You Are What You Watch?

I thought it was a gimmick, along the lines of “Wife Swap” or “Joe Millionaire” – television shows designed to appeal to our most degenerate impulses, exploiting those weak or stupid enough to sign up for their fifteen minutes of fame.

The name of the show is “The Biggest Loser,” after all.  And the show’s promotional spots feature images of morbidly obese people grunting and straining under the weight of their own bodies with incredibly attractive instructors yelling in their sweaty, moon-shaped faces.

I never watched it, until one night I was channel surfing – what people used to do before the invention of TiVo and DVR – and I was immediately hooked.  Apparently, I'm not alone. The show, according to Neilsen, draws 10 million viewers per week, and more than 200,000 people (all at least 100 pounds overweight) per year audition for a coveted spot "on the ranch."

For the skinny, or otherwise uninitiated, the show premise is simple: fat people compete to lose the highest percentage of weight. The show's title – which seems to be an insult to the competitors’ size and social status – actually refers to the goal: to determine who can lose the most weight by body percentage.

This is a pretty noble goal in a country like ours -- it’s no secret that we’re just too fat.  Time magazine described the phenomenon this way:

Fully two-thirds of U.S. adults are officially overweight, and about half of those have graduated to full-blown obesity. The rates for African Americans and Latinos are even higher. Among kids between 6 and 19 years old, 15%, or 1 in 6, are overweight, and another 15% are headed that way. Even our pets are pudgy: a depressing 25% of dogs and cats are heavier than they should be.

At the beginning of each season, contestants stand on a scale to determine how much damage they’ve done to themselves.  Like a caloric accident, it’s impossible not to look rolls of fat so thick you imagine losing a sandwich or a small automobile between the layers.

Just after we got married, my husband and I moved to New York City. David worked around the clock at a law firm, so I occasionally passed the time by taking long walks through Manhattan. I ended up in the studio audience of Regis and Kathy Lee this way.  And in a regrettable moment, I ended up in the studio audience of Ricky Lake when a staffer at the show desperately needed to fill their studio audience.

You remember her, right?  She, of the “talk to the hand” eloquence that made her a household name.  I was wedged next to people who had been bussed in by the dozens, with a promise of free pizza afterwards.  Slumped over in their chairs, waiting for the show to be over so they could eat, their eyes were slits.  They were barely awake enough to be interested in the fifteen year-old child who was pregnant and telling her dad for the first time on stage.

The “stars” of the show were plucked from the nearest trailer park and seemed genuinely distraught during commercial breaks.  The young girl was shaking, visibly traumatized by her father and her boyfriend waiting in the wings.  She darted off stage and a producer ran after her.  It was then that I had a flash.  I remembered sitting in my high school Latin class, lamenting how evil spectators went to the Coliseum and watched people get torn from limb to limb for entertainment. 

Yet, there I sat, complicit.

“Excuse me,” I said as I climbed over the drugged audience members.  One awakened long enough to say, “You gotta stay for the whole show to get your slice of pizza.  They won’t let you back on the bus early.”

I decided then and there that I wouldn’t participate in or watch a show that existed presumably so America could get a good laugh at our weakest members.  Well, at least I wouldn’t sit in their studio audience and risk catching whatever communicable disease the other audience members brought in.

If the Biggest Loser stopped after the weigh-in, it would be simply an opportunity to gaze at what gluttony looks like – a weekly Ricky Lake meets “What’s Eating Gilbert Grape.”  But the show doesn’t end there. Each team is divided into two groups, given a personal trainer, and advice on how to cook and eat.  At the end of each week, the weigh-in sends one person – one of the two people with the lowest percentage of weightloss – home.

The two trainers – the amiable Bob and the gorgeous Jillian – push the individuals further than they want to go, resulting in treadmill falls and hot tears. Apparently, the trainers are rewarded by a predetermined bonus structure that gives the winning contestant's trainer more than $100,000.  The winning contestant receives $250,000.  And there’s even a $100,000 prize for the contestant who continues their weight loss journey at home – a nice feature since we’re used to the “lose-weight-fast” pills and gimmicks that net in flash-in-the-pan, unhealthy results. 

Though controversial, “The Biggest Loser” strives to promote safe weight loss, partnering with Subway to encourage healthful eating in addition to exercise.  They also employ four doctors, including a psychiatrist.  But the medical advice doesn't stop once they're off the show, as the show’s doctors and trainers give regular check-ups to former contestants.

The departing contestants leave the show saying, “America, the next time you see me…”  before telling us their secret goal.  Last season, one morbidly obese contestant was sent home, lost even more weight, and ended up running a half marathon.  I misted up as she crossed the finish line, conquering the universal conflicts of insecurity, sadness, and fear.  It's a show about second chances, life, and the altogether-overused notion of hope.  The weigh-ins become less a spectacle of gluttony and more a proof of what self-determination and hard work look like.  The producers show the contestant in all of their (sometimes) 400 pound glory in a split screen with their current, more slender bodies, making the transformation seem magical if we weren’t privy to all the sweat and exasperation the contestants undergo in the gym.  

Okay, okay, so there's a little too much pop psychology and annoying embedded ads.  ("Look, Bob, I'm going to use this Ziplock bag with the new convenient label for calorie counting."  "Thanks, Jillian.  Want a piece of Extra gum, which reduces food cravings?")

Danny Cahill, 40, of Broken Arrow, Oklahoma was the winner of Season 8 by losing 239 pounds, or 55.6 percent of his 430-pound starting weight.  But will he keep it off?  According to the New York Times, the trainers claim at least half of the contestants "stay close to the weight levels they achieve on the show for several years."

JD Roth, who is an executive producer of the series and created its current format, told the NYT this:

“Getting 100 percent to keep the weight off has never been the goal,” he said. “The goal is can we inspire people in America to make a change in their life. In that, we’re batting 1,000.”

Not bad for a two hour weekly television show.  You just didn’t get that with Joe Millionaire.

The Biggest Loser begins again on NBC, January 5, 2010 and will be in a “couple” format.  The heaviest contestant ever will try to fight for his very life, in his effort to shed some of his 526 pounds. Also, it will feature the heaviest couple, twin brothers who –together -- weigh 969 lbs.

by NANCY FRENCH loves reality television. Her dream is to go to the Biggest Loser Resort at Fitness Ridge, Utah.