Ten years on, the global appetite for Big Brother and its brand of increasingly twisted reality shows may finally be waning.
Australia's Network Ten dropped the format this year after its audience share fell from an average 50.3% on its debut in 2001 to 890,000 viewers and a 36.9% share this year.
There was a similar audience decline in Germany, the Netherlands and the US for the former ratings juggernaut. For Endemol global head of programming Paul Romer, one of the key creatives who developed Big Brother, this comes as no surprise. "In Europe and the US we are coming out of a period where we had a lot of reality shows with an edge," says Romer. "It started in 2000 with Big Brother but now people don't want to see shows where people are prodded to be nasty or to gossip. They want entertainment shows for the sheer purpose of entertainment."
Romer cites Endemol format Wipeout, where contestants slog through a series of extreme obstacles for a cash prize, as a good example of this return to pure entertainment values. The show became a hit for US network CBS this summer and has been commissioned in 20 other countries. It is a shift that has not escaped the notice of Gareth Williams, executive producer of international format production at BBC Worldwide.
"There has been a move towards more family programming," he says. For BBCW this move has helped to cement the success of celebrity dancing format Strictly Come Dancing. "Shiny floor formats are still popular," says Williams. "Strictly is still made in 27 countries worldwide."
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