The early seasons of MTV’s Jersey Shore (known overseas as Macaroni Rascals) are considered some of the wildest, most unfiltered reality television in history, and a new oral history of the series from Vulture helps make it clear why. For one, producers were scooping up the kinds of people—hard-partying,…
Vinny, for those of us who never watched Jersey Shore, was the “nice guy” of the Shore House, a political science major with a 3.9 GPA who “followed the others’ lead when it came to the ladies on the shore and also managed to avoid most (not all) of the arguing and fighting,” according to a surprisingly detailed entry …
Like sea turtles returning to bury their eggs, the cast of MTV’s Jersey Shore will once more beach their gel-hardened carapaces on the Atlantic coastline for the just-announced reunion series Jersey Shore Family Vacation. As the title suggests, the show will find this erstwhile gang of club approximate-kids now even…
Jersey Shore star Mike “The Situation” Sorrentino has been hit with multiple charges of tax fraud, the Associated Press says, including allegations of tax evasion, filing bogus tax reports, and falsifying records. It’s a stunning rash of indictments that could spell serious legal trouble for Sorrentino and his brother…
Among its 100-plus lists, the 2009 Inventory book (now available for the low, low price of a penny!) contains “TV Guides: 5 essential books about TV.” The books it highlights—The Late Shift by Bill Carter, Live From New York by James Andrew Miller and Tom Shales, Total Television by Alex McNeil, The Glass Teat by…
The Hills was cancelled by MTV six years ago, but the love between reality TV casualties Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt endures to this day. In April 2016, the pair will celebrate their seventh wedding anniversary, even though their fame and money have largely dried up, and they are currently living in Spencer’s…
On The Level examines one small part of a larger video game.
Jersey Shore’s Mike “The Situation” Sorrentino is doing everything he can to remain relevant in the reality TV world. The Sitch will star with his family in The Sorrentinos, a new eight-episode reality show on the TV Guide Network. While Jersey Shore found Sitch hooking up, getting drunk, and showing the world his…
Here’s what’s up in the world of TV for Tuesday, July 23. All times are Eastern.
MTV may be busy filling you in on pregnant teens, Snooki, and catfishing scams, but the network hasn’t forgotten about music altogether. The channel that once actually showcased music on television is teaming up with its sister networks, VH1 and CMT, along with its parent network Viacom to launch a 24-hour online…
Here’s what’s up in the world of TV for Thursday, May 2, 2013. All times are Eastern.
Preachers’ Daughters debuts tonight on Lifetime at 10 p.m. Eastern.
What really hooked me about the opening episode of Kroll Show, aside from it being a funny sketch show created by and starring a comedian I like, was that it paid attention to form. As Erik noted in his review of the pilot, Nick Kroll eschews the Chappelle’s Show convention we’ve seen repeated on Comedy Central’s…
I can see at least two problems with the title Stars in Danger: The High Dive, Fox’s celebrity diving competition special.
Buckwild—MTV’s latest attempt to capture the hearts, minds, and hormones of America’s most bored demographic—is full of warning signs. I don’t mean “warning signs” in the “early indications of cultural decline” sense of the phrase, though that definition would apply as well. I mean literal signs: title cards, the…
Don't be fooled: This isn't the end of Jersey Shore. Not just because there’s a new season of Snooki & JWOWW on the horizon (three whole weeks from now!), but if there's anything we've learned from this whole experience, it's that when you cut the head off one reality television phenomenon, there will be at least two…
Sometimes the secret purpose of academic conferences, roundtables, and symposia seems to be to make whatever subject they’re covering more substantive than it actually is. That particularly applies to academic conferences devoted to seeming pop ephemera, like last year’s University Of Chicago academic conference…
Despite the welcome news that MTV had decided to cancel Jersey Shore, MTV seems determined to continue milking its "guido" franchise through spin-offs. Joining Snooki and JWOWW and The Pauly D Project, the network just announced that Vinny Guadagnino—the sort-of likeable, seemingly normal one, but only in relation to…
I began watching VH1’s disgustingly addictive Couples Therapy out of a morbid desire to see Bay Area independent-rap pioneer Too Short resolve his relationship issues in an exhibitionist, queasily exploitative group environment. So it brings me no joy to report that Too Short is a total washout as a reality-television…
MTV is throwing a telethon to help the Hurricane Sandy-ravaged Jersey Shore, a region it first called the nation’s horrified attention to with its show, the aptly-titled Jersey Shore. The one hour Restore The Shore will air Thursday, Nov. 15 at 11 p.m. Eastern, right after a synergistic new episode of Jersey Shore.…
