Dylan Reeve

And today, a question that has vexed many of our greatest minds over the years.

How real is reality TV? Well, speaking of great minds, Dylan Reeve has worked in and around reality TV for more than two decades.

He also happens to be one of the hosts of RNC podcast, The Reality Machine, which is out now.

And he joins me on the line now.

We can't get into that, but I'm talking of psychology experiments.

Anyway.

Dylan Reeve, lovely chatting.

Another time.

Kia

ora, I'm Dylan Reeve, and I've spent more than half my life making TV, including a fair bit of reality.

And I'm here to tell you about it, including some of the stuff that doesn't make it on screen.

So far in this series, we've been talking about some formative shows and some of the big reality success stories.

It's desktop computer editing.

Hey, thanks for listening and cheers to all our participants.

I'm producer and host Dylan Reeve.

RNZ's senior producer and co-host is Phil Vine.

[upbeat music]

A teaser there for The Reality Machine, featuring Dylan Reeve, one of the editors he was talking about there, who made the series along with RNZ's own Phil Vine, who turned out to be not so much of a fan of reality TV.

[radio static] Dylan, you've worked in it.

H- how, how do you define it?

And if you have a good idea for a reality show, your best bet really is to, um, self-fund it for a start, get an audience on YouTube and, um, and go from there, which is desperate and it's not like, um, some of the producers talked about just going over the road to TVNZ and picking up a check.

It ain't like that anymore.

Dylan Reeve, writer, documentary maker, and film editor who's got his hands dirty on a wide range of New Zealand reality TV down the years, and who's now made a podcast series for RNZ all about it, The Reality Machine, along with RNZ producer Phil Vine, who it turns out has a skeptical eye and not such a big appetite for the unscripted stuff.

Though, as we also heard, he does cast an eye over some of those survival of the fittest struggles in the wilderness type shows from time to time.

Now, our journey to understand unscripted TV continues.

Kia ora, I'm Dylan Reeve, and I'm here to talk to you about reality TV.

That voice you heard just then, the deep, American-accented narrator? He's a friend I've roped in, to add a little colour to some moments in the show.

His name is Stephen Lyons, and I actually first met him when we were both working on the block NZ.

You have no identity.

Hey, thanks for listening and cheers to all our participants.

I'm producer and host Dylan Reeve.

RNZ's senior producer and co-host is Phil Vine.

So as I mentioned, I am one of those reality TV insiders, and I should probably introduce myself.

I'm Dylan Reeve.

And if my name sounds familiar, it might be because you watched me in the first season of The Traitors, or you've seen my documentary film Tickled that I directed with David Farrier.

This tickling empire is way bigger than we ever imagined.

[upbeat music]

Hey, thanks for listening, and cheers to all our participants.

I'm producer and host Dylan Reeve.

RNZ senior producer and co-host is Phil Vine.

[singing] Do you wanna play? [upbeat music]

A teaser there for The Reality Machine featuring Dylan Reeve, one of the editors he was talking about there, who made the series along with RNZ's own Phil Vine, who turned out to be not so much of a fan of reality TV.

[static crackles] Dylan, you've worked in it.

H- how, how do you define it?

There's no single experience, aside from every now and again when some particular show breaks through that we're all very excited about, Squid Games or something like that.

Any show you make now is for some, and to some degree, for a niche audience.

Dylan Reeve, writer, documentary maker, and film editor who's got his hands dirty on a wide range of New Zealand reality TV down the years and who's now made a podcast series for RNZ all about it, along with RNZ producer Phil Vine, who it turns out has a skeptical eye and not such a big appetite for the unscripted stuff, though as we also heard, he does cast an eye over some of those survival of the fittest struggles in the wilderness type shows from time to time.

The Reality Machine, a seven-part series, is out from tomorrow on the podcast section of rnz.co.nz, or you'll find it for free wherever you get your podcasts.