Big Brother At War With Glass House
We thought Big Brother had its day years ago; America didn’t agree and now all hell’s broken loose. Just as the original reality show is renewed for a 14th series in America, a rival US broadcaster has decided to launch a competitor show. ABC defied Big Brother host CBS’ legal threats and went ahead with its new series The Glass House. The show bears an uncanny resemblance to the stalwart reality programme. 14 people are locked up in a house (made of glass, funnily enough) with cameras following their every move. Every week, two people are voted into ‘limbo’, and the public decide which of the two re-enters the house and which exits the game for good. Sound familiar?? ABC claims, and had to prove in court, that the programme differs from Big Brother because the viewers get to decide everything. There is no controlling ‘Big Brother’ force. The audience decides what the housemates do, what they eat, who stays and who goes. There isn’t even a presenter; all footage is narrated by a robotic voice. Crucially, the competitors can also ask the viewers one question every week, and will receive a response within 24 hours. This could be something simple like ‘who won the football?’ or something more tactical like ‘should I trust the girls in the house?’. So does the new show intrigue you? Or is it BB overload? Given the original concept had to move to Channel 5 to stay on UK screens, The Glass House producers will have to put across a damn good sales pitch to convince a UK broadcaster to make a series here. Watch The Glass House trailer below, and then read the ever-so-slightly vitriolic statement released by CBS:
CBS Statement:
Los Angeles, June 20, 2012 – Subsequent to recent developments in the creative and legal community, CBS Television today felt it was appropriate to reveal the upcoming launch of an exciting, groundbreaking and completely original new reality program for the CBS Television Network.
The dazzling new show, DANCING ON THE STARS, will be broadcast live from the Hollywood Forever Cemetery, and will feature moderately famous and sort of well-known people you almost recognize competing for big prizes by dancing on the graves of some of Hollywood’s most iconic and well-beloved stars of stage and screen.
“This very creative enterprise will bring a new sense of energy and fun that’s totally unlike anything anywhere else, honest,” said a CBS spokesperson, who also revealed that the Company has been working with a secret team for several months on the creation of the series, which was completely developed by the people at CBS independent of any other programming on the air. “Given the current creative and legal environment in the reality programming business, we’re sure nobody will have any problem with this title or our upcoming half-hour comedy for primetime, POSTMODERN FAMILY.”
“After all,” the spokesperson added, “people who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones.”
Ouch!
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