Of the past decade, the most prevalent and ubiquitous Television programming has been the reality show, and the genre’s most recent pop-culture following has been MTV’s gold mine “Jersey Shore” which hit initially amused and judgmental viewers across the country like a brick by the summer of 2010. The show offset the second round of Jersey-mania, the former being the early-millennium era of “The Sopranos”. “Jersey-licious”, and “Jersey-Couture” are a couple of Jersey-based reality shows capitalizing on the perpetually kindled fire of the Garden State. Many across the country (Jersyites included) must question just what it is about the eclectic Southern New York neighbor that is so enduringly appealing, in such a way that has rendered a simple peek into a tiny slice of it the highest rated television show today? And what is it about “Jersey Shore” in particular that has millions of viewers across the country finding themselves incorporating the Guido/Guidette star cast’s slang words into their vocabulary, such as “grenades” to describe a girl deemed unattractive? Is it the affably doltish and superficial ways of the Seaside Guido “juicehead” that charms us so? Or is it the pint-sized “Meatball” Snooki and her catty girlfriend posse of perpetually fake-tanned and overly made-up Italian sex dolls that dramatically and humorously co-exist with the former? Or is it the train-wreck theory in general? All encompassingly, it’s safe to say it’s all of the above.
The premise of MTV’s sleeper phenomenon (having just recently completed its third season) is disparagingly simple: a small group of charismatic male and females in their twenties co-exist in an amiably ostentatious (duck phone anyone?), high energy beach house overlooking the Seaside Heights boardwalk, where they are employed (“employed” is one word, “work” is another) at a custom t-shirt shop. Jersey Shore’s sub-categorization in the lucrative reality TV spectrum can encompass the following: docu-soap, docu-sitcom, reality sitcom, reality drama, lifestyle programming, and perhaps even (and it’s a stretch calling it this), romance. What separates Shore from most reality shows today is the ever-present competition aspect of the run-of-the-mill “gamedoc”, ala “America’s Next Top Model”. The show’s boundaries (mainly the house) are decked out with omnipresent means of documenting the rat pack of charmingly shallow, sexed-up narcissists; roughly thirty remote cameras are set up in all rooms of the house (apparently, the only privacy the cast gets during shooting periods is when they shower), and a few handheld digitals operated by cameramen.
The overall aesthetic and viewing format of the show is leisurely surveillance, voyeur, confessional (where the cast sit in front of a camera in a medium close up to relay what they are going through and feeling at certain points in the day in documentary-interview style format), and docu-drama. All this is, of course, edited in post to highlight the most high energy, dramatic moments where the cast’s personality traits are exemplified to intensify. In post, the editors isolate moments of cast at their most idiosyncratic best (or most often, worst), which is what ultimately provides the can’t-look-away shameless entertainment that keeps us watching. Each episode is structured similarly: during the day, we will usually watch the cast lounge about in the house providing some slacker juvenile humor (such as playing harmless pranks on each other) or doing the same at the boardwalk t-shirt shop. Once night hits, both sexes prep for some wild clubbing (usually frequenting their favorite, Club Karma), with the narcissistic guys looking for a hot girl to take home for the night to “smush” (cast’s slang for having intercourse), and the girls endeavoring to do the same, but instead hunting for hunky “juiceheads” of course. The latter half of the show documents the night out; after spending an exorbitant amount of time doing themselves up, with hairspray often filling the entire room, we are in the dark and loud clubs that require the producers to subtitle any dialogue taking place inside.
What must draw viewers in is the “hate that you like it” (or “like that you hate it”) shamelessness of watching these extremely well-groomed Italian-Americans go about their superficial existence of hanging out, partying, getting drunk, and having sex. It’s the wanton lifestyle that makes for some entertaining escapist television, replete with the catty drama that often leads to fights (verbal and physical) to mix it up. New Jersey has clearly become a hot commodity, and Snooki and co are no exception. The show ultimately gives viewers (through the power of editing and some burgeoning hammy egos) a well-balanced mix of comedy and drama. Many seem to find it irresistible to kick back and observe such shallow, over-the-top behavior and excess, as most of us would like to escape from our mundane, over-worked lives. However, underneath it all remains a close bond between these friends, and viewers can really get to know these people who, despite all their faults, are often akin to a family that sticks close together, which is something almost everyone can relate to.
