ELLEN DeGeneres (center) and the “Design Challenge” contestants.
We had an instructive viewing experience late last month, when we viewed two different TV tilts involving furniture designers.
The first, “Ellen’s Design Challenge,” was produced by Ellen DeGeneres and showcased eight promising designers who were tasked each week to come up with an original piece of furniture, with “expert” judges eliminating one contender per week, until the “best” designer emerged victorious.
The other furniture design tilt, “Framework,” had many more contestants, as well as a generally less “artistic” and more practical approach and purview.
The two productions ended up as an instructive viewing experience for us, because they showed how two “similar” shows can actually be quite different on point of effect and impact, due to a number of relevant factors:
Early on in our comparative analysis, the element of “intended viewership” presents itself as an important factor.
Producer Ellen obviously has taste, so she intends her “design challenge” to showcase the best designers-craftsmen-artists—hence, the amazing beauty and creativity of their weekly output. Function is still a consideration, but beauty trumps everything.
For its part, “Framework” appears to be intended for an audience of hobbyists and craftsmen, who expect to get detailed tips on how they can solve crafting and construction problems at home.
This accounts for the choice of their first challenge—to design and make an unusual ping-pong table!
Expectedly, while the contenders tried to come up with interesting variations, their creativity was severely limited by the “generic” choice of furniture type.
For their part, Ellen’s hopefuls were tasked to create “signature” beds that reflected not just their artistic “essence,” but even their “philosophy” about sleep, what it connotes, the stuff of dreams—etc.
True enough, their output went from zen-like “sculptural” pieces to a nightmarish creation that featured a headboard that looked like tongues of carved wooden flames! So much for getting a good night’s rest
The outcome, of course, was that the designer of the “flaming” headboard was the first to get booted out. There are limits to artistry, even on Ellen’s design show.
Other contrasting factors related to production and challenge choices include the kind of contestant chosen to compete in a particular show.
On Ellen’s challenge, many of the eight contenders were focused and high-minded designers—while their counterparts on “Framework” were more argumentative, competitive, in-your-face nasty, loud, devious—and even prone to verbal, psychological and perhaps even physical violence!
No actual blows were exchanged in the telecast we watched, but it still made for decidedly more stressful viewing. Relax, guys, it’s just a ping-pong table!