Head for the Hills

Based on the reaction to last week's video it can be surmised that most of my readers not only don't watch television but don't stand in line at the supermarket.  Well well well!  I can't say I approve, but go ahead and do you thing.  Actually, no, don't.  TV rules.  Everyone should be watching more TV.  Even bad tv is better than most people give it credit for.

And maybe truly crap tv like THIS HILLS is secretly genius.  This post from a blog I never read before today puts forth this very thesis quite convincingly.  Seriously, I really wish I wrote this because it's exactly how I feel about reality television:

"Some people take issue with the fact that some aspects of "The Hills" are fake, staged, or scripted, whereas I consider metatheatre the key to the aesthetic success of "The Hills." The complex interplay between the multiple layers of plot is what makes the show so compelling...

On "The Hills," the theatrical device of a play within a play is taken to a new level, with its multiple interwoven layers of fiction and the shimmering thread of Truth that runs through them. There is the surface plot, a conflation of actual events in the lives of the characters and events staged by the producers. There is another plot reflected in the tabloids and gossip columns. There is the plot as each individual character believes it to be and the plot they attempt to portray on screen and articulate in interviews. There is a larger story that encompasses the various stars' experiences with television program itself as they expose their lives and personas to the public, the producers' attempts to orchestrate drama and dupe the audience, and the incredible interplay between fiction and reality. The producers and the audience are all participants in this larger story. And buried among all that, there is Truth. There are real people with real personalities and real emotions and real relationships. And the Truth can be entertaining and amusing and depressing and heartbreaking and surprising, but to detect it at all is exhilarating. Every facial expression or gesture, every interview and every rumor hints at the Truth among the layers..."

Doesn't that sound intellectual?  Duh!  It should!  The Hills is classy/sophisticated pomo metatext.  And Heidi and Lauren Conrad are the Cindy Sherman and Karen Finley of our times.  (JK, Heidi and Lauren are still idiots.)  In conclusion, you should definitely be watching more television if you want to be as smart and cultured as I am.