Mark Burnett is planning to produce “Talent Behind Bars” show
The reality show king Mark Burnett is planning on making a prison talent show for the crime section of the Discovery Channel.
Investigation Discovery channel has announced lat week that they are going to broadcast Burnett’s “Dancing Behind Bars”, along with a singing competition called “Talent Behind Bars” and his fans already started doubting his project. Henry Schleiff, the Discovery president, does not mind the comparison of these shows with the popular “American Idol” and the “Dancing with the Stars” series which proved to occasionally gain more popularity than the “Idol”. Nikki Fine of the website Deadline Hollywood has already criticized Burnett copy of the “Design Star”, in which Fine said that he managed to turn Vern Yip Donald Trump. Some people said that they believe Burnett has lost his programming touch, together with his new show, “Dancing Behind Bars”. But Hibberd from The Hollywood Reporter does not believe so, and says that his brand was based until now on the big family entertainment and is trying to polarize his business with this show and the Sarah Palin show. Hibberd said that it has been impossible in the last years to produce a television show that would break the TV rates, so Burnett has turned to launching smaller shows on cable.
Burnett’s new show and the other jailhouse contest will surely cause controversy also Schleiff says that this is not his intention. He declared that his intention is to draw an audience that wants to watch the show for half an hour. Schleiff said that the shows will not feature violent offenders although some of the ”actors” may have been convicted for drugs. The idea of the show is to mark out people who have been convicted for non violent crimes and discover people that have never had a real chance to have a proper education, but are talented, no matter if thay can dance or sing. And if someone acnowledges their real talent, it might ease their sentence. According to Broadcasting & Cable, the prizes given to the reality series winners are not determined yet, but they can go to supporting prisoner rehabilitation. Will Marling, head of the National Organization for Victims Assistance argues that these shows ignore the most important part of the population involved in the crimes: the victims. Even in the case of non violent criminals, there is alwys a victim involved and Marling says that he fails to see how this show will serve the victims and it seems unjust to him that the network is benefiting from people who are imprisoned and the prisoners may be benefiting to some extent.
