Entertainment

How much bad reality can you handle?

November 13, 2009 Edition 1

Bianca Coleman

THINGS have been serious in the television viewing world for the past few weeks, so it's time to balance it out with some good old fashioned rubbish, and where better to find that than in reality shows?

The third season of Rock Of Love finally started last Sunday (Vuzu, Sundays at 7.30pm). The reasons, presented by the good folks at MultiChoice, are as vague as ever and I suspect their strategy is to annoy me until I throw up my hands in frustration and give up.

It doesn't really matter now anyway, and the first episode of the season, in which Bret Michaels has moved the action out of the ubiquitous mansion and into the cramped and volatile space of two tour buses, did not disappoint.

Among the initial contestants were a former porn star, a Penthouse Pet, a decidedly less classy nude model and a crazy Brazilian (person, not grooming style).

There was enough silicone and peroxide to sink a battle ship, and within minutes there was drunken vomiting, screaming, swearing catfights complete with drinks being poured over bleached heads, and the Brazilian had her hands around someone's neck with intent to do grievous bodily harm. Great stuff.

In case this is news to you, Rock of Love is former Poison front man Michaels's quest to find a girlfriend from this pool of dodgy tarts. For the third time.

Just about anything can be the premise for a reality show, and over on Animal Planet (Fridays at 6.15pm) you can watch the second season of Groomer Has It in which dog groomers battle it out for top honours. Who knew it was such a serious occupation, right up there with cheffing, running business corporations and fashion design?

Apparently it is. Challenges include tying the perfect top knot - and they are not the same for every breed of dog, I have learned - bathing pot bellied pigs, and teaching third-graders how to brush and trim a yarn dog.

In one episode, the contestants were divided into teams to groom the members of a canine wedding party, the "marriage" of a white Westie and a black Scottie. And yes, there were vows.

Some of the challenges are sensitive: to make old dogs feel young and spry again, and give them a youthful expression.

Appropriately, Janice Dickenson was a guest judge for that episode, although I'm not convinced dogs have enough vanity to care what they look like.

As ridiculous as many reality shows are, Hollywood can still laugh at itself and the desperate craving for fame and attention that drives people to humiliate themselves on the telly.

To wit, Reality Hell (Wednesdays at 8.30pm on E! Entertainment). From fake dating shows to wife swops, they take one hapless innocent, add several actors, mix well with outrageously unexpected and difficult situations, then sit back to watch the fun.

Sometimes a person just doesn't know what to believe anymore.

We have our own share of reality programmes right here at home, and the latest to come our way - well, it will air on M-Net Series in 2010, which is closer than it appears in the rear view mirror - is Style Apprentice.

Based on Running In Heels, it will place six interns with Fairlady who will, along with the title and bragging rights, get a paid internship at the magazine and a foot in the door of the glamorous world of magazines, as well as a new wardrobe, laptop, cellphone and all the right accessories a budding fashionista might need.

Style Apprentice will be shot in Cape Town, and applications have to be in by December 14. See www.fairlady.com or the current issue for more details.

TONIGHT

Groomer Has It (Animal Planet, 6.15pm): The groomers travel to a rescue shelter to transform a group of homeless dogs for a special adoption fair, where one of them will be adopted by a celebrity.

SUNDAY

The Biggest Loser UK (e.tv, 4pm): Really? Do we really want to watch yet another bunch of fatties slim down? Never underestimate the appetite of the television viewer for the comfort and familiarity of a predictable diet.

IN THE WEEK

Heroes (SABC3, Monday at 9pm): The long-awaited season three - or volume three as the opening credits would have it - with chapter one, The Second Coming.

The action begins with an assassination attempt on Nathan Petrelli and the consequences in the future. Hiro gets a posthumous message from his father and the fate of the world again rests in his hands.

Sylar, who is never as dead as you think he is, visits the cheerleader and Mohinder has a breakthrough in his research.

Hung (M-Net, Tuesday at 9.30pm): Thomas Jane stars as Ray Drecker in this HBO comedy series. An unhappy, divorced father of teenage twins, Ray is a cash-strapped basketball coach at a suburban high school.

But there's more to this miserable life - Ray's house burns down. What's a guy to do? If he's well-endowed in the swimsuit area, he can turn to prostitution.

Of course, it's not a completely immoral tale ... to his credit, Ray does still try to live a normal and conventional life by enrolling in an entrepreneurship seminar where he discovers the winning tool which he hopes will bring him much-needed fortune. Anne Heche co-stars as Ray's ex-wife.

House Bunny (M-Net, Wednesday at 9.30pm): M-Net has declared November comedy month, which is why there are so many stupid movies on at the moment.

Call me old fashioned, but I don't need a bodily function gag to make a movie funny. This one caught my attention because I remember it from an episode of Girls of The Playboy Mansion (new season, new girls, still freaky, E! Entertainment, Sundays at 11pm). From the writers of Legally Blonde, it is described as a "feel-good romp about a bubbly blonde who surprises everyone, including herself, when she finds her real purpose in life".

Anna Faris stars as Shelley, a Playboy bunny kicked out of the Mansion because she's too old (only 27, but that's 72 in Bunny years).

Shelley finds herself on a college campus, where she becomes house mother to the girls of Zeta sorority, giving them hair, make-up and deportment tips, and helping them to work out how to outwit the bitchy girls on campus.

The only thing Shelley can't work out is how to woo the nicest man she's ever met. And there you were thinking life was easier for the pretty girls.

The Take (M-Net, Thursday at 9.30pm) is a four-part series based on a Martina Cole novel. In it, Freddie Jackson has just got out of prison and is out to prove the East End belongs to him.