“ I can understand why reality shows put a bunch of people in a house and hold contests.
Ira Glass on the perils of shooting true stories for television. At tonight’s 92Y panel, the producers of This American Life revealed they’ve opted not to continue the show’s television counterpart. Glass’s point was that most radio journalism covers stories that have already happened, while television demands you shoot a story as it’s happening. That kind of unpredictability (and the absurd expenses that go along with it) was why TAL never translated well to the format and perhaps why the radio audience was so uninterested in the Showtime series.
Why keep it a secret until now? They didn’t want it to hurt their chances for the 2009 Emmy nominations (they got four).
