• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

Andy Dehnart

writer, TV critic, teacher, improviser

  • about me
  • writing
    • highlights
    • essays and reviews
    • long-form journalism
    • reporting and journalism
    • publications
  • speaking
    • What I can do for you
    • interviews and press
  • newsletter
  • contact me

writing

Andy Dehnart > writing

My writing life ranges from my daily reviews and reality TV news analysis on reality blurred to long-form magazine journalism.

Explore what I’ve written, starting with these highlights:

An L.A. chef tries to preserve a dying Italian tradition

Photo Credit: Los Angeles Times

Chef Evan Funke travels to Italy to learn how to make rare shapes of pasta by hand, a tradition that’s dying. I interviewed him and the producers of this new Quibi documentary show.

Reality on the High Seas

Photo Credit: Playboy

Sea Shepherd activists went to the Faroe Islands to try to stop whaling, a tradition that goes back centuries. Aboard their ship was an Animal Planet film crew.

This piece won the Society for Professional Journalists’ Sunshine State Award for magazine feature reporting.

Double Dare's Marc Summers' new role: vulnerability on stage

Photo Credit: Los Angeles Times

I traveled to Indiana to profile one of the stars of 1990s television: Double Dare host Marc Summers. He was performing in an autobiographical play that told stories from his life I wasn't aware of, a performance that I wrote was "both biography and a triumph of vulnerability, a very public rejection of the fear of being stigmatized after sharing his OCD diagnosis."

How Could Survivor Have Screwed Up This Badly?

Photo Credit: Vulture

In this essay in Vulture, I explored Survivor’s clear, unambiguous illustration of sexual harassment, and the show's many failures in its handling and presentation of real-life events.

Forget the pounds. The Biggest Loser tries to shed critics of its weight-loss plan

Photo Credit: Los Angeles Times

The Biggest Loser returned, promising that it had changed. I investigated whether or not its formula and format was still causing harm to its participants and the public.

'Survivor: Samoa' Rises To New Season Of Challenges

Photo Credit: NPR

On location in Samoa, I explored for All Things Considered about what it takes to create a reality TV challenge.

Can Food Network Survive in the Age of Netflix Cooking Shows?

Photo Credit: Grub Street

I reported on Food Network, which has evolved into a home for reality TV competitions and personalities, not instructional cooking—and whether Netflix's food shows represent an existential threat.

Did The Real World change, or did I?

Photo Credit: Vulture

In my review of The Real World: Atlanta, a rebooted version of the show produced for Facebook, I looked at the show's history, from seminal unscripted TV show to drunken mess.

For my other writing, explore one of these categories:

essays and TV reviews
reporting and journalism
long-form journalism
all publications

Primary Sidebar

Andy Dehnart, photographed by Kellie Warren, March 2019

Hi! I'm Andy, a writer and teacher who obsessively and critically covers reality TV and unscripted entertainment, focusing on how it’s made and what it means. Learn more about me.

follow me

  • Email
  • Facebook
  • RSS
  • Twitter

RSS recent writing on reality blurred

  • Mikey Eyebrows left Tough As Nails after a dramatic episode that also sent Tara home
  • Road Rules is returning! Drag Race All Stars is leaving VH1! And other Paramount+ shows
  • Design Star Next Gen isn’t just great, it’s better than HGTV’s Design Star
  • How Name That Tune was produced and filmed (in Australia!)
  • Holey Moley is returning, and Frogger is on the way!
  • Magical Elves reveal what TV networks want from reality TV today
  • Design Star returns, Below Deck reunites, and Tim Allen judges: this week in reality TV
  • Survivor’s first deadlocked vote, a pig stabbing, and actual strategizing
  • Who won two different reality shows? Will Race to the Center of the Earth air in Canada?
  • What a Real World cast member’s identity crisis revealed

what I’ve been doing

  • Me and my writing, in your inbox October 24, 2019
  • I asked CBS executives about their reality shows’ problems with race. Here’s what happened. August 16, 2019
  • An anniversary, and three recommendations, plus a way to really stay up to date July 15, 2019
  • Three magazine articles, one cheesy appearance September 20, 2018
  • The return of Jersey Shore, and cake wrecks worth watching April 5, 2018

“It’s good to be curious about many things.”

—Mister Rogers

Footer

RSS recent reality blurred stories

  • Mikey Eyebrows left Tough As Nails after a dramatic episode that also sent Tara home
  • Road Rules is returning! Drag Race All Stars is leaving VH1! And other Paramount+ shows
  • Design Star Next Gen isn’t just great, it’s better than HGTV’s Design Star
  • How Name That Tune was produced and filmed (in Australia!)
  • Holey Moley is returning, and Frogger is on the way!

let’s connect

  • Email
  • Facebook
  • RSS
  • Twitter

Copyright© 2015–2021 Andy Dehnart. Thanks for visiting.