Up in Splitsville

If I was George Orwell writing a sequel to Big Brother, I would be all over the place now. MTV India recently released its brand reality show Splitsville and it's not news anymore. A clutch of girls fight it out for two sickly sweet chocolaty boys on an exotic location - perfect for a holiday. With dialogues like 'Main pyaz katne wali bharatiya nari nahi hoon' (mind you this is one of the participants) I couldn't help fathom if the archetypical bharatiyanari ends up teary-eyed with slices of onions and tomatoes in both hands. The guys get to dump one girl per episode, an example of the game element in any game show.

There's something gladiatorial about game shows in that the participants make an irresistable public spectacle. MTV's Roadie 5.0 was a laugh riot with a single episode airing all possible combinations of inglis galis. Channel V's Get Gorgeous (a model hunt) has the Bitch Diaries an antecedent to a rather bitchy elimination episode. Our home-spun version of Big Brother - Big Boss was a lesson in raunchiness. What with Rakhi Sawant's razor-sharp tongue and frequent abuses to Bhowjpuri superishtar Ravi Kumar I can only feel sorry for the other stars who joined the show to save a flagging career. Separting the real from the 'act up' is a challenge, really. I would personally prefer a CCTV (close-circuit tv) in the neighbourhoods to capture footages of our daily misadventures or even fly-in-the-wall docusoaps with matter-of-fact names like 'Airport' or 'Shopping Mall.'

Not too long ago AXN aired a gameshow on a forelorn island 'Survivor' with a number of challenging and unpleasant tasks. However, as a caveat, one of the edgy competitors later featured in a movie called 'The Animal.' The overtly theatrical 'Big Boss' tempted our theatrical lachrymal glands and aroused the conscience of the human right activist in us (now that's another story.) Pop Idol in the west was followed by Pop Star in India--a hunt for talent among the ordinary college goer and later a degree of voyeurism into the plush hotel where they were stationed, the makeover has something of a Cinderalla fairytale syndrome. Bindaas TV's Dadagiri every bit as obvious in its lift from AXN's Fear Factor format starts airing in early July. And, paradoxically, my sequel to Orwell's is on the way.