A Reality TV Certified Geek (and Proud of It!)

You've probably noticed our funny new writer, Nate Dern. What you may not know about Nate is that he was on the Ashton Kutcher-produced reality show Beauty and the Geek a few years ago. He has agreed to share his experience with the SparkLife community. Enjoy! —SparkNotes editors

When people find out that I was a contestant on a reality TV show called “Beauty and the Geek,” the first question they usually ask is: “Why?”

I can’t blame them. After all, why would anyone want to appear on a national television show announcing to the world that you were a certifiably nerdy, helplessly dorky, and completely geeky geek? The best answer I have ever been able to muster is this: I don’t think being a geek is necessarily a bad thing.

Being on the show was definitely not something that I actively sought out. It was more like something that jumped into my lap, like an energetic puppy. Actually, it was more like something that plopped onto my shoulder, like bird poop.

The plop, er, opportunity happened as I was going about my business as a junior anthropology major at Harvard. I was standing in front of the Science Center with my friend Chris, handing out small black and white fliers I’d made for an upcoming performance by our improv comedy team. I was wearing blue plaid slacks, a red and yellow striped tie, a retro track jacket, and a trucker hat that originally said “Nantucket,” which I'd modified by crossing out certain letters with white paint so that it said “Na__t____e_.” I also had big glasses, messy hair, and a bushy beard. At the time this was fairly standard attire for me. I must have stuck out as non-standard to the right people, however, because as Chris and I were handing out fliers, two Hollywood Types handing out fliers of their own approached us. I say Hollywood Types because they were so obviously not from Harvard. They were tan, gorgeous, well-dressed, and, most noticeable of all, did not seem to be the least bit stressed out about studying for an upcoming organic chemistry exam. Clearly, something was amiss.

“Hey, you guys go to school here?” they asked, beaming smiles full of white, sparkling teeth. Immediately, it seemed like we were about to hear some sort of a scam.

“You do? Cool! Well, we’re casting for this TV show and we think you’d be great for it!”

TV show? Yeah right. And I’m Richard Simmons (I’m not).

But Chris and I took one of their fliers, which read, “Casting Call: Beauty and the Geek 3!”

I hadn’t actually seen the show,  but I had heard of it, and slowly it clicked that this might be a legitimate opportunity. And then the full implication of their approach hit me: Oh. They think I’m a geek… Ha! That’s awesome.

It seems like approaching someone on the street for a show like “Beauty and the Geek” would be a tough sell. You see, the premise of the show is this: Girls who have looks but don’t excel at academics are paired with guys who are smart but socially awkward. The teams compete against each other in weekly elimination challenges until the final team wins a large cash prize. In short, no matter what, saying, “We think you’d be great for this show” is tantamount to telling a girl, “Hey, you look dumb!” or telling a guy, “Hey, you’re a dork, right?”

Chris quickly declined, but I was reluctant to say no. I debated extensively with myself about whether or not it was a good idea to audition. It was going to be filmed over the summer, so I wouldn’t have to miss school, which was good. But would it be a mark against me for my future personal and career aspirations? After all, there is a certain, shall we say, stigma against people who appear on reality television shows. The members of MTV’s “Jersey Shore” aren’t exactly being offered professorships at Princeton.

In the end, I decided to go to the casting call. My reasoning was basically threefold: 1) in the unlikely event that they actually chose me, it would be an interesting experience, 2) I didn’t mind being called a geek, and 3) it would be kind of cool to be on TV.

After going to the casting call, things moved quickly. I was invited back for a second round interview. Then a third. And then, before I could fully understand the implications of what was happening, I was being flown to Hollywood to live in a big mansion with a bunch of strangers to have every second of our lives taped as we competed against each other in a series of increasingly absurd challenges…all for TV.

And it really was absurd. For one challenge, the geeks had to try to get phone numbers from girls in a public park. Have you ever tried to do that? It is ridiculously hard! People look at you like you’re a crazy person! (As they should, quite frankly.) And the absurdity didn’t end there. We gave tours of aeronautical museums. We milked cows. We built doghouses. We competed in date auctions. We drew a nude model (when this happened, the geeks collectively blushed so hard that it raised the temperature of the room by 10 degrees). And at one point we even danced on a yacht while a helicopter flew by and filmed us. It still makes me chuckle that I get to say a true sentence about my past that involves the words “yacht,” “dance,” and “helicopter.”

But in addition to these silly Made For TV situations, there were also some genuinely cool, genuinely meaningful moments in the mix, too. I got to meet seven other guys who were not only willing, but actually proud to appear on TV as geeks. And not just regular geeks but, like, super geeks. And I got to meet eight girls who were willing to live in a house with said super geeks and be their teammates—a fairly brave thing to do.

Now, I’ll be the first to admit the show had some problems. While it claimed to try to break down stereotypes by proving that two groups of people who seem like polar opposites actually have things in common when they take the time to get to know each other, the very premise of the show was actually enforcing entrenched stereotypes. I mean, come on, how revolutionary is a show that has two social archetypes: smart/dorky guys and pretty/not-academically-inclined girls? That being said, I think that the show was trying to do something noble: namely, show that no matter what table we sit at in the lunch room, deep down we are all people with things to share with and learn from each other.

I once heard someone say, “Offense isn’t given; offense is taken,” the implication being that if someone says something that offends you, you are responsible because you chose to “take” offense. I don’t think I agree with this entirely, but I do think that it hints at the biggest lesson I learned from my “Beauty and the Geek” experience. Even though it doesn’t always seem like it, we do have some control over how the words of other people will affect us. If someone says, “You’re such a dork,” instead of hearing “You’re such a dork,” next time try hearing, “You care about doing well in school,” or “You work hard to get good grades and better yourself,” or “I am intimidated by the successful future that you are securing for yourself, and to make myself feel better I am attempting to cut you down with lame derogatory anachronisms.”

So be proud, my geeky brothers and sisters. A geek is just a person who cares about something enough to strive to master it. Be proud to be an academic geek, a Shakespeare geek, a computer geek, a piano geek, or a sports geek. Be proud to be whatever type of geek you want. The only thing you shouldn’t do is let your fear of what other people will think or say stop you from doing whatever excites you—that thing that you truly care about, that thing that sends a rush through you so positively exhilarating and maddeningly pulsating with life that it makes dancing on a yacht seem about as much fun as a bird pooping on your shoulder.

What kind of geek are you?

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