Spectacular melodrama: the drama of

Spectacular melodrama: the drama of the moment
In terms that echo some of the larger socio-political shifts outlined above, commentators have been concerned with the overall transformation of documentary television into ‘staging the real’ (Kilborn 2003) in a ‘postdocumentary culture’ (Corner 2002) in which ‘the real’ is constituted through a contrived set of scenarios produced for entertainment, rather than any socially realist argumentation of benefit to public culture. Bill Nichols (1991) suggests programming that focuses on the personal and spectacular renders them inert as socio-political phenomena: ‘Spectacle is more properly an aborted or foreclosed form of identification where emotional engagement does not extend as far as concern but remains arrested at the level of sensation’ (p. 234). The characteristic motifs of depthless ‘spectacles of particularity’ in Nichols’s presumption, however, fail to account for how political processes work at the level of sensation and emotion (see Deleuze 2003; Ahmed 2004), a process highly evident in our audience responses. But here we want to consider how the operation of spectacle in ‘reality’ television generates emotional engagement through melodramatic techniques.

By telling intimate stories ‘reality’ television draws on traditions of melodrama, as well as documentary. David Singer (2001) defines melodrama as a ‘cluster concept’ with different configurations of constitutive factors, including pathos; overwrought emotion; dramatic intensity without the pathos (all characters expressing anger, frustration, resentment, disappointment, etc.) moral polarization; non-classical narrative structure and sensationalism. Our textual analysis suggests that dramatic intensity is regularly produced through what we have called ‘the judgement shot’, where, after crisis and chaos, expert advice is given or negative voiceover commentary provided and the participant is held in facial close-up.

Often this is followed by a poignant symbolic image with ironic music, or the repeating and reselecting of various montage shots so that the dramatic significance is intensified. The long-held close-up is the modern equivalent of the theatrical melodramatic tableau – where the stillness and the silence of the actors enable the suspension of action and all attention is given to contemplation of the drama previously enacted. Once we started examining our material in detail for ‘melodramatic moments’ we became aware of the ubiquity of the use of the ‘judgement shot’ to produce dramatic tension. In this sense ‘reality’ television’s relation to ‘reality’ is often more closely linked with ‘emotional realism’ (Ang 1985) where participants take part in what Helen Piper (2004) usefully calls a new category of ‘improvised drama’ more typically allied with the fictive traditions of melodrama than documentary. The use of melodramatic techniques to produce sensation should not surprise us; it is a tried and tested method for making the domestic and everyday more interesting. Peter Brooks maintains that:
The melodramas that matter most convince us that the dramaturgy of excess and overstatement corresponds to and evokes confrontations and choices that are of heightened importance, because in them we put our lives – however trivial and constricted – on the line. (1995: ix)

These techniques follow a long tradition of ‘women’s television’, as Rachel Moseley (2000) notes:
Makeover shows ask the audience to draw on our repertoire of personal skills, our ability to search faces and discern reactions (facilitated by the close-up) from the smallest details – the twitch of a muscle, an expression in the eye – a competence suggested by Tania Modleski as key to the pleasure of soap opera’s melodramatic form. These programmes showcase the threatening excessiveness of the ordinary . . . These are, precisely, instances of powerful spectacular ‘über-ordinariness’: an excess of the ordinary. (p. 314)

Thus the forms of excess and heightened drama, which according to Nichols (1991) in documentary forms generate a distancing effect, limiting modes of engagement, instead on ‘reality’ television offer resonance with our own intimate lives. Bringing together realism with melodrama, Christine Gledhill (1987, 2000) maintains, enables the techniques of film and television to increasingly intervene in ‘private’ life for the moral good of the nation. As ‘reality’ television uses documentary techniques to open out ‘real’ relationships, intimacy, and domesticity, it draws upon melodramatic traditions that give significance to and make daily lives sensational and intense, hence potentially more interesting to watch. Thomas Elsaesser (1987) notes in relation to these traditions, ‘Even if the situations and sentiments defied all categories of verisimilitude and were totally unlike anything in real life, the structure had a truth and life of its own’ (p. 64).

Historically the heroes and heroines of melodrama were not exceptional subjects but characters operating within social norms, making visible and sensational the differences between good and evil. The icon of the ‘good home’, for instance, has long been used to establish the ‘space of innocence’ and its virtuous victims. Melodrama was, and, we assert, still is, one of the main dramatic devices for making moral values visible across many domains of social life. For Brooks (1995) it represents the ‘reaffirmation of society’ of ‘decent people’. Linda Williams (2001) proposes that melodrama has been insufficiently understood as a major force of moral reasoning that is not just limited to women’s films or the domestic sphere but structures our understandings of the power of the nation more generally, generating a ‘moral structure of feeling’ (p. 26). In particular, and central to our argument, the reduction of morality to an individual dramatic performance enables social relations to be visualized and known through the psychologisation of character.

Ian Goode (2003) argues that it is the ‘proximity to, and observation of behavior and character . . . that drives the performative formats of “reality” television’ (p. 108). In particular the construction of time on ‘reality’ television generates a sense of ‘actuality’, its reconstruction of time as an ontological claim to ‘nowness’ and possibly also ‘hereness’, rather than an epistemological claim to truth (Kavka and West 2004). This immediacy is part of the ahistorical emphasis that many critics of ‘reality’ television describe, its depthlessness apparently giving it no purchase on ‘real’ social issues.

However, we would argue that it is exactly the lack of sociological understanding that repeats how the working class have been continually decontextualised, rerouting social problems to the level of the individual/psyche.

There are two important structural features of ‘reality’ television which are central to the way in which self formation now appears on television. First, by bringing together melodrama and realism, ‘reality’ television works with an aesthetics of depth below the surface (a variant of realism) where underlying forces govern surface phenomena which the characters will reveal: things happen to people which are beyond their own control.
The realism expressed is a form of ‘we are all governed by forces of happenstance’, which relates in particular, Elsaesser (1987) argues, to working-class life. Yet at the same time we have noticed a shift in the subject positions offered to participants. Elsaesser’s characters in melodrama are subject to forces beyond their control. But in ‘reality’ television, whilst participants are also subject to the unknowable, they are simultaneously faced with the impossible task of accounting for ‘happenstance’ (through the reiteration of reflexive talk to camera) and held responsible for the social positions they occupy. ‘Reality’ television thus retains a structural modicum of melodramatic fatalism whilst also effecting a shift into the individualised responsible self.

In this vein, many of the dramatic techniques used on ‘reality’ television rely on placing people in situations that are unfamiliar, in which they are likely to lack control, such as transformations through: swaps (wife, house, village, etc.), ‘new lives in strange places’ (Get A New Life, No Going Back), ‘new’ relationships (What The Butler Saw), ‘new’ jobs (Faking It, The Apprentice), ‘new’ clothes (What Not to Wear), ‘new’ culture (Ladette to Lady, ASBO Teen to Beauty Queen), all designed to generate insecurity, discomfort and humour for dramatic effect as we watch how the participant copes. Celia Lury (1998) identifies these techniques in consumer culture more broadly as evidence of ‘prosthetic’ culture, in which two central processes – indifferentiation (the disappearance of the distance between cause and effect) and outcontextualisation (where contexts are multiplied and rendered a matter of choice) encourage experimental individualism, in which the subject is increasingly asked to lay claim to features of the context or environment as if they were the outcome of the testing of his or her personal capacities. ‘Reality’ television visualizes the impossibility of an ontological contradiction: we are rarely able to completely control events, but we are expected to do so as a measure of self-worth.

The second key structural feature to ‘reality’ television makes this contradiction even more intense, not just by the decontextualised immanent nature of much of the drama, but also by the way that the temporal version of ‘everyday life’ presented does not allow space for the type of modern self-reflexivity that Tony Bennett (2003) argues is necessary for the demonstration of depth and moral understanding. In discussing the literary construction of everyday life Bennett identifies two different architectures of the self

Hasil (Bahasa Indonesia) 1:

Spektakuler melodrama: drama saatDalam istilah yang echo beberapa perubahan sosial-politik besar yang diuraikan di atas, komentator telah prihatin dengan transformasi keseluruhan televisi dokumenter ke dalam 'pementasan nyata' (Kilborn 2003) dalam 'budaya postdocumentary' (sudut 2002) di mana 'nyata' dikuasai melalui sekumpulan buat skenario diproduksi untuk hiburan, daripada setiap sosial realis argumentasi bermanfaat bagi umum budaya. Bill Nichols (1991) menunjukkan pemrograman yang berfokus pada pribadi dan spektakuler menjadikan mereka inert sebagai fenomena sosial-politik: 'Tontonan yang lebih tepat bentuk dibatalkan atau gadaian identifikasi mana keterlibatan emosional tidak memperpanjang sejauh keprihatinan tapi tetap ditangkap di tingkat sensasi' (hal. 234). Motif khas depthless 'kacamata dari kekhususan' di Nichols di praduga, namun, gagal untuk memperhitungkan kerja proses bagaimana politik di tingkat sensasi dan emosi (Lihat Deleuze 2003; Ahmed 2004), sebuah proses yang sangat jelas dalam tanggapan penonton kami. Tapi di sini kita ingin mempertimbangkan bagaimana operasi tontonan di televisi 'realitas' menghasilkan emosional keterlibatan melalui teknik melodramatis.Oleh menceritakan kisah-kisah yang intim 'realitas' televisi menarik pada tradisi melodrama, serta film dokumenter. David Singer (2001) mendefinisikan melodrama sebagai sebuah 'konsep cluster' dengan konfigurasi yang berbeda konstitutif faktor, termasuk pathos; terlalu tegang emosi; intensitas dramatis tanpa pathos (semua karakter mengekspresikan kemarahan, frustrasi, dendam, kekecewaan, dll) polarisasi moral; struktur narasi non-klasik dan sensasi. Analisis tekstual kami menunjukkan bahwa intensitas dramatis secara teratur diproduksi melalui apa kita sebut 'tembakan penilaian', di mana, setelah krisis dan kekacauan, ahli saran yang diberikan atau disediakan komentar negatif sulih suara dan peserta diadakan di close-up wajah.Sering ini diikuti oleh gambar simbolis yang pedih dengan ironis musik, atau mengulang dan reselecting berbagai montase gambar sehingga kepentingan dramatis diintensifkan. Yang lama dipegang close-up adalah setara modern Tablo melodramatis teater-mana keheningan dan keheningan aktor mengaktifkan penghentian tindakan dan semua perhatian yang diberikan kepada kontemplasi drama yang sebelumnya ditetapkan. Begitu kita mulai memeriksa bahan kami secara rinci untuk 'melodramatis saat' kita menyadari kehadiran penggunaan 'tembakan penilaian' untuk menghasilkan ketegangan dramatis. Dalam pengertian ini 'realitas' hubungan televisi 'realitas' sering adalah lebih erat kaitannya dengan 'emosional realisme' (1985 Ang) dimana peserta mengambil bagian dalam Helen Piper apa (2004) berguna panggilan kategori baru 'improvisasi drama' lebih biasanya bersekutu dengan tradisi-tradisi fiktif melodrama daripada dokumenter. Penggunaan melodramatis teknik untuk menghasilkan sensasi seharusnya tidak mengejutkan kita; ini adalah metode yang dicoba dan diuji untuk membuat domestik dan sehari-hari lebih menarik. Peter Brooks berpendapat bahwa:Melodrama yang paling penting meyakinkan kita bahwa dramaturgi kelebihan dan berlebihan berkaitan dan membangkitkan konfrontasi dan pilihan yang tinggi penting, karena di dalamnya kita meletakkan hidup kita-namun sepele dan terbatas-pada baris. (1995: ix).Teknik ini mengikuti tradisi panjang 'wanita televisi', sebagai catatan Rachel Moseley (2000):Menunjukkan Makeover meminta para penonton untuk menggambar di repertoar keterampilan pribadi, kemampuan kita untuk mencari wajah dan melihat reaksi (difasilitasi oleh close-up) dari detail yang terkecil-kedutan otot, ekspresi di mata – kompetensi yang disarankan oleh Tania Modleski sebagai kunci untuk kesenangan opera sabun bentuk melodramatis. Program ini menampilkan berlebihan mengancam biasa... Ini adalah, tepatnya, contoh kuat spektakuler 'über-luar': kelebihan biasa. (p. 314)Dengan demikian bentuk kelebihan dan peningkatan drama, yang menurut Nichols (1991) dalam bentuk dokumenter menghasilkan efek yang jarak, membatasi mode keterlibatan, sebaliknya di televisi 'realitas' menawarkan resonansi dengan kehidupan intim. Menyatukan realisme dengan melodrama, Christine Gledhill (1987, 2000) berpendapat, memungkinkan teknik film dan televisi untuk semakin campur tangan dalam 'pribadi' hidup untuk kebaikan moral bangsa. Sebagai 'realitas' televisi menggunakan teknik dokumenter untuk membuka hubungan 'real', keintiman, dan domesticity, itu menarik berdasarkan tradisi melodramatis yang memberikan signifikansi untuk dan membuat kehidupan sehari-hari sensasional dan intens, oleh karena itu berpotensi lebih menarik untuk menonton. Thomas Elsaesser (1987) catatan dalam kaitannya dengan tradisi-tradisi ini, 'bahkan jika situasi dan sentimen menentang semua kategori verisimilitude dan itu benar-benar seperti apa pun dalam kehidupan nyata, struktur memiliki kebenaran dan kehidupan sendiri' (ms. 64).Secara historis para pahlawan dan pahlawan dari melodrama itu tidak istimewa subjek tapi karakter yang beroperasi dalam norma-norma sosial, membuat terlihat dan sensasional perbedaan antara baik dan jahat. Ikon yang 'baik rumah', misalnya, telah lama digunakan untuk membangun 'ruang tak bersalah' dan korbannya Saleh. Melodrama adalah, dan, kita menegaskan, masih adalah, salah satu perangkat dramatis utama untuk membuat nilai-nilai moral yang terlihat di banyak domain kehidupan sosial. Untuk Brooks (1995) ini mewakili 'penegasan kembali masyarakat' 'orang baik'. Linda Williams (2001) mengusulkan bahwa melodrama telah kurang dipahami sebagai kekuatan utama penalaran moral yang tidak hanya terbatas pada wanita film atau lingkup domestik tetapi struktur pemahaman kami dari kekuatan bangsa lebih umum, menghasilkan 'struktur moral perasaan' (hal 26). Pada khususnya, dan pusat argumen kita, pengurangan moralitas untuk kinerja dramatis individu memungkinkan hubungan sosial untuk divisualisasikan dan dikenal melalui psychologisation karakter.Ian Goode (2003) berpendapat bahwa itu adalah 'kedekatan, dan pengamatan perilaku dan karakter... yang mendorong format performatif "realitas" televisi' (p. 108). Khususnya pembangunan di televisi 'realitas' menghasilkan rasa 'kenyataannya', rekonstruksi waktu sebagai klaim ontologis 'nowness' dan mungkin juga 'hereness', bukan klaim epistemologis kebenaran (Kavka dan Barat 2004). Kedekatan ini adalah bagian dari penekanan ahistoris yang menggambarkan banyak kritikus 'realitas' televisi, depthlessness yang tampaknya memberikan tidak ada pembelian pada isu-isu sosial 'real'.Namun, kami berpendapat bahwa itu adalah persis kurangnya pemahaman sosiologis yang berulang bagaimana kelas buruh telah terus-menerus decontextualised, rerouting masalah sosial ke tingkat individu/jiwa.Ada dua penting struktural fitur 'realitas' televisi yang tengah dengan cara di mana diri pembentukan sekarang muncul di televisi. Pertama, dengan menyatukan melodrama dan realisme, ' Realita ' bekerja dengan estetika kedalaman di bawah permukaan (varian realisme) mana kekuatan-kekuatan yang mendasari mengatur permukaan fenomena yang karakter akan mengungkapkan: hal-hal yang terjadi kepada orang-orang yang berada di luar kendali mereka sendiri.Realisme yang diungkapkan adalah bentuk 'kita semua diatur oleh kekuatan kebetulan', yang berkaitan dengan khususnya, Elsaesser (1987) berpendapat, kehidupan kelas buruh. Namun pada saat yang sama, kami telah memperhatikan pergeseran dalam posisi subjek yang ditawarkan kepada peserta. Karakter Elsaesser's melodrama dikenakan di luar kendali mereka. Tetapi di televisi 'realitas', sementara peserta juga dapat tidak dapat diketahui, mereka secara bersamaan dihadapkan dengan tugas yang mustahil akuntansi untuk 'kebetulan' (melalui pengulangan refleksif berbicara kamera) dan bertanggung jawab mereka menduduki posisi sosial. 'Realitas' televisi dengan demikian mempertahankan sedikit struktural melodramatis fatalisme sementara juga mempengaruhi pergeseran ke diri bertanggung jawab individual.In this vein, many of the dramatic techniques used on ‘reality’ television rely on placing people in situations that are unfamiliar, in which they are likely to lack control, such as transformations through: swaps (wife, house, village, etc.), ‘new lives in strange places’ (Get A New Life, No Going Back), ‘new’ relationships (What The Butler Saw), ‘new’ jobs (Faking It, The Apprentice), ‘new’ clothes (What Not to Wear), ‘new’ culture (Ladette to Lady, ASBO Teen to Beauty Queen), all designed to generate insecurity, discomfort and humour for dramatic effect as we watch how the participant copes. Celia Lury (1998) identifies these techniques in consumer culture more broadly as evidence of ‘prosthetic’ culture, in which two central processes – indifferentiation (the disappearance of the distance between cause and effect) and outcontextualisation (where contexts are multiplied and rendered a matter of choice) encourage experimental individualism, in which the subject is increasingly asked to lay claim to features of the context or environment as if they were the outcome of the testing of his or her personal capacities. ‘Reality’ television visualizes the impossibility of an ontological contradiction: we are rarely able to completely control events, but we are expected to do so as a measure of self-worth.The second key structural feature to ‘reality’ television makes this contradiction even more intense, not just by the decontextualised immanent nature of much of the drama, but also by the way that the temporal version of ‘everyday life’ presented does not allow space for the type of modern self-reflexivity that Tony Bennett (2003) argues is necessary for the demonstration of depth and moral understanding. In discussing the literary construction of everyday life Bennett identifies two different architectures of the self