On Friday night I spoke with none other than Jerry Springer. For those who don't know, Jerry's in town once a week to film a new show in SA called Jerry Springer Saturday Night.
As interesting as his SA stint is, this obviously wasn't the only thing I wanted to discuss because this isn't who Jerry is to us.
We all know Jerry from his notorious American talk show and so I asked about this.
Jerry Springer is essentially a lawyer and politician. Not easy to believe. But he is.
By the age of 33 he was Mayor of Cincinnati. How did he go from being Mayor to hosting one of the most outrageous talk-shows in the world where people beat each other up and sleep with their own mothers?
Apparently it all stemmed from politics - interesting and unsurprising. What happened was that Jerry became a political correspondent of sorts on TV and became quite popular. When the BigWigs saw this they took him to lunch. They offered him his own talk-show and The Jerry Springer Show began - sort of.
Twelve years ago the show wasn't what it is today. I think it was more for the Olds. More political. With more commentary and so on. After three years the BigWigs decided it needed to change. It needed to get more 'young'.
According to Jerry when the youngsters began to come on (I suppose the 20/30 something's) things got a little crazy ... and now you're not allowed on unless you're crazy. As more and more stories came out - the bizarre ones obviously got the ratings and now you can't get on unless you're a whackjob.
I explained my horror at the episode with the fat people who had sexual fetishes that revolved around food - rolling and fondling and kissing and eating all at the same time. It was just too much. It couldn't be real. I told Jerry it had to be an act.
He said it wasn't. He said the people were for real. That they weren't paid a cent. They come on of their own accord and were selected from the thousands of calls the show gets each week.
People are prepared to come on the show, share their story and big it up for the cameras to get their 15 minutese. They know they're not gonna be famous - instead they love the glamour and the glitz of things like consulting with the producers, having their flights booked, going off to the airport, getting their airtickets and staying in a fancy hotel.
They get to be acknowledged in front of an audience. They have the camera's and Steve. With the crowd going and camera's on they embellish everything.
That's why people so often look like they're acting. They are. For one night they're prepared to turn up all their feelings and embellish the truth. They know what's expected - they've seen the show before. They give the producers what they want because they've enjoyed the whole experience.
It can't all be an act because of what's happened before. We know there have been rumblings about a murder that was allegedly directly linked to the show so I suspect some of the feelings are more real than others but that on the whole people will exaggerate their worst possible sides just to be seen.
I played a game of Rapid Fire with Jerry - like he does with his guests on Saturday Night. I asked him: three words to describe the people on your USA show. He had to answer as quickly as he could.
He stammered and stuttered and barely squeezed out: "Outrageous", "Low-income", "Outward going". I had an excellent laugh. Poor Jerry was on the spot. He obviously couldn't say what he was really thinking.
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