This is the true story, of seven strangers, picked to live in a house……WAIT, this isn’t that reality show we’re talking about here. Although twenty years ago I desperately wanted to be on MTV’s The Real World. Looking back, I’m super grateful I was never one of those seven strangers.
My very good friend and talented interior designer, Tracey Erickson (Fré Interior Design @caligirl92262) asked me to audition for the HGTV/DIY Network show Renovation Realities a few years ago. She wanted to show the world the transformation process of her kitchen, and the well designed result.
I, of course, was very reluctant in doing it. Thinking, yeah right, they’re never going to pick us to do this show anyway, what will it hurt. Im not kidding you, a week after submitting the audition tape, they called and said they wanted to come film us.
We both freaked out. Number one, they had to film us eight hours a day for five days straight. The idea of renovating a kitchen for that long, to me, was going to send me over the edge. Tracey was ecstatic and instantly went into preparation mode. Number two, and more important, what the hell was I going to wear? I didn’t want to go on national television looking like a slob. Not going to lie, being filmed, having cameras follow us, to know what it was FINALLY like to be a housewife, I said, SIGN ME UP!
It was really interesting how the show was produced. We had a checklist of items Tracey needed to make happen to complete the design. While we attempted to clear that list, a camera was in our face and a story line was developing. The producer took a ton of notes and would stop us mid renovation to ask us questions. She would make us answer in past and present tense. Sometimes they would give us a sentence or two to repeat to make things make sense. Tracey and I were completely in the dark of the story line until the show aired.
The way the producers edit footage to look a certain way was comical to me. They make Tracey look like she’s mixing water and electric, about to get electrocuted. Let me tell you, she knew better.
The scene where the sparks go flying, well, that was real, and could have been a disaster. The main water shut off valve in real life, took us about half a day to find. We searched for what felt like forever. That was edited to be about two minutes. When they show me giving up and leaving, that happened, but not quite how it seemed. That was the second day and I was just leaving for the day. I was tired folks, and you would have been too.
For those who watched it when it aired, I hope it made you laugh. For those that didn’t get to see it, it’s below for your entertainment. While my career is not in television, you never know where life can go…a show on Bravo perhaps? Not counting on it…but we’ll see.
(side note - our sound guy worked on Keeping Up with The Kardashians for a few seasons, he said they couldn’t have been a nicer group of people to work with)
View the episode below…
