Well-written, entertaining, and dark, "Cue the Sun" is a must-read for fans of reality television. It is a nesting doll of behind the scenes tattles and tales. Highly recommended for fans. Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

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I love reality tv. And I love Emily Nussbaum’s writing. Really enjoyed this. Felt like I learned something but was also thoroughly entertained.

Emily Nussbaum’s meticulous research in Cue the Sun makes it difficult to find fault with the book. For readers who are reality television fanatics, Nussbaum covers every corner imaginable here. Prior to reading this, one may wonder if the book will merely cover the reality television giants, but Nussbaum even covers reality television shows that had a short three-episode run with little notoriety. Of course, Nussbaum goes deep inside the big shows—even a Survivor super fan should learn some new details. The book should appeal to those who aren’t specifically interested in reality television but in general pop culture. Nussbaum is a Pulitzer-winning writer for The New Yorker, so she touches on the bigger cultural impacts resulting from the surge in reality television.

Cue the Sun is a bit longer than a typical pop culture book, but it also feels more substantive. Nussbaum covers a huge swath of history. Reality television hit a critical mass with Survivor in the early 2000s, but there were many, many reality television predecessors, including Cops and America’s Funniest Home Videos and all the way back to radio shows near the WWII era (Orson Welles’ 1938 War of the Worlds was thought to be real news at the time). This leads to a great discussion about what qualifies as “reality” in television because people staging embarrassing mishaps on poor quality home recorders isn’t truly reality. Her coverage feels more than fair, too. Nussbaum covers the subject exhaustively like the best journalist but isn’t afraid to wield her critic’s background to offer a bit more than just recitation of fact. Her takes are witty and unafraid of being critical when warranted but not dismissively so. She offers praise when it is deserved. Overall, an entertaining and informative read that is sure to teach readers something new about the history of reality television and think about how it has affected our culture at-large. Recommended.

This was a bit of a slog in a good way. The writing was excellent, the subject matter is something I really was interested in. The problem for me was it was too long. I lost interest in many chapters because they were over an hour. The information at times was lost in the weeds. There were also chapters that were of no interest to me.
The premise is the inception of reality tv. Just way too many people to keep track of, I just think it could have been edited down a bit.
Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the advance copy in exchange for a honest opinion.
3⭐️

Thank you to NetGalley for an advanced reader copy of Cue the Sun. I love reality tv, I love readig about tv. This book was a match made in heaven for my inerests! I learned so much, I had no idea the Real World wasn't the first reality tv show. The writing was so interesting and succinct while being incredibly entertaining.

Whether you love reality TV or don't care for it, you'll undoubtedly be intrigued by this book! CUE THE SUN! is an entertaining exploration of the genre and its evolution over the decades, starting from radio shows in the 1940s, all the way to today, where both cable channels and streaming services alike are home to so many of these hit shows. Emily Nussbaum has clearly done her research—I found this book so interesting, despite not being super familiar with some of the earlier shows she mentions, and she goes into extensive detail from start to finish, while also keeping the narrative fun and engaging throughout. She also does a great job of grounding each reality TV "era" in the social, historical, and cultural context it took place in, showing how the media landscape has changed over time. I've always been fascinated by reality TV .in general, looking it both with a critical eye and from a less serious viewer's perspective, someone who just wants entertainment, drama, and mess galore! As such, I feel like Nussbaum establishes a good balance between these two types of voices, too, embodying both viewpoints and also catering to readers who might identify with one over the other (or both).

Despite this being a longer read (over 400 pages), I still found myself wanting more from some areas of the book. Maybe I'm just showing my personal tastes here, as someone who never misses an episode of Love Island and has been tuning in to the Bachelor franchise for years, but I wished Nussbaum had focused a little bit more on the "guilty pleasure" type of shows, that may be considered "mindless," but have still had a significant impact on reality TV overall. The chapter comparing and contrasting Joe Millionaire and The Bachelor was so fascinating, and I would have liked to see more discussion like that, for example! However, I understand that there's so much to focus on with this sort of topic (someone could probably write an entire book about the reality dating show phenomenon alone!), and CUE THE SUN! is already so comprehensive and truly has something for every fan. If you love nonfiction reads, particularly in the pop culture realm, you won't want to miss this one! Thank you to NetGalley and Random House for the ARC.

Love it or hate it, reality television is hard to ignore. Some version of it exists on most traditional channels and the streaming platforms are getting deeper into it. Most of us have a favorite show (“Survivor” fan here) and although we call it a guilty pleasure, maybe it’s just more of a pleasure at this point since no one feels that guilty about it anymore. Emily Nussbaum is our finest writer/critic chronicling television, combining genuine enthusiasm with deep research. She has elevated television criticism to high art, winning a Pulitzer prize for her work in the New Yorker along the way. Her book Cue The Sun! is a both a fun read and a scholarly look at the history of reality television.

Nussbaum starts at the very beginning with radio and takes readers through the campy shows of the 1970s, including the stylings of television jester Chuck Barris. The book is mostly chronological, taking us through the rise of Fox during the 1980s, MTV’s pivot into the reality world, and the rise of home video shows before turning to our current landscape of offerings, many of which have their roots in earlier ideas. Not every show was a hit and some of the fun of this book is hearing about shows that you had forgotten about or maybe never saw in the first place.

Throughout the book, one theme is the question of how real the reality is. From faked home videos to re-shot and re-staged reality moments, what we call reality television is always manufactured to some extent. Sometimes, that is fairly benign; sometimes, it involves a lot of manipulation.

Fair warning, this book may change how you think about some of your favorite shows. As she shines a light on the producers and the ways the participants are coerced into giving the camera what it needs, there’s a fair amount of uncomfortable knowledge that as the audience, the responsibility also lies with us. Perhaps no more so in the final chapters when Nussbaum tackles “The Apprentice” and its impact on the global stage. The book, it turns out, is a love letter wrapped in caution tape.

Cue The Sun- As someone who is obsessed with reality TV, I knew I had to read this. I loved Nussbaum’s exploration and information that she imparted in this book. It added a layer to the shows that I was really excited for.

Ever since I read Emily Nussbaum's collection I Like to Watch, I've had the feeling she had a book like this in her: not a complete history of TV (though I now have a feeling she'll indeed get around to that) but a deep dive into one show, genre or era. Cue the Sun!'s systematic approach to exploring the high- and low-water marks of reality TV, and her grappling with why so many viewers can't get enough of it, continually leads to fascinating peeks behind the curtain. Reality TV has never really been <i>real</i>, but as Nussbaum demonstrates, it matters, for better or (more often) worse.

Thanks to Random House and Netgalley for the review copy.

This is where I admit my (apparent) overwhelming existing knowledge of reality TV. I had no idea. CUE THE SUN was immediately interesting to me because reality TV has often seemed just…what?…a complete black box to me. The more I watched, the less I understood. I would ‘check in’ on each new iteration of it, expecting to have some glimmer of understanding, but no, that didn’t arrive. Emily Nussbaum’s explanation of the origin and growth of the industry does explain how it developed and to what purpose. I learned more about the peculiarities of the background players than I perhaps needed to know. But, this is an interesting deep dive into a topic on which most people hide their knowledge or their viewing habits. I received my copy from the publisher through NetGalley.

I wanted to LOVE this book as much as I do reality TV. I did really like it, but some of the early stuff - pre-Real World - moved a little slow for me. That said - once I got to the 1990s and forward it really kept my attention. Four stars.

So many of my references with my friends are based on reality shows.
"Was it yours to open, you stupid bitch?!"
"You're a snake. Ssssss"
"How am I doing? Not well, bitch"

Emily Nussbaum has taken on the task of laying out the history and evolution of reality television. From Cops, to Survivior, to The Real World (my personal favorite), Nussbaum gets into the dirt and the drive to bring regular, or at least, sort of regular people to everyone's television.

Yes, the final chapter touches on the Reality TV President, but it's almost a must when talking about reality television. Nussbaum does a wonderful job on research and shows the trajectory from The Apprentice to .... the White House.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for the opportunity to read and review this book.

This reality tv overview gets a little too verbose at times (particularly in regards to Survivor), but I enjoyed learning more about my favorite type of tv shows.

I was surprised that we started with a radio program, but it was a stepping stone I hadn’t ever considered. I know that it would be impossible to cover the entirety of reality tv, but I felt like the subjects in this book trended more towards middlebrow reality shows. I think that trashy reality shows are a very important part of the genre. I did appreciate the inclusion of Joe Millionaire as a foil to The Bachelor.

Thanks for the advance copy in exchange for my honest review, NetGalley!

During the pandemic I binged pretty much all the Survivor I’d missed since I stopped watching after the first two iconic seasons. There is something unique about the real life characters reality tv creates and the way it intersects with culture…and the way that connects with our brains. In Cue the SUN!, Nussbaum (of Pulitzer and Twitter) takes a well researched look at the history of reality tv along with its progression and cultural and societal impact. The writing is accessible and smart. It would drag if it was fully comprehensive of all of reality tv so it’s interesting to see what the author picks and chooses to write about. I will admit I struggled to care as much about the content in the first couple of chapters but they are important for setting the stage. The American Family chapter is where I became fully engaged. The rawness and emotional impact of the series was captured on the page in a way that I could visualize. Other highlights for me were earlier sections on Bob Saget and Cops, the inner workings of the first season of The Real World, the connection between shows like Alien Autopsy and Fox Cable News, how Survivor and Big Brother came to be, the dive into Who Wants to Marry a Multi-Millionaire?, the gross inner workings of early seasons of The Bachelor and the way predators like Weinstein and Trump interacted with the reality tv landscape. This review was published on Goodreads on 5/24/24.

If you are a reality TV buff, you must read this book.

I came of age watching many reality series, from American Idol and America's Funniest Home Videos as a kid, to Top Model, Flavor of Love, Survivor, and The Amazing Race as a teen, to Drag Race and Top Chef as an adult. I love reality TV and the campy escapism it offers, but I also have described it as a "guilty pleasure."

Emily Nussbaum, who won a 2016 Pulitzer for her television criticism in The New Yorker, combines in-depth interviews, meticulous, and a true connoisseur's appreciation for the genre that simultaneously attracts and repulses. She seeks to neither "clutch [her] pearls" or "dismiss [reality shows] as frothy nothing"—a difficult line to walk—but rather explores the history of the makers and participants of landmark shows throughout the decades, revealing the tensions and contradictions within.

She describes the paradox of loving reality TV so aptly: "These programs had always had an obvious allure: They offered something authentic, buried inside something fake. They stripped away the barrier between the star and the viewer. More than any other cultural product, they functioned as a mirror of the people who watched them—and if that reflection was sometimes cruel, it was also funny, riveting, outrageous, and affecting, even if—maybe especially if—you found it disturbing."

Nussbaum starts with the hidden-microphone radio shows of the 1940s, then moves onto the pioneering and divisive 1970s An American Family and The Gong Show, then the beginnings of the '80s reality boom with Cops and AFV. Finally, she explores the ramp-up and explosion of reality TV in the '90s, '00s, and '10s, from The Real World and Big Brother to Survivor, The Bachelor, Bravo shows, and The Apprentice, arguably the reality show with the most outsize ripple effect on modern political life. Every chapter is fascinating, well-written, and propulsive, often following a scrappy showrunner, a pioneering editor, and some of the contestants on their shows. Nussbaum also critiques the productions through lenses of race, gender, class, fame, and subjectivity/authenticity, all of which made me consider different facets of each show.

What I really loved about this book is the framing conceit of The Truman Show, which also lends the book its title. Reality showrunners and producers have the "godlike power to create stories from the lives of ordinary human beings," and the audience eagerly consumes every minute. The chapters within Cue the Sun! trace the evolution of the participants, as well. In the candid microphone and candid camera shows, as well as first seasons of popular shows, the contestants were often naive Truman types, unsure of how to harness and construct their own image on TV and unaware of the ramifications of such visibility. But as these shows get renewed and we move into the age of Kardashians, Real Housewives, and social media virality, they take a much more active role in shaping their narratives (even if they don't always share in the power).

Overall, a fascinating book and one of the best I've read so far this year.

I've been such a huge fan of Emily Nussbaum's work for a long time. I absolutely loved her first book, and this one was fun! As a huge reality TV fan, it was nice to learn the origins and where it's gotten us now with the TV landscape.

Cue the Sun! is one of the most in depth and well written books I’ve read and Emily Nussbaum delves deep into the history of Reality TV, it’s creation and the figures and shows that helped revolutionize the medium. Nussbaum uses historian level research to look at shows ranging from The Gong Show to Survivor and never makes the reading monotonous or boring all the while peppering in stories of creators, contestants and those surrounding the shows.

Several years ago, I dated someone whose sister lived in LA and worked for the company that edited America’s Next Top Model. She was legally prohibited from sharing wacky Tyra Banks stories; however, I did learn one thing about the business from her. A part of her job was cutting and pasting bits of dialog to make it sound like the contestants said something the producers wished for them to say. Emily Nussbaum’s Cue the Sun: The Invention of Reality TV taught me that these bits of phony dialog are called “frankenbites.”

Writing in an incredibly engaging way, Nussbaum traces the origin of reality TV all the way back to “audience participation” radio shows. These shows featured regular people talking to a host about incredibly inappropriate things. Think of them as a precursor to Jerry Springer, Riki Lake, and Phil Donahue. From there she talks about Candid Camera, the Gong Show, and then An American Family, the PBS series that most resembles reality shows of today. More modern shows like The Real World, Survivor, and The Bachelor get plenty of pages as well.

Cue The Sun is a fascinating look at a subject many love/love to hate. You’ll learn a lot about the culture that produced these types of shows and the making of the shows themselves. I’m grateful that Nussbaum didn’t shy away from the bad side of these shows and how harmful some of them have been to their subjects. Reading it will undoubtedly change the way you watch them.

I am worried about Emily Nussbaum. She clearly needed to watch thousands upon thousands of hours of reality TV to write her book, Cue the SUN!, and I am seriously worried what that can do to someone's mental health.

If you love reality TV, then this review is simple. You must read this book and you will absolutely love every page. If you hate reality TV, then guess what? You and I are in agreement. I hate reality TV. Unless Gordon Ramsay is in it, then it should win an Emmy. All others are trash. All that being said, I still loved this book.

The reasons why everyone should love this book are evident from page 1. Nussbaum's writing style is easy to read, and it feels like a conversation. Also, I am not kidding about how much reality TV she must have watched. She is utterly meticulous, and she consistently brings up events that have long been forgotten. And I mean long forgotten. Nussbaum doesn't start with a show like Survivor. Instead, she traces the roots of reality TV all the way back to the 1940s and works her way to today. The chronology is seamless and a chapter on a show called An American Family is a particular standout. If you aren't keen to go back that far, then you are missing out. However, Nussbaum quickly gets to all the shows you know and love (or love to hate).

There is no way to write this book without inevitably touching on some political hot buttons. The Apprentice was a show after all and is the subject of the final chapter. As someone whose tolerance for political diatribes is zero, I think Nussbaum is fair with her subjects throughout the book. Yes, I don't think it is hard to pick out what side Nussbaum herself is on. However, multiple times I read a chapter and thought, "Hm, I think one extreme would be mad about this part of the chapter, while the other extreme would be mad about another." In the end, Nussbaum's research is so extensive and so well presented that it doesn't matter what side of the aisle you fall on. A great story is just a great story.

(This book was provided as an advance copy by Netgalley and Random House.)

I enjoyed this book. I thought the characters and the narrative structure were very interesting. I would recommend this book to those interested in this genre. I would be interested in reading more from this author.