. One is that they are cheap to put on; like magazine "news" shows you don't need expensive sets or a cast with the talent level required by, say "Baywatch." Their other and greater virtue is that people really do love watching other people act even stupider than themselves.

Am I wallowing shamelessly in all this? Of course I am! So are you. (If you want "reality" entertainment for sophisticated citizens of the Net age, check out the Darwin Awards.)

In the old days, putting stupidity on the air wasn't easy; it required finding people, like the Three Stooges, who knew how to act stupid, a fairly rare and demanding talent. In the videocam age, you don't have to go looking for the likes of Larry, Moe, and Curly if you want stupidity; you can get the real thing -- and pay hardly anything for it. Genuinely stupid people jump at the opportunity to be stupid on TV.

But I digress: Back to Rupert Murdoch. He too has a rare and demanding talent, for finding the worse in us (i.e., our unabashed, sub-hypocritical selves) and selling it to us for big bux. Before "Multimillionaire" there was Fox News Sunday -- punditry without pretense -- and the rest of the Fox Network lineup. Before that was the NY Post's immortal headline, "Headless Body Found in Topless Bar." Before even that (though not, sad to say, for us puritanical Americans), were his Brit and Australian tabs, mixing right-wing moralizing politics with those charmingly underdressed Page Three Girls.

Arthur Clarke's Third Law states that the only way to discover the limits of the possible is to go beyond them to the impossible. This is what Murdoch achieved with "Who Wants to Marry a Multimillionaire?" He proved, after over 200 years, that it is indeed possible to underestimate the taste of the American public. For that unique contribution to our culture, he deserves our true and heartfelt gratitude. 

-- Rick Robinson

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Last revised 11/07/2006 ... by RM Robinson

Email me: Lyonesse@compuserve.com

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