Reality Check.

Insurers are making sure the stunts on television shows such as "Survivor" and "Fear Factor" are as risk free as possible.

This summer, millions of viewers watched contestants on the reality television show "Fear Factor" spend four minutes in a body-size case with 300,000 worms wriggling over their bodies. A risky stunt, perhaps, but insurers made sure beforehand that it wasn't too risky.

Even though unpredictability is part of the allure of reality shows, before "Fear Factor" contestants munched sheep's eyeballs and "Survivor 3" contestants jetted to Africa, those shows' insurers had questioned, researched and double checked every detail of each of the shows' situations, and participants had signed waivers as thick as the New York City Yellow Pages. "If I can visualize what they are going to do and how to accomplish it, and it's well controlled, it's easy for me to move forward with the risk," said Wendy Diaz, an entertainment insurance underwriter with Fireman's Fund, Novato, Calif.

Reality shows look to entertainment insurance specialists--such as Fireman's Fund, American International Group Inc. and St. Paul Cos.--for coverage that allows these programs to set up the risky stunts that build viewership. Most coverage is placed through brokers, such as Marsh and Aon's Albert G. Ruben unit, which handles the insurance for the majority of the reality shows, said Paul Jones, senior vice president.

Entertainment insurance is a tiny part of the property/casualty market, accounting for an estimated $250 million in premiums annually, compared with the $303 billion total property/casualty market, according to the Insurance Information Network of California. The entertainment insurance total covers film and television, said Peter Moraga, a spokesman with the network.

Brokers take a creative approach to placing coverage for a genre where every show has different challenges. Even though insurers have the power of the purse--putting a price on the risk of setting a contestant on fire, for example--Jones says he never would allow an insurer to dictate what a client can do. "Our job is to find creative solutions. We'll provide extra accident coverage or place the exclusions in the London market if we have to," Jones said.

Reality shows require a "plethora of coverages" -- that is, about 12 different policies, Jones said. They include extra expenses, such as downtime if a facility is lost or reshooting if a lab ruins film during developing; general liability; workers' compensation; errors and omissions; cast coverage; auto insurance; and prize coverage.

Must-See TV

Reality television dates back to "Candid Camera," which made its debut in 1948. Its newest evolution sprouted in 1989 with Fox Network's "Cops" and then MTV's "Real World" in 1992. Hit shows like "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?" and "Big Brother" were tested in Europe and given a ride on U.S. airwaves as either summer fill-ins or extra programming that would come in handy if the Screen Actors Guild strike threat became reality.

After networks witnessed the public's taste for successive nights of Regis Philbin on "Millionaire," and "Survivor" broke ratings records in 2000, networks sought ways to cash in on the trend, and reality shows became the biggest thing in television since newsmagazines broke through in the '80s.

Reality shows are also popular with networks, because they are cheaper to produce than sitcoms and dramas, which can cost $13 million per episode, compared with reality shows' cost of $500,000 to $3 million per episode. And after "Survivor 1" brought in an estimated $30 million to CBS in ad revenues, networks scrambled to schedule reality shows in their weekly lineups.

The infusion of ad revenue is important to networks in light of the dismal findings of ad guru Bob Coen's advertising report for McCann Erickson Worldwide. The report said ad revenue for the first quarter of 2001 is down 2%, compared with an 18% spike for the same period last year.

In fall 2001, an estimated 24 reality shows went on the air via the major networks or cable. The definition of reality is broad. The term includes the familiar "Survivor," but also quiz shows like "Weakest Link" and comedies like "Spy TV." The newest shows include CBS' "Amazing Race," in which 22 contestants race around the world for $1 million, and NBC's "lost," which places three couples in a race to reach the Statue of liberty after being dropped in an undisclosed location with $100 and no help from friends or family.

"You'd have to say it's a growing part of entertainment insurance. Where were reality shows two years ago? Now you're seeing them constantly. It's still a niche market, but a growing one," said Candysse Miller, executive director of the Insurance Information Network of California.

Reality shows are capturing the public's attention, because they give people something with which they can identify, but set in an illustrious frame, said Richard Smale, a lecturer at Bournemouth University in the United Kingdom. As children, individuals learned life lessons from fairy tales and fables and later in life through soap operas. "However, in recent years, and perhaps because the ante of audience attention grabbing has been raised, story lines have become more melodramatic and extreme," Smale said. "There is now much more sex and violence, gunshots may be heard on the village green and no marriage in soap-land can ever stand the test of time. In other words, the soaps have become less lifelike. Hence, reality TV may be seen as more true to life."

Robert Thompson, a pop-culture expert and professor of radio-television and film at Syracuse University, said that after 50 years of sitcoms and television dramas featuring stories of doctors, lawyers or police officers, reality TV is something completely different. "Also, Americans, and probably humans, are inherently voyeuristic. Anyone who has ever peeked into the medicine cabinet of a party host understands the allure of reality TV," Thompson said.

Risk Factors

In underwriting, insurers always have looked to previous experience to price coverage. Because the reality show genre is relatively new, insurers face the challenge of pricing a genre that doesn't have a track record. Reality show risk factors also include employing the general public plucked from gyms or videotaped applications rather than trained actors or stunt people.

"The biggest difference between insuring regular television shows and reality shows is the use of contestants. Many insurers don't like dealing with nonprofessionals instead of real stunt performers. In this situation, a lot of things can happen," Jones said.

To make sure things don't happen, insurers conduct intense on-the-scene information gathering, "that you just can't get from a slip of paper," said Diaz of Fireman's Fund. Once when Diaz's company was to insure a show's participants who were to go skydiving, Fireman's Fund sent a staff member from its loss-control department to the site to analyze the risk firsthand. The loss-control employee investigated the level of training provided to the skydiving participants and visited the aircraft company that was doing the drop and checked its credentials.

Risk control is so integrated into the stunts in "Fear Factor" that it's often scarier to view on TV than in person. The Insurance Information Network of California's Miller said she had spoken with a news reporter who tried a "Fear Factor" stunt in which he was strapped in a harness between two buildings several stories high and pulled himself from one building to the other. "He was surprised at the number of safety factors involved that you don't see on TV" Miller said.

Even if insurers find a situation's risk too high, the conditions of the stunt are negotiable. That was the case when a show wanted to set a contestant on fire and make him run down a pier before jumping into water. "You have to respect and understand that the last thing a network wants to do is start a show where people have died," said Ted Tafaro, president of the Hanleigh Cos., a Lloyd's affiliated sports and entertainment health and disability underwriter.

Surprisingly, in an entertainment vehicle that features contestants living in the Australian Outback or existing in a tank with 24 boa constrictors and pythons, the largest insurance claims so far fall in the errors and omissions coverage, not liability. To explain this odd twist, insurers again point to the fact that the producers are dealing with the general public and not trained professionals. "Unfortunately, some people aren't forthright and honest. So producers rely on things like background checks to avoid what happened on '[Who Wants to Marry a] Millionaire,' which was a black eye for reality-based programs," said Brian Kingman, a senior vice president at Aon/Albert G. Ruben. After the show aired, it was discovered that the show's millionaire groom, Rick Rockwell, had a restraining order issued against him by an ex-fiancee.

"You'd think financial danger for a show is getting injured, but instead it seems to be because someone got their feelings hurt. The E&O part of the insurance package is seeing more action than liability," Miller said.

Earlier this year, Fox's "Temptation Island" took an E&O hit in a suit brought by a couple who participated in the show. Because the premise of the show was to break up a couple's relationship, couples who were chosen as participants were not supposed to be parents. But during one episode in front of an audience of 18 million viewers, the show's producer asked Taheed Watson and Ytossie Patterson about being parents to a 2-year-old child. Watson and Patterson brought suit against the show's producers, Rocket Science Laboratories, because of the questioning and their subsequent dismissal from the show. The couple claimed defamation of character and sought unspecified punitive and compensatory damages.

"Survivor 1" castoff Stacey Skillman is suing the show's producers, claiming they conspired to have the show's participants vote her off in favor of contestant Rudy Boesch. "Even though participants sign waiver after waiver, that's not going to stop some people from suing," Miller said.

The Lineup

Here's a list of shows in development,
currently being aired or already in the
sequel stage.


[] Amazing Race            CBS
[] Big Brother             CBS
[] Boot Camp               FOX
[] Chains of Love          UPN
[] Combat Missions         USA
[] Destination Space       NBC
[] Fear Factor             NBC
[] Greenlight              HBO
[] Hopkins 2417            NBC
[] I Want a Divorce        FOX
[] I Want a Wife: Alaska   FOX
[] Jailbreak               ABC
[] Lost                    NBC
[] Love Cruise             FOX
[] Love Stories            CBS
[] Manhunt                 UPN
[] The Mole 2001           ABC
[] Murder in Small Town X  FOX
[] No Boundaries            WB
[] The People Versus       ABC
[] Popstars                 WB
[] The Real World - lO     MTV
[] Rivals                  ABC
[] The Runner              ABC
[] Survivor 3              CBS
[] Temptation Island       FOX
[] WWF Tough Enough        MTV

Real Stunts

Although most of reality shows' challenges are mind games, many involve physically grueling antics.

Fear Factor: Eating sheep eyes

Amazing Race: Bungee jumping a 300-foot gorge in South Africa

Survivor 2: Stabbing a pig to death in the Australian Outback

Boot Camp: Standing at attention for five hours wearing a 30-pound backpack