Yury Andrés Narváez had already admitted stealing $5 000 from his family, cheating on his fiancée with one of her friends, and kissing another man. Now came another question: Did he want his fiancée to be the mother of his children?
Ominous music swelled as Mr Narváez, isolated on a podium, met the gaze of his betrothed, Viviana, before answering with a confident: ”Yes.”
The music stopped and from somewhere on the darkened set an electronic voice boomed out the judgement: ”That is … false.”
A polygraph had supplied a different answer and Narváez was deemed to have lied, costing him $25 000 prize money and possibly a lot more, judging by the expression on the face of Viviana, who looked on from the studio audience.
Welcome to Nothing But the Truth, a Colombian gameshow which brings new levels of excruciation to reality television. The format has been so successful with Colombian viewers that it is due to be exported to Europe and the United States, cementing Latin America’s growing influence on Western popular culture.
The concept is simple and brutal. A contestant is asked 21 questions which must be answered with a yes or no. The first ones are banal — do you tidy away your shoes before going to bed? — and become increasingly pointed and invasive, probing for possible betrayals of loved ones in the studio audience.
Those deemed to have answered all 21 questions truthfully walk away with $50 000. Those judged to have lied get nothing. Veracity is determined by a lie-detector test which the contestant takes backstage before taking to the podium.
No matter that a 2003 study by the US National Academy of Sciences concluded such tests have too many false results to be used in job-screening. For the purposes of the show the polygraph is God, an infallible diviner of falsehood. Sales of the devices have soared in Colombia. The presenter, Jorge Alfredo Vargas, revels as a Jeremy Paxman-style grand inquisitor, folding his arms and raising a scornful eyebrow: ”Are you sure you’re telling the truth?”
Contestants cornered into admitting wrongdoing tend to give sheepish grins, stare at the floor or try to justify what they did.
”This is the moment to make right a lot of things that I’ve done wrong,” said Narváez, after admitting cheating his family out of money he was meant to invest in a fast food restaurant they owned. ”That is part of the reason I’m here.” But when caught out on question 18, about having children with Viviana, he forfeited prize money which could have paid back his family.
Another contestant, Olga Trujillo, hesitated at question 14: had she ever withdrawn money from cash machines with cards which did not belong to her? Three female relatives in the audience flinched as Trujillo said yes. In a flash of defiance she matched their stares. ”It was a necessity,” she said.
Caracol TV, which makes the show, bought the concept from a Los Angeles-based producer, Howard Schultz. A pilot which has been sold to the Fox network is expected to air soon in the US. Other versions are reportedly on their way to Britain, Brazil and France, though all Caracol would confirm on Thursday was that a sales representative is touring Europe this week. Critics say the show is crass, others say it is the most fun on television. Cristina Palacio, a Caracol executive, suggested Colombia’s murky politics made it a hit. ”The reason the show has caught on is because we are fed up with lies.”
Latin America’s most famous cultural export, after salsa, used to be writers such as Gabriel GarcÃÂa Márquez and Mario Vargas Llosa. But increasingly its influence is on television, from lurid soaps to Ugly Betty, a remake of Colombia’s Betty La Fea. The US network NBC is planning to remake another Colombian hit, Without Breasts There Is No Paradise, about a teenage prostitute who worries she will remain impoverished without breast augmentation. – Guardian Unlimited Â