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JANUARY 2000
| FEATURE
LAST MONTH |
RICK CONNELLY
"I'll never get through this if I don't do some coke," says Stevie
Nicks. "I woke up," quoth Nikki Sixx, "and the needle was still in my arm."
Such are the auspicious, semi-epic starts to two of VH1's
installments of "Behind the Music," the deadpan, one-note series that
inflates the trials of music's most fallible characters to Greek tragic
proportions. The stories, VH1 would have you believe, are astounding: Def
Leppard rules the world with a one-armed drummer. (Cue headlines.) The
Black Crowes get swindled in a dead-end contract deal. (Cue millionaire
boo-hooing.) Best friend dies. (Cue slow-mo sniffles.) Lead singer
gets a tube of glue stuck in his left nostril. (Cue remote control...
or, if suitably hooked, cue microwave for express popcorn popping.) Sure, the names and incidents in each saga start to blur with
success and downfall tugging at each other for equal air time. But VH1
scores in these potboilers with their own brand of non-specific
omniscience, staging within the BTM series the conflicts of everyone
from Cher to Shania to Grand Funk Railroad, all in the same baited
breath. The results? Often melodramatic, always hyperbolic--soapy
sensationalism at its emptiest. Yet it makes for great television, as
addictive as a big bag of Redenbacher Lite. VH1's new dramatic direction isn't without its downside, though.
BTM forms not just a flagship for the network but also something of a
fulcrum; their entire programming base emulates its in-depth,
non-fictional, talking-head-spliced-with-concert-footage style. It's a
motif that has revolutionized the network from cushy baby boomer
backdrop to newsy music television alternative, a sort of pop-umentary
paradise. Obviously, the series hasn't broken new ground, and if anything,
it's just a rolling stone's throw from A&E's famously successful
pre-cursor, "Biography." Instead of the story of Mussolini, we're here
given Madonna. Forget Jesus Christ, it's time for the rise and fall of
Vanilla Ice. Sketching out biographical detail is big business across
cable markets these days with each channel laying claim to its own
distinctive style of storytelling. Yet with every new variation--from
Lifetime's "Intimate Portrait" to E!'s "Celebrity Profile" to MSNBC's
"Headliners & Legends"--the subjects start to seem familiar, the
narrative voice more and more formula. The economic backbone of these shows is the same, with the entire
bio-based genre converging on an industry practice known as
"re-purposing." In short, re-purposing is devising a way to present
existing footage and archival material within a new framework. Budgetary
constraints cause cable executives to be pragmatic; thus, for VH1, the
task of depicting a Blondie or a Bette Midler is greatly abated by
access to sister station MTV's vaults. After chronologically sorting
photos and footage, digging up some dirt, and slapping on narration,
low-cost storytelling becomes a cinch. A compelling show need be greater than its recycled parts, though;
an hour's worth of Culture Club clips can only as good as the dramatic
ties that binds them together. (Drama is perhaps the one quality not
lacking in the Boy George episode.) But with inter-band theatrics to
spare, what can be the limits to a premise as presumably perfect as BTM?
Nothing, at least according to VH1, which has branded their re-purposing
style into an entire stable of similar shows and segments. In this
case, too much of a good thing is too much indeed for VH1, as their
profiling tendencies are bogging the network down in tiresome
redundancy. [ MORE: first signs of trouble ]
RICK CONNELLY is the staff television writer for Renaissance Online Magazine. He can be reached at rconnelly@renaissancemag.com
PICTURES copyright ©1999 MTV Networks
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