Recapping a reality show is always a bit dicey because you're making fun of actual people, who just might send you irate emails. But try recapping a reality show about actual people's kids. Fortunately, the only email I've gotten so far from aKid Nation parent is from Lori, who is very nice. She also has at least one great kid: Lori's daughter is Sophia, she of the cooking and the sheriffing and the social experiments and the dancing for the bicycle. Naturally, I asked for an interview with both of them. It seemed like a good idea to have Sophia's mom on the phone as well, not only to get her perspective, but to prevent people from bitching at me the way they did at CBS for separating them. An edited version of our conversation follows, because if I don't edit myself I sound like a moron. M. Giant: Sophia, how did you end up on the show? Sophia: I was first contacted through a summer camp I went to at Emory University, and then proceeded with an auditioning process. Lori: It was a gifted program. Jared came from the same program. As did Kelsey, and a bunch of kids. It's this summer institute for the gifted that they have at a bunch of major universities around the country and that was one of the places that CBS went looking for kids to audition. Sophia: I actually remember Jared [from the original program]. I never talked to him because he seemed so weird. And then later I recognized him immediately. MG: "Oh, yeah, that guy." Sophia: Yeah, right [laughs]. MG: I understand they're casting for a second season. What advice would you give kids trying to get onto the show, and if they get on the show, what would you advise them to do? Sophia: Um, try not to make an ass of yourself. MG: Where did you first meet everyone? We first saw you guys on the school bus in the first episode, but did you all meet at the airport or what? Sophia: We saw each other. We were actually hanging out in a hotel for a few days beforehand, but it was a really weird experience because we couldn't talk to each other. It was a whole sort of secret agent thing because you had, like, the CBS people kind of watching you, talking into walkie-talkies. Lori: This was the audition process? Sophia: No, even the day before when we were meeting up. We couldn't speak to each other until the cameras were on in the school bus. That made it all the more interesting because all you knew about the kids was the impressions that you had gotten based off their physical appearance. Which, [who knew] how right or wrong you were, you know?
MG: So that night before, did you stay in Santa Fe? Sophia: Yeah, Santa Fe. I think two days before we started. MG: So you rode on the school bus all the way from Santa Fe to the ranch? Sophia: It was only like fifteen minutes, except they drove us around in circles so they could get different camera shots. Lori: [laughs] Sophia: That was actually my first taste of reality TV. MG: Doing stuff over and over again for the cameras? Sophia: Yeah. And it's not that the show was scripted or staged or anything. It's just that if they saw something they'd say, "Oh, we like that, do it again so we can get it from this angle." MG: About the first Gold Star: you were the only person who got one who didn't already know that it was worth $20,000. So what went through your mind when you first got it, but before you knew about the money? Sophia: I was flattered. I was a little confused, because I kind of figured there would have been something behind it, you know? It was just really nice. That's not a very exciting answer. MG: I was wondering how the camera crews always seemed to get to the parents' houses so quickly for the phone call home. Sophia: My mom told me that they called a few hours ahead of time. I know that they had camera crews stationed around the country by the residences of each of the kids. MG: Wow, each of the kids? All forty? Sophia: Yeah, that's what they told us. I mean, people sort of knew who would get the Gold Star. It was always made pretty obvious to us. So I guess they had the crews on standby. MG: It seemed like there were always frontrunners on the show, too. Sophia: Right, right. Lori: And Sophia had said that there's so many hours that elapse between getting the Gold Star and calling the parents, so it gives the news crews time to get to the house. They do all the interviewing of the kids after the Gold Star before they call home. MG: That makes sense. So, Lori, how long were they there setting up before you got the call? Lori: I'd say maybe two and a half hours. Sophia was the first Gold Star and I think maybe things were a little more disorganized the first time around, so things took a little longer. I think they expected her to call in before she did. And I had no idea. I just thought she was calling home. I mean, all the parents were totally shocked. That was genuine. Except Alex's mom [laughs]
MG: Yeah, she didn't seem all that amazed, I thought. Lori: They just sent the most adorable Christmas card. It's a portrait of their three kids. It's so gorgeous it should be in a nice magazine. MG: I bet you guys have gotten great Christmas cards this year. Lori: Yes, everyone. And we're such losers, we never do anything. Also because we're Jewish, we never even think about those things. But Taylor sent one out, a picture of herself holding a teddy bear, so I feel like she's fully recovered. Sophia really liked Taylor, so we're glad she's doing well. MG: Who else have you been in touch with since the show, other than Jared, and the cards from people? Sophia: Michael, sort of. Laurel and Kennedy. Morgan visited once. Lori: Morgan, Kennedy, and Jared have all been to visit. Jared has been here several times. Michael comes from a wonderful family. They live up outside of Seattle in a rural area, Both his parents are doctors, and his mom is so cool. She's like a teaching doctor, a family doctor, and she just went to Africa for a month. I mean, they're just the coolest, most wonderful people. And the funny thing is, when I had gone to pick Sophia up, we were there for about a day or two before we saw the kids, and so we hung out with the parents. This time we're allowed to talk with them, and I immediately hooked up with them when I met them for the first time, and we had such a great time together. And then I learned that their son was Sophie's best friend, so it was just so interesting, you know? The kids are reflections of their parents. It should have beenParent Nation. MG: Maybe season. Getting back to Gold Stars, Sophia, did you know that Kennedy had nominated you for a repeat win? Sophia: I think she told me a few days later. Lori: Kennedy also comes from a great family. She's an only child. They live in Kentucky. She's a tennis pro! And her parents are real class acts, really good people. MG: Did you feel like, with the show, that the goal was to build a world and build a society like they kept saying, or was it trying to make a TV show? Sophia: They were trying to make a TV show. What was frustrating to me -- I don't know if I could speak for the whole town, but I think I can speak for most of them -- what's frustrating to us is that certain things we wanted to do, we would be stopped, saying, "No, it doesn't work with what we're doing," meaning what CBS is doing. We were focused on building the world; they were focused on making a TV show.
MG:Can you give me an example? Sophia: Well...I don't know if you could tell or not: I tried to overthrow the Council every day I was there. But often, the staff intervened. [all laugh] MG: Well, good for you for trying. Did you have a sense as to which of the kids were getting the most screen time? Sophia: Yeah. Definitely. In a way, you sort of control how much screen time you get depending on what you do. I mean, a lot of the kids who weren't on much, they were maybe shy-ish kids. You knew how much screen time you were going to get. Because if you would approach the cameras, if you were doing something interesting, they would film you. Lori:For example, conducting a social experiment. [laughs] MG:Yeah, I was going to ask you about that. The thing with the money and the pot, was that actually your money? Sophia: It was my idea. But I think I was Laborers at that time, so [the producers] gave me a few buffalo nickels. MG: So they helped sponsor it? Sophia: Right. But you know what? As the show went on, money became less and less of a big deal as we realized we could kind of, you know, steal things from the stores. MG: [laughs] Sophia: At first, we were so obsessed with getting highly paid, but people just didn't seem to care any more after a while. MG: You said that you tried to overthrow the Town Council. Did you ever consider running? Sophia: I did run. MG: You did? Sophia: I didn't win, so they cut it out. And I gave a very bad speech, so... MG: Did you run in both elections or just one? Sophia: I ran in just one election. In fact, a lot of the Green district ran in that election. Like, half the kids, anyway. At this point in the interview, three-year-old M. Small, who is supposed to be asleep, comes downstairs with the urgent bulletin that he has just crapped his PJs. I apologize to my interview subjects and attempt to continue the interview while changing his diaper. Might as well have a parent and child on both ends of the phone, right? Lori: I remember those days. M. Small: Who's that? MG: That is Sophia, and her mom Lori, who Daddy watched on TV while Mommy was putting you to bed. [to Sophia] So, you said pretty much everyone in the Green district ran for Town Council in that election?
Sophia: Well, maybe not everyone. But I mean, Michael did, I did, Laurel did. Lori: Kennedy did, didn't she? Sophia: Yeah, Kennedy did. So that's four out of the nine people that were left. MG: So they just edited it so that there was just one candidate challenging each Council member? Sophia: Right. Lori: They also have to format it into forty to forty-five minutes. MG: So how long were those Town Council meetings, for real? Sophia: It depended. Once we were sitting there for five hours. MG: Wow. Sophia: It was pretty awful. Other times, generally, an hour and a half, two hours. Everything on the show is a lot longer than it seems. Lori: The one that I sat in on was two or three hours. MG: I can imagine, with all the parents. Lori: It was torture. MG: Lori, did you ever get interviewed on camera? Were you expecting to? Lori: Yes, they interviewed all the parents when they came to our homes for about ten minutes, or fifteen minutes. And I guess they didn't use that too much. Sophie, did they interview me there? Sophia: I think so. Lori: They must have. Yeah, they must have asked me some questions there also. M. Small: Who's that? MG: That's still Lori and Sophia. Daddy's talking to them. M. Small: Why? MG: Daddy's picking their brains and asking all sorts of nosy questions. [To the interview subjects] He's three and we're trying to get him to bed at a reasonable time, but he's not always up for it. [To the child] Come back here! Lori: [laughs] MG: Say, "Goodnight, Lori and Sophia." M. Small: Goodnight, Sori-ophia! Lori and Sophia: Goodnight! MG: I'll be right back, you guys. Here the interview pauses again while I put the child back in bed, in front of a movie to keep him occupied. Moments like this are why I tried to refrain from criticizing any of the kids' parents in my recaps. MG: Are you guys still there? Lori: Is he in bed? MG: Uh...he's...down. Lori: You mentioned every now and then [in the recaps] that the kids didn't look that dirty. Even the last show, they didn't look that dirty. But when I picked Sophia up, she was so disgusting. I mean she was just gross. And you don't notice that, even at that Town Council meeting how dirty they were. They didn't take that many showers.
MG: Yeah? Lori: Their clothes were disgusting. I didn't want to take anything home, but she insisted. It was just...the place was disgusting. MG: And you guys had just been running around with garbage for an hour, too. Sophia. Yeah. There should be a lot more of that Showdown than they showed. I guess they had the whole time complex. MG: Sophia, what would you have done differently on the Town Council? Sophia. I'm not sure. I would have tried to get the town running more smoothly. It just didn't seem that hard. I don't know, I had a totally different perspective than they did, obviously. But what the Town Council leaders were struggling with, what they thought were huge obstacles, I thought could be solved very simply. All the stupid town dramas usually caused the most problems for the Council, and I just would have attempted to crush all of that. MG: Would you have done this when you were younger, like when you were ten or twelve or eight? Sophia: Yes. I don't know if my parents would have let me go, but the idea, I think, would have been appealing to me at any age. [laughs] Lori: Sophia at age fifteen is like she would have been at age eight. She was just always this way. MG: Really? Lori: Sophia was always old. I remember, for her tenth birthday party, we had a Revolutionary War party and everybody had to come in Revolutionary War hero costume. And she was obsessed with John Adams through ages eight, nine, and ten. Sophia: A brief phase. [all laugh] MG: I must have missed that phase. Lori: Sophie was just always old and eccentric. Sophia: [Jokingly] I was ridiculed as a child. MG: Would you go through this experience again? Sophia: Absolutely. I wish I could do it again, but I can't. MG: How long do you think it could have gone on as a town if there hadn't been a forty-day timetable? Sophia: Not so much longer, because the little kids just would have left, because they were so homesick. MG: Really? Sophia: I think so. Even I was homesick. But I don't know. Taylor probably wouldn't have lasted that much longer. The kids were all so young. They don't seem like it. Zach is ten years old. He seems so mature. I remember, I made him cry once, because I screamed at him about something. And it shocked me that I could do that because he just seemed like this old kid. But they all got homesick and I think they would have left, personally.
MG: When you were nominated as sheriff, did you know that was coming, or was that sort of dropped on you? Sophia: No! No, no, no, no, no. Okay, here's what happens: Blaine said that thing, like, I think Sophia should watch over the town, and the little guy in Jonathan's ear apparently -- I assume -- he seized the opportunity, and then Jonathan said, "Well, wait a minute, did you just appoint Sophia sheriff?" And there's this roar from the crowd: "No, no, no, we did not!" MG: [laughs] Sophia: And Jonathan said I was the new town sheriff. I had no idea, they had no idea. Lori: So when Blaine discussed it out loud, just in passing, Jonathan seized upon it. The producers thought it was a great idea, so they didn't want him to change his mind. Sophia: The appointment was a mistake on his part. I don't think anyone intended for me to be sheriff. MG: You mentioned the little guy in Jonathan's ear -- he had an earpiece during those Town Council meetings? Sophia: Always, always, always earpiece. Whenever he was on camera. He would always, like, stop and stare off into space. We made fun of him. MG: He seemed so natural on camera. Lori: He's a wonderful man. Sophia: At first we hated him because we associated him with imminent misery. MG: [laughs] Sophia: But then once you started talking to him he was a really nice guy. Lori: He's such a decent guy. Really, just so good to the kids and just a kind man. I have such nice thoughts about him. MG: When the Town Council was called away near the end, did you feel like that was kind of setting you up, Sophia? Sophia: No, they didn't actually throw any hurdles at me. I think they had planned to get rid of the four people ahead of time. Whoever's in charge of writing the episodes, I'm sure that was in there. Then again, it was all very cheesy. The way they described it, they made it sound so cool. And then I saw it and I realized I definitely got the better end of the bargain. MG: Like those shots where they had you come out of the bunkhouse and made you stare all steely at the camera. Did they direct you for that? Sophia: Yes. [Laughs] That was actually the only time I can remember that happening, but they had a lot of different cameras. It was fun, but it wasn't really me. It wasn't my idea.
Lori: It was good, though. It was cute. Sophia: I got the feeling they did that more for their own amusement. I don't know, it's probably not true. MG: Do you know how far in advance they would set things up, like the Pioneer Journal entries? Was that like an arc that was planned for the whole season in advance, or do you think they just made it up as they went along? Sophia: I think it was all planned in advance. But I know that the pages weren't put into the Pioneer Journal until the morning of. Because kids would go in there and try to see what was happening . MG: Oh, really? Lori: I thought the same thing as you, when you said they could have gotten money on eBay. MG: Yeah, it seemed like a shame. Sophia: I was thinking that I don't remember when he burned the Journal, but then I realized I was asleep in my bunk. Then someone came to get me when they realized I was gone. MG: Lori, I'm sure you've been asked this a lot. What do you say to people who ask you about having Sophia go on this...adventure? Sophia: Sending me away. Are you a bad parent? Lori: Well, actually, before the show started I was a poster child for a bad parent, and now I'm the poster child for a great parent. Sophia: Poster child for a parent? Lori: That's just an expression. Well, you know, nobody in their right mind would send their kid off someplace if they weren't more than reasonably certain that they were going to be okay, that they were going to be safe. I mean, it's just ludicrous, all that controversy. And certainly CBS isn't going to put any kids in harm's way. They had so many adults there. They had the producers, the cameramen. You've read the articles. They had a doctor there, they had somebody watching the kitchen stuff. It was a relief to me, quite honestly, to have one kid out of the way for six weeks. You know, I've got three kids close in age, and five animals, and I work full-time. I was happy to have a kid who I knew was in a supervised place for six weeks. I worried about her less there than I would when she's at home. MG: You have two other kids -- what are their ages? Lori: Sixteen and thirteen. Sophie's right in the middle. MG: When was the season shot? Sophia: April first to May tenth. MG: Remember the rock-hauling showdown? You got bleeped.
Sophia: I did, yeah. MG: What did you say? Sophia: I said, "Fuck you, Guylan." MG: Okay, well, the readers will be glad to hear that because they've been speculating about it. Sophia: [Laughs] I know, I know! Lori: Sophia does not curse normally, she leaves that to me. MG: Your mom also said that you spent a lot more time in the kitchen than was shown. Sophia: I cooked at least two thirds of the meals. I don't want to...it's just the truth. Lori: One of the reasons she did it -- she told me, and I guess she'll tell you -- Sophie was older than most of the kids and she had a tendency to get bored. So she'd either do social experiments or she'd hang out in the kitchen and work. It just gave her something to do. Plus she likes to cook. Sophia: I don't want to take the credit away from anyone else, but a lot of the teams in the kitchen, as you saw from the show, didn't get things done, and I enjoyed doing it, so. Lori: I really liked the comment that Miss Alli made on one of your forums, and people said the same thing here also -- why didn't Sophia just make pancakes for herself that morning when Blaine wasn't there? And your friend said that wouldn't occur to Sophia because she wanted to make sure all the kids ate. She didn't just think about herself, and that's exactly what happened. I was really glad that she made that point. Sophia: I hope everyone noticed that the arcade was the downfall of our town. MG: Yeah, that was pretty clear. I didn't see you spending much time in there. Sophia. I hate videogames. I would have wanted to play chess. Lori: It's like when Sophia didn't choose the mini golf over whatever it was, because she knew if the kids were golfing they wouldn't clean up in the kitchen. It was a choice between the religious books and the golf course, and you chose the books. Sophia: [One time] we asked Jonathan if we could just take the box instead, because we hated both the rewards. You know, those big boxes that the rewards came in? MG: Yeah, those were cool. Sophia. We wanted one of those because the rewards were so crappy. Lori and MG: [Laugh] MG: Too bad he said no. Sophia: I know! Some of us were saying for Season 2, one of the reward should be forty hot pizzas...or Jared. You see them pulling down the front and him coming out.
MG: "Hi, everyone!" Sophia: I know, exactly! Lori: One funny thing -- Sophia won't do this imitation, she does such a good imitation of Jared -- he said to somebody during the filming [Jared voice]: "Don't you just looove Sophia? She's so beautiful, and she's Jewish, too!" MG: That sounds like Jared. Lori: He's adorable. And he has nice parents too, and they all revel in their weirdness. They love it. They got such a kick out of watching him. They know they're all different. They really had fun with it. MG: Well, that's good. I'm glad to hear it. Anything else you wanted to set the record straight on? Sophia: It was just a great experience. Lori: One thing that I hear more than any other comment is that it was the one show that parents and kids sat down every week to watch and discuss. I don't even know what's on TV anymore [Lori had said in a email that before Kid Nation, the family didn't have a TV], but it seems there's such a dearth of that kind of programming. To have a show that showed that it was okay and entertaining to have really smart kids and you don't have to be embarrassed. It was really nice to have a show that appealed to kids' intelligence rather than everything that's so dumb in our country. Sophia: Wait! Is this going to go on the Television Without Pity website? MG: Yes. Sophia: You know the "Meet Sophia" video on YouTube? Lori: She's making pasta and she tells people, "Where's the salt? You need salt to boil water." Well, that started such a million-page discussion. Sophia: I wanted to know if you can make a public announcement on my behalf apologizing to all the people who I offended by suggesting that you needed salt for pasta. I realize the error of my thinking. I am so, so sorry, and never again will I make that mistake. MG: Well, the point is that you learned something from the whole experience. Sophia. Exactly. MG: What's another big thing you learned? Sophia: This is going to be something that you're going to hear a lot, and not very interesting either, but power does really bad things to people. I mean, I just had the chance to experience that firsthand. MG: Would you ever run for public office in real life? Sophia: Probably not anymore. I mean, my idea of what I want to be changes every month or so. I wanted to be president for the longest time. Now I want to be a chef. I don't know. After having theKid Nation experience, I'mless likely to run for office.
MG: Well, I didn't think you were the only one. Sophia: Even the town campaigns were intense, with the whole tearing down of the Taylor posters? I can't deal with that in the real world. At this point we go off the record for a bit. When I restart the tape, Lori is telling me about the production people and the people at CBS. Lori: Really, just wonderful people to work with. Really gracious, and they just went over and beyond with everything. They really just left a good taste in our mouth. Plus they sent all the kids a Wii system. Sophia. That was exciting. MG: Just what you wanted, huh, Sophia? Lori and Sophia: [Laugh.] Sophia: My siblings are enjoying it, though. MG: Well, you got your bicycle too, right? [CBS mailed it to Sophia after the show] Sophia, Yeah, I do have my bicycle. I still need to assemble it. Mom, your banana bread is ready.