The name Richard Hatch is surely familiar to anyone who watched TV 24 years ago, or at least reality TV. Hatch won the first season of Survivor in a way that "seemed shocking" at the time, writes TV exec Michael Hirschorn in a New York Times essay. First, "the often rude, sometimes randomly naked Mr. Hatch struck a strategic alliance to force out his strongest adversaries," writes Hirschorn, who is chief executive of the TV production company Ish Entertainment and former head of programming at VH1. He then "outsmarted producers" by skipping a challenge and manipulating his way to victory. "But most shocking of all, he broke the golden rule of network television: You have to be likable." More than that, writes Hirschorn: "He was the most hated man in America."
Hirschorn argues that Hatch changed the direction of reality TV and helped it emerge as its own unique cultural form—"a fully self-referential cinematic universe, artfully levered between the authentic and confected, a winking co-creation among players, producers and audience that gleefully showcased narcissism and other antisocial character traits." He birthed the TV reality star, and Hirschorn sees a clear line from Hatch to Donald Trump as the latter morphed from Apprentice star to president. "Trump clearly understands how to operate in this particular version of the upside down, collaborating with his audience to create shareable moments that are full of in-jokes and provocations, perpetual-motion meme machines." Are his sometimes "outrageous" statements real or jokes? "Possibly both," but Trump is expert at "muddying the distinctions." (Read the full essay, which notes that Hatch eventually ran into legal trouble himself.)
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