THE HOUSE OF ILL REPUTE HOW LOW CAN 'BROTHER' GO?

Byline: Commentary by David Kronke TV Critic

Two things leapt out from last week's revelation that ``Big Brother'' inmate George had accidentally killed a man: his wife's assertion that America's knowing of his mishap would ``destroy him,'' followed by ``Big Brother'' executive producer Paul Romer's desultory shrug, ``I'm just surprised it came out so early.''

George is the 41-year-old father of three - best-known for reclining on a snow-covered diving board while clad only in shorts, and donning a wig, a straw hat and performing a clunky chicken dance. But years earlier, he was responsible for the death of a close friend in a hunting accident that sounded like something out of the Coen brothers' ``Fargo.''

Picture the portly fellow in bulky winter finery; he scrabbles onto an icy log, only to slip and tumble; his gun goes off, ammo flying straight into the back of his buddy. Poor George wandered the wilderness for hours, so dazed that when he turned up in the hospital, he didn't even recognize his wife, Teresa.

Shouldn't that have been part of his initial biography? How can a ``journalist'' like Julie Chen host the show and introduce a documentary feature that excludes the key event of a person's life story? If the release of the information was inevitable, as Romer seemed to suggest, why not steel the guy for it by letting him know it will be announced up front - or simply find someone who doesn't have blood, no matter how inadvertent, on his hands?

Might someone at CBS have asked, would the family of the man accidentally shot be amused when the network wrung that story for high drama, using it like a surprise plot twist in a potboiler? Waiting for the information to leak its way into the national consciousness isn't disingenuous; it's flat-out dishonest and dishonorable.

This followed hot on the heels of Karen, the 43-year-old mother of four, railing vehemently against her husband, Tom, and vowing that her marriage was kaput. Again, one must assume that the ``Big Brother'' brain trust was aware that Karen was an emotional powder keg with a short fuse: Her marital dissatisfaction weighed so heavily upon her that the slightest provocation would cause her to blow.

How must Karen's kids feel, watching Mommy dump on Daddy and realizing that all America - including the kids at school they really hate - now knows that their father has intimacy issues? Have acquaintances already taunted them: ``Yo, dude! Can I touch your dad's face?''

(Husband Tom, who had expressed reservations about the whole enterprise on the show's premiere, made a dignified yet emotional appearance on Thursday's live episode, at least until he started getting poetic. Such reserve - so incongruous with the show's concept - probably, coupled with other houseguests' cogent reservations about Karen, put America squarely on his side.)

When the story that William was a disciple of a Nation of Islam splinter group came down the pike, it hardly seemed a surprise. But how many more of these Scuds has ``Big Brother'' prepared to drop on the American public before the show wraps up? Perhaps the reason CBS hasn't shown much concern about the show's vague ratings anemia is that it knows it has a card up its sleeve, one that, once exposed, will impel America to watch.

More to the point, however, is the question: Can America really find the suffering of those who aren't even on the show that entertaining? Will Jewish viewers find the show amusing anymore, knowing now that William hangs with a man whom even the Nation of Islam found too extreme in his anti-Semitic views?

Random developments in the BB house are posted on the Internet, where you can also watch the 10 contestants around the clock: Former stripper Jordan has been bawling her eyes out over her objectification, first in bars and now on this show (on CBS, judicious editing made it seem she was just upset that people in the house didn't like her). Brittany got all lachrymose because William accused her of bandwagoning on his outsider status. Josh is fretting that the group is too dull and the show will get canceled (hey, he's smarter than he looks).

Of course, it's OK to laugh at these rubes and their penny-ante travails - they've put this all on themselves by wanting to appear on the show. But CBS was perhaps fatally cavalier to think that the network could contain the humiliation and toxic emotions to the CBS Radford lot in Studio City, where the BB minimum-security prison sits baking in the Valley sun.

One dreads the next revelation: Did attorney Curtis successfully defend a monolithic corporation against the family of a man killed by one of its products (or puncture someone's eardrums with his operatic crooning)? Did Jamie, Washington state's idea of a beauty queen, have an opponent kneecapped before a beauty pageant? Is the lipstick Brittany smears on daily from a company that tests its products on animals kidnapped from dewy-eyed children? Did Jordan break a boyfriend's heart by profiting on more than mere glimpses of her body? Does Eddie buy human body parts on eBay? Does William secretly mail Spike Lee videos to rednecks, causing coronaries across the Deep South? Is someone a closet racist infuriated by William's antics?

In fact, a queasy politicization has subtly emerged on the show in the racial arena: Cassandra, at age 37, is the only person who doesn't seem to have a clear-cut counterpart of the opposite sex. William, the only other African-American in the house, is about a decade younger than she, and George, the man closest to her age, is married. Like much Hollywood entertainment, this show has cast a black woman in an asexual role.

Meanwhile, William has largely been depicted trying to instigate mischief, passionately discussing race issues, or flirting and verbally fencing with the white women his age. Is it just a coincidence that William - despite the fact that he's virtually the only housemate even trying to mix things up and keep things interesting for us poor viewers - ranked near the bottom of the popularity polls being maintained on the Internet and was likely to be the first inmate booted out even before his Nation of Islam ties came out?

If he claims racism contributed to his ouster, he'll at least be partially correct (all-American disdain for a certain kind of self-satisfied iconoclasm will be a culprit, as well). But many of William's well-reasoned race-based opinions will now be tainted by his extremist ties. What was CBS' agenda with the racial makeup of its casting?

And everyone understood from the outset that the network has some sort of agenda. One question I've been hearing a lot: How much is CBS controlling the houseguests' behavior?

Unless they've been ordered to be as dull as possible, the network is likely letting things transpire as they will (or, so far, won't). The houseguests should understand their responsibility toward making this show a success. So far, though, save for William, they haven't, really.

The constancy of that query, however, underscores viewers' distrust of the proceedings: We expect the show to be manipulated. Big Brother does nothing to help the houseguests (well, OK, he healed the chicken), but constantly confounds them: Instructions of all sorts are left in the Red Room, from those goofy challenges to conversation topics. So it wouldn't be unreasonable to expect BB to tweak George's lingering guilt by suggesting the group discuss death, or to force another meltdown from Jordan (or, really, anyone) by asking: Where do you draw the line in terms of maintaining personal dignity?

But what happens when the houseguests are provoked into griping about old flames or complaining about their family or slagging enemies, and begin naming names? Several inmates seem bratty or petty enough to settle scores in this fashion. Granted, this is more likely to occur on the Internet than on CBS, but can easily seep its way into the mainstream. Could a casual acquaintance with one of the BB 10 disrupt your life when one of them starts talking about ``this guy I know who has this twisted hobby ...''?

It's pretty clear: Big Brother is Loki, the Norse god of chaos, and the 10 (soon, nine) are a modern-day Donner Party going nowhere fast. But did anyone stop to consider how many other lives beyond the purview of those ubiquitous cameras would be cannibalized before the last houseguest staggers off the CBS Radford lot?

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Photo:

Julie Chen, host of CBS' reality-based show ``Big Brother,'' with television images of William and Jordan, who were selected for banishment from the house.

Associated Press