Essay on “Entertainment Industry” Complete Essay for Class 9, Class 10, Class 12 and Graduation and other classes.

Entertainment Industry

In the past five years, the entertainment industry has been more and more focused on the scheme of reality-based entertainment. This urge for live television has made a great force upon major network television stations. Shows such as MTV’s Real World and CBS’s Survivor are great indicators of society’s passion with drama in a “live” situation. It seems our obsession with these shows stems from our desire to focus our attention away from our own tribulations and focus on problems elsewhere. Our mysterious want for conflict among others has forced many networks to provoke such drama, for example in Survivor, where castaways are forced to take sides and vote another Member off the island. This idea of social Darwinism in shows like Survivor and the ever so popular Big Brother force major networks to create entertainment that both provoke and stimulate disagreement among participants. People are now turning to the movie industry to get away from such realistic forms of entertainment. Moviegoers can simply escape reality for a few hours by entertaining themselves with themes such as action, thrillers, romance and science fiction. Real-life issues however can be distorted at times when being seen second hand. MTV’s Real World has been accused several times of editing their tape purposely to show conflict for the viewers. Add cameras and you are guaranteed drama. This was the same for CBS’s Big Brother this past season. Although the majority of time residents got along just fine, there were many scenes that focused on the personal problems of those living in the house. Whether it dealt with a crush on another member of the house, or a disagreement, viewers were able to relate their issues to those in the house, making them feel as if they are not alone. This is a primary reason why we see such an increase in reality-based television these days. If you analyze current rankings among primetime network shows, you will not find as many reality based shows. This is because seasons of both Survivor and Big Brother have just ended. New series’ will be coming out sometime in 2001, where networks feel the impact will be even greater than last time. ABC’s Who Wants To Be A Millionaire is however still one of the top syndicated shows in the industry today. Its Indian version “Kaun Banega Crorepati” was equally successful in India and neighbouring countries. This provides both inconsequential and real life perspective for viewers out there.

Because movies can be sometimes far fetched, people are many times inspired to act upon what they have seen in movies. Many school killings such as Columbine have been said to be inspired by movies, specifically Basketball Diaries, in which Leonardo Di Caprio’s character shoots his entire class during school. These fantasy ideas given to viewers can sometimes be dangerous for susceptible teenagers to see, but thanks to laws such as our rating system, the industry tries it’s best to keep such movies out of the minds of our youth. Another relationship that I found to be very insightful is that of the nightly news and drama based shows such as Big Brother. As resolute on earlier in this class, news today deals with mostly negative information and investigative reporting. This so called drama we see in the news is highly demanded; ironically this is exactly what voyeuristic viewers yearn for as well: a situation where conflict and negativity are highly prevalent. In a nation of immense variety, society has found a common interest when it comes to television shows today. Reality-based entertainment is definitely the standard for today’s major networks. It will be interesting to see what stations come out with in the next few years that deal with our voyeuristic wants. The question on my mind is how far are people willing to go when it comes to submitting themselves to the public for means of entertainment. From what I have witnessed so far, the more money offered, the farther people are willing to take away their privacy and cash it in for fame. What we must realize though is that television shows that are based on real life are still television shows. It’s entertainment and we must not let ourselves get buried into the turmoil of others we see on TV today, even if it seems “live”.