Bedsitcom (2003)

Genre

sitcom, reality television

Country

United Kingdom

Length

1 season, 8 episodes

Rating

10.0 of 10 from 1 voters

Elsewhere

IMDb

How it feels

A reality TV show where six young people think they are starring in a new series called Making Friends. Three of their housemates are actually actors following directions from writers in a garage.

scriptedmanipulativeartificialunsettlingdeceptiveordinarylow-stakesmildly absurd

What happens

Bedsitcom is a British reality television hoax series that was broadcast on Channel 4 in December 2003. Pitched as "somewhere between a sitcom and a reality TV show", the show documented the lives of six young people living in a loft flat in London. Its hook was that its TV audience was aware that three of the participants—named Mel, Paul and Rufus—were actually actors being directed by a trio of "writers" in a garage on the ground floor. Bedsitcom was commissioned by the Channel Four Television Corporation and produced by Objective Productions. Producers auditioned thousands of people to be the show's genuine subjects and selected from them six young adults to live in the flat with the three actors. These six participants were told that they would be starring in a new reality TV series called Making Friends, and featured on the show three at a time over a period of eight weeks. The programme ran for a single series of eight episodes and featured various storylines, involving dead goldfish, dodgy dealings, promiscuous mothers and telephone psychics. The show received largely negative feedback from television reviewers, who criticised the show's premise as a "deeply offensive" idea. It received a viewership peak of 1.2 million with its final episode, giving it an audience share of 8.9 per cent. Bedsitcom was not recommissioned for a second series and is currently not available either on DVD or on Channel 4's on demand service, 4oD. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

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