How MTV Revitalized The Real World

The Real World, which first aired on MTV in 1992, has always introduced itself with the same slogan, longer than a tweet but just as easily reduced to nothing: “Strangers picked to live in a house … to find out what happens … when people stop being polite … and start getting real.” Each year the show followed the same formula of trapping different demographics together in an often comically gorgeous home. Virgins flirted with the less so, rich Republicans clashed with perma-drunk liberals, and Ikea furniture (it’s always Ikea) broke during brawls.

Like any long-running series, The Real World became predictable; for the past five years its ratings have sagged, and last season’s first episode drew only 720,000 viewers. (Compare that with the 3.5 million who tuned in to watch Real World: Las Vegas in 2002.) So it wasn’t surprising that before the current edition—its 29th—the network considered ending the franchise. “Another season was contingent on doing it completely differently,” says Stephen Friedman, president of MTV. The network took a cue from the reality show genre it helped create: When all else fails, add a twist.