Defamer is committed to informing its readers of exciting opportunities to be humiliated by television networks desperately trying to fill out the non-American Idol portions of their primetime schedules with similarly intellectually challenging fare. And in the service of this noble mission, we direct you to…
Fox orders eight episodes of the Mark Burnett game show Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader? Unfortunately, the competition won't pit adults against school kids, just ask them questions from fifth grade textbooks. The children will, however, be on hand as lifelines and to remind their elders how stupid they've become…
TV producer Mark Burnett has dug his hit-sniffing snout back into the competitive reality show trough and rooted out another winner: By applying the same basic fundamentals of dog-eat-dog survivalism set in literal and urban jungle locales that made Survivor and The Apprentice such enduring hits and merely…
Just two weeks into the much-derided, color-coded current season of Survivor, producers have opted to do away with their four race-warring tribes by blending them into two diverse groups. No reason was offered—no seismic, segregationist-TV-history-altering moment, such as Sundra of the Manihiki tribe refusing to…
· Survivor: Race Wars producer Mark Burnett options the rights to a series of children's fantasy books similar in tone to Harry Potter, but instead of the children assigned to Gryffindor and Slytherin houses, they're segregated accorded to—on second thought, we can't bring ourselves to finish this joke. [Variety]
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People do tend to hang out in their own ethnic groups socially. Not because of exclusion or hatred of others, it's just quite normal. Where I come from, you go to Santa Monica and certain pubs, it's nearly all English people. You go to Fairfax Boulevard in Los Angeles, it's all Ethiopian people. Go a little further up…
Amid a flurry of media criticism, and with corporate sponsors dropping like so many swatted tsetse flies, reality TV wunderkind producer Mark Burnett finds himself forced to justify his decision to pit race against race on the new season of Survivor. Burnett has finally spoken up in defense of his humanitarian vision
The rules of media celebrity are fairly simple: You fluff a boldface name, you smack them down, and repeat until said individual's celebrity can no longer withstand another cycle. Martha Stewart is the perfect example, as her post-prison comeback might be fizzling. Her company's shares dropped 16% yesterday and her…
11:00 It s the goddamned Gifford Miller commercial. We instinctively zone out and miss the Martha opener. Thanks a lot, Giff.
11:01 Ah, here we go: The show leads in with some cutesy stupid intro with Mark Burnett, who s wearing a gold ankle bracelet as a cutesy stupid homage to Martha.
11:02 Intro music is…
Perhaps prompted by the recent media love for super-rich housekeeper Martha Stewart, a reader privy to the first taping of syndicated daytime show Martha writes in to inform us that perhaps one leg of Martha's comeback might be less than perfect:
Martha Stewart gave a flashy press conference yesterday, in which she revealed not just her court-ordered ankle "bracelet" but also some spicy details about her forthcoming spin-off of the Apprentice. Producer Mark Burnett notes that Martha's version of the show will feature a "softer" palette of colors to reflect…
After a prison stint for conspiracy and obstruction of justice, the Martha Stewart basked in the afterglow of daily media handjobs. New television shows, a slow return to work, the glowing Vanity Fair spread — she kinda ruled. Yet no matter how high our heroine climbs, someone will insist on pushing her down a rung…
