11/7/2022 1 Comment Romi klinger![]() ![]() The result is that “The Real L Word” is even more Hollywood than its predecessor. Chaiken is now running a lesbian reality show about lesbian reality stars, many of whom grew up watching the original. “Since last year, I’ve been traveling a lot, doing appearances, hosting parties, and things have changed,” she says in the Season 3 opener. ROMI KLINGER PROFESSIONALOnce a Hollywood special effects artist and after-hours party girl, she is now a professional lesbian - attracting loyal fans to her paid club appearances, blasting the results to her 53,000-plus Twitter followers, and then talking all about it back on the show. ROMI KLINGER TVThe opportunity is more likely to attract younger, less established women willing to stake their careers on whatever personal image the reality TV machine churns out for them, like Whitney Mixter, the tattooed, dreadlocked ex-girlfriend to Romi and many of the show’s young stars. ![]() “The challenge is that a woman like Bette Porter is not going to be on a reality show,” Chaiken says. Take Bette Porter, the scripted series’ fortysomething half-black art world dynamo, portrayed by Jennifer Beals. The question is whether the women tapped to be taped by Chaiken’s cameras represent the true breadth of the lesbian experience or just a carefully selected feedback loop of Chaiken’s own fictionalized archetypes.Ĭhaiken says the reality show was never a serious effort to replicate the story lines of her scripted show it was a “continuation of my desire to tell lesbian stories.” But she’s found that “reality as a genre is tricky, problematic, interesting, challenging” - and that reality television narratives can actually be more difficult to make “real” than scripted ones. ROMI KLINGER SERIESThe question is not whether “The Real L Word’s” shower sex sessions and vodka soda bar fights between lithe, long-haired lesbians are orchestrated by producers (for the record, Chaiken says that the series is “completely unscripted”). Of course, reality television offers its own form of fantasy. When the series ended and Showtime picked up a reality version, Chaiken seized the opportunity to “make true my claim that it was real, that it was less a fantasy than a lot of people thought it was.” Some critics deemed her Hollywood cast of characters “glamorized” one reviewer called the relationships on the show “a Joey Tribbiani fantasy about girl-on-girl make-out sessions.” But since no one else was telling these stories, some expected Chaiken to tell all of them. “‘The L Word’ was in many ways inspired by my life, by people I knew, by a culture and a lifestyle I had experienced,” Chaiken said, speaking by phone from London. So what is a real lesbian? That’s a pointed question that’s been lobbed at Chaiken since she launched “The L Word” in 2004 with a cast of fictional characters - from androgynous wild child Shane to bisexual trans-man Moira (later, Max) - and carved out a rare televised space for lesbian narratives. “The Real L Word”: An earlier version of this article said that “The Real L Word” is Showtime’s top-performing unscripted show it is actually Showtime’s top-performing unscripted show in prime time. The show was originally inspired by Showtime’s scripted ensemble drama “The L Word,” which was in turn inspired by writer-producer Ilene Chaiken’s own experiences in the Hollywood dating scene - real lesbians inspired by fictionalized lesbians inspired by real lesbians. It’s a question that has serious consequences for her personal and work life, since Romi is a star of “The Real L Word” - the Showtime reality TV series that entered its third season this past week. It’s like, ‘What is she doing? Is she a real lesbian?’” Romi asks the camera. “Lesbians can be really harsh toward women who sleep with men again. And Romi is worried what her other friends will do when they find out about Romi’s new relationship - with a man. Her ex-girlfriend Whitney is dating her friend Sara, who has brainwashed Whitney into thinking Romi is evil. There is so much drama going on in Romi Klinger’s life right now. ![]()
1 Comment
|
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |