In Hollywood, the prevailing philosophy seems to be “anything worth doing is worth doing to death

WHO WANTS TO BE A COSMONAUT?

In Hollywood, the prevailing philosophy seems to be “anything worth doing is worth doing to death.” So it’s no surprise that the networks have been scrambling to come up with their own version of CBS’s massively successful “Survivor”, which asked the question, “can a naked homosexual find fame and fortune by manipulating his fellow castaways on a deserted island in the South China Sea?” The answer, depressingly, was “yes.” Where are the Professor and Mary Ann when you need them?

Perhaps the most ambitious “Survivor” clone is NBC’s proposed “Destination Mir”. The idea is to follow a group of aspiring cosmonauts through a grueling selection process that takes them through space camp to a final broadcast, when the winner will be picked, launched into space for a sojourn aboard the aging and decrepit Russian space station , and then, presumably, brought back. (I say “presumably,” but only because we’re talking NBC, not Fox.)

Unfortunately, the Russian cabinet decided the other day that Mir wouldn’t be safe without extensive renovations. Further, keeping the wheezy old bird hanging up there in space would be prohibitively expensive, so they plan to crash the station into the Pacific Ocean in February.

NBC refuses to be deterred. "We have every faith in [“Survivor” producer] Mark Burnett…and we hope that he is able to execute an exciting program for us," a spokesperson said, with the same sort of clueless enthusiasm that provided us with programming decisions like “Suddenly Susan” and “Caroline in the City”. These people wouldn’t know a good idea if it jumped up and bit them.

Supposedly, NBC plans to ask Russian President Vladimir Putin to overrule the cabinet and allow the show to continue. Well, sure. Why not? I mean, why let the fact that the station is going to die a flaming death deter you from making a show set there? In fact, why not reverse the whole concept? Why not have the other contestants determine who gets sent up to crash into the ocean with Mir? I mean, can you imagine the ratings for the final episode? “Well, it looks like Roger is having to be dragged kicking and screaming into the launch vehicle…whoops, he almost got away there! Bon Voyage, Roger!” And if we do it just right, we can crash the station into Regis Philbin. I, for one, would be tuned into that. And if Putin nixes the Mir idea, maybe we can put the contestants in a Russian sub on the bottom of the ocean. That idea doesn’t seem to bother ol’ Vlad at all.

I have to confess, I’m a little creeped out by this whole “reality TV” idea. The idea seems to be that you put a bunch of people together, promise them some sort of huge reward (a million bucks, a trip into space) and then film the people plotting, conniving, and manipulating each other to get at the prize. The worst proposal I’ve heard is far is for a new ABC show called “The Mole”. It’s just like “Survivor,” you see, but with one sick twist. In this one the contestants are , as usual, promised some sort of major prize and given tasks to perform to achieve the prize…except that one of them is a “mole”, a double agent paid by the network to sabotage the efforts of the others. Eventually, the hope is that the contestants will turn on each other in paranoia and suspicion, trying to figure out who the “mole” is. Big laffs!

It seems as if there’s nothing people like better than to see their fellow citizens behaving badly. From the “Jerry Springer” show, to “Cops”, to “The Mole”, it looks like we’ll jump at the opportunity to look at someone to whom we can feel morally superior. Chuck Barris, producer of TV’s late and lamented “Gong Show”, once told an interviewer that he had proposed a show in which three contestants would be shown a small boy and his dog…and then there’d be a bidding war to see who would take the least amount of money to shoot the dog in front of the boy. Network executives were, at the time horrified at the proposal. Now, they’d probably make Barris president of the network.

Dusty Rhoades lives in Carthage, practices law in Aberdeen, and just couldn’t bring himself to write another column about the election this week.

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