One for UK Dopers: last night Channel 4 screened a programme called The Great Reality TV Swindle, which I understand was first shown back in December last year (I didn’t see it then as I was out of the country).
Briefly, this was (or at least purported to be) a documentary about 30 people who had signed up for a year-long reality TV show, sold their houses, given up their jobs etc, only to find out that the whole thing was a sham - the “producer” turned out to work in a bookshop and his “production company” didn’t exist - the address given was that of a mate of his and he roped his mum into answering the phone.
This programme intrigued me, mainly because I couldn’t work out if it was a genuine documentary about a fake programme, or a fake documentary about a fake programme - which, even for Channel 4, is taking self-referentialism a step too far. Certainly I would have thought that if this actually happened, it would have gained more media attention than an obscure documentary shown six months after it happened.
This Guardian story from around the time of the show’s first airing makes no reference to its being a sham; some of the folks on this message board claim that the whole thing was a fake.
Anyone have the Straight Dope?