Reading the trades, I had noticed some coverage about the newest VH-1 reality TV conconction: Viva Hollywood! I glossed over the headlines until I saw it mentioned again today and saw that Latino TV darling Carlos Ponce was hosting– had to learn more. Turns out, VH-1 is pitting 12 aspiring bilingual actors in a race to become… a Latino novela star!
The premise of the show is that contestants have to master the 7 sins of novelas. They will be showing off their acting skills while living at the ’Casa de Locos’. But hold on: in what seems like an implausible plot twist from novela madrina Delia Fiallo, astrologer Walter Mercado will provide alerts and predictions of challenges to come during each episode. And in true novela style, contestants will be ‘killed off’ during the progress of the show until one is crowned with the ‘papel estelar’ and receives a contract with talent firm LatinWe, a Miami condo, and $100,000 prize.
From the press release, it seems VH-1 was able to plot every single cliché of the Latino novela culture into one big reality TV show (or should we call it ‘spoof’?). Sofia Vergara, Daisy Fuentes, Angelica Vale, Charo, Christian De La Fuente, Lorena Rojas, Maria Celeste Arraras and Perez Hilton all have signed on as celebrity guests on the show that premieres this Sunday.
I know we are not to expect quality or serious programming from the network that is looking to pair up a has-been rocker with the love of the next season, or to rehab celebs while the world watches, but the description of this show sounds very over the top and an attempt to capitalize on the fact that many in the mass market watch novelas to make fun of them.
We all have heard the comments from non-Spanish speakers who tune in to Univision or Telemundo for the screaming matches and to catch a glimpse of starlets, we have seen ads that make fun of novelas and the inability to understand what goes on, and this show is taking that to the next level. After the success of Betty la Fea, the cross-over of Desperate Housewives in Amas de Casa Desesperadas and now this, perhaps the novela format has now been embraced by the mainstream, and categorized as a satire and not the tearjerker, suspense filled, audience grabbing phenomenon that it long has been for Hispanics around the world.
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