IV. Points for discussion.

1. Why do you think defiant boys are called ?ratboys? in England? 2. How should they be dealt with? Is putting them behind bars the right way of alleviating the existing problem? 3. What seems to be the journalist?s attitude to a newly opened prison for delinquents? What do you think of it? Is it accidental that such a prison has been built in Britain? Are the British law-abiding people? What about you?

A LITTLE TOO MUCH REALITY

Court TV tries murder confessions as entertainment

?Confessions? is the most disgusting, exploitative television show of the century ? maybe of the last century, too. There, that ought to make the people at Court TV happy. They?re the ones who had the bright idea to turn videotaped confessions of convicted rapists and murderers into a half-hour entertainment, and they?re obviously itching for the negative publicity. Not that ?Confessions? is unwatchable. In fact, the tree scenes in the debut episode feel like they?ve been lifted from ?NYPD Blue.? The fluorescent lighting, shifty criminals, outrageous stories ? including one where the killer dismembered his victim and boiled her on the stove ? come straight from Central Casting. But there?s a huge difference between actors playing fictionalized versions of criminals and watching real ones telling their own horrifying tales. Cross that line, the entertainment becomes voyeurism at its creepiest. And television doesn?t get any creepier than ?Confessions.?

Not surprisingly, the people who helped create ?Confessions? insist they have nothing to apologize for. Robert Morgenthau, the Manhattan district attorney who turned over the initial confession tapes after a friend at Court TV asked for them, says he?s unconcerned that they?re being used for a profitmaking TV show. ?My position is that anything that?s a matter of public record, the media or anybody else is entitled to,? Morgenthau says. (Evidence presented at trial is a matter of public record.) The usually responsible folks at Court TV say their show is an educational drama. ?I see it as an incredible theatrical performance about some of the most important issues of our time,? says Eric Nadler, the show?s co-creator.

Really? What?s ?important? about a crackhead who stabs a one-legged man in a wheelchair? As ?theatrical? as these stories may be, the confessions are presented without any social or legal context, so it?s hard to make a case for enlightenment here. Perhaps to counter that criticism, Court TV added a half-hour discussion after the Sept. 10 première, where experts talked about the implications of ?Confessions.? But no explanation will appease the show?s critics. ?I?m not sure it serves any purpose other than resensationalizing what was already a tough experience,? says Thad Hinnant, whose sister, Kathryn, was raped and murdered by one of the men featured in the première. ?What they are doing is revictimizing the families themselves.? And giving all of TV a black eye.

Mark Peyser, Suzanne Smalley

/Newsweek, Sep.18, 2004/

Set Work

Date: 2016-06-12; view: 86