It was M-Net executives who have
ordered a block on Love Island South Africa episodes being placed on
DStv Catch Up to try and limit more viewers from seeing how unrepresentative
and badly-produced its new reality series is, while an expert says that South
African TV content like this is misleading Africa's viewers through
misrepresentation.
A firestorm of criticism has
engulfed Love Island SA since its debut this past Sunday for its lack
of diversity in casting and cringe-worthy production gaffes that DStv
subscribers are not used to seeing on M-Net (DStv 101) as MultiChoice's top
premium pay-TV channel.
Love Island SA is a local
adaptation of the ITV Studios format show with the main sponsor LottoStar that dropped the embarrassing series on Tuesday to distance itself from the public
fallout and reputation damage, while insiders said that the crew that is in a
"flatspin" is "living through a nightmare".
Numerous interview requests – all rebuffed – have been made all week to try and talk to M-Net executives and
Rapid Blue producers to explain the issues around the show, and with several
questions in media enquiries as yet unanswered, Joanne Botha at Aprio, the PR
firm representing MultiChoice told TVwithThinus on Thursday to "please refer
to the channel’s social media pages".
There, M-Net's only comment to date late
on Tuesday was a statement card, not issued to the media, saying "We are
working tirelessly to fix things".
After 5 days there's yet to be a
virtual press conference from the pay-TV operator's top execs to take questions
with no statements yet from Yolisa Phahle as MultiChoice Group CEO for general
entertainment, group executive of general entertainment Gideon Khobane, Nkateko
Mabaso as group executive of programming, M-Net director Jan du Plessis;
or Kaye-Ann Williams as M-Net's head of local productions.
At Rapid Blue Love Island
SA is overseen by executive producers Adi de Lancey and Duncan
Irvine, series producer Abigail Clark, series director Nadia White, and Kim
Thwaites as head of production who have all been silent too.
By Friday none of the the already shown 5 episodes of Love Island SA is available on DStv Catch Up and it
has now come to light that it is M-Net who is trying to keep the show away from
a wider DStv audience who might see it through time-shifted viewing.
M-Net
decided to limit episode availability to a single late-night linear airing on
the channel to try and curtail the damage.
After only episode 2 was made briefly
made available on Tuesday morning and removed by Tuesday afternoon, DStv is
telling subscribers that Love Island SA episodes on DStv Catch Up
have been removed at the request of M-Net.
Speaking about where channels like M-Net and shows
like Love Island SA go wrong, the linguist Lutendo Nendauni, lecturer
and language editor at North-West University, tells TVwithThinus that "what
causes them to get out of line is that they're trying, by all means, to grab
content from overseas, from Western countries to incorporate it here".
Lutendo Nenduani has authored an academic paper critiquing
the cultural and racial representation in South African TV soapies.
"Those programmes sometimes come
with their own culture – just like when they say that when you adopt someone's
language you also adopt their culture. So once they adapt those programmes,
they tend to do away with what actually represents us."
"There are a lot of programmes on
South African television that does not actually talk to who we are as South
Africans. For them is business – they want to attract viewership. They want to
increase revenue through international soapies; international programmes."
"However, in the midst of doing
that, they sometimes do away with our traditions which must be embedded to show
who we are. That is where questions about representation and under-representation
come in".
Africa's viewers mislead by South African content
Lutendo Nendauni says "Love Island
SA should incorporate more people of colour" and that "we are in
Africa. The content is serving African people".
"Eight percent of the people in
South Africa are black. How come should a TV programme have 90% white people?
It means it's not really reflecting our rainbow nation."
He says M-Net going forward
"should ensure that whatever content they're broadcasting to people
should actually speak to people. That's why we've got the local content policy.
They shouldn't overlook that – that should be taken into account when they're
designing their programmes; their reality shows".
While Love Island SA is being
pirate-viewed globally with viewers in the United States, Australia and the
United Kingdom online asking where they can stream-watch and download illegally
uploaded episodes, Love Island SA is also seen across sub-Saharan
Africa as far as Nigeria, and in all neighbouring Southern African countries.
"Remember, people watch South
African programmes because they want to have an experience of what it's like
living in South Africa," says Lutendo Nendauni.
"They want a taste of what
being a South African is. If you're going to be showing them something that is
not actually a representation of what South Africa is, you are misleading
them."
"They watch a show because they
want to get a taste of our culture; a taste of how we live. If you're giving
them something that is not us, it means you are not actually representing us.
That's where the problem comes in. It sends a wrong message to the people who
are in our neighbouring countries and all other countries."
"They are expecting to get the
real reality – not something else that doesn't reflect who we really are."
TV biz: Allow more people in with new
ideas
Lutendo Nendauni says "we
definitely need change within our media industry from the gatekeepers."
"The gatekeepers are the same old
people. That's why we see the same people, over and over, in different
programmes – the same actors doing the same thing in different programmes –
because the gatekeepers are the same."
"We need to open up the media
sector and allow for more people to come in," he says. "And allowing
more people to come in, means having new ideas because they will come with new
ideas that get to be incorporated within those ones that exist and we can then
have a better media sector wherein everybody stands a chance to go in."
"Ideas that are then reflected are
many, meaning that we get to cover at least more of the views that need to be
included, we get to reach more people, we get to compete better globally with
the media industries of other countries."
"We need to open up the space and
allow more new people to come in – young people with different ideas – and to
add sort of 'va-va-voom' to uplift our media industry".
