Fishing for an Audience: Not as New as We Think

I was fairly familiar with the central concept of Catfish the film as I have seen the TV quite a few times. Deception plays a fairly central role in the TV show; Nev and his friend approach almost every case with a very skeptical view of the supposed relationship. And almost every time I have seen the show, the investigation (I use the term loosely) reveals that the person is in love with a character created by the real person on the other side of the screen. Deception was not present at the outset of the movie, although it certainly becomes a central theme later on. The deception in Catfish seems very real and very tangible, with the supposed love interest becoming a potentially mentally unstable middle aged woman. In a case of art imitating life, Catfish received some criticism as to how real the documentary was. Many viewers of the film speculated, and offered ample evidence, that the documentary was staged. If true, Catfish can simply be viewed as a modern film adaptation of the deception common in Shakespeare’s stage plays. The buzz surrounding the deception of audience members and the subject of the film generated a larger audience for the film. Shakespeare knew audiences love to see conflict, and apparently so did Catfish's crew.

 Shakespeare uses deception in many ways through his plays. Helena’s deception of Bertram in All’s Well is Helena literally using her social network to create a relationship, just like Nev’s love interest. This discourse in Helena's relationship attracted viewers in the same way as Nev's personal "problem play". The concept of disguised or mistaken identity is also heavily used in Shakespeare’s works. Catfish presents the story of the problem that stems from social networking as a means of forming relationships, but Shakespeare seems to be an original producer of illusory lovers as entertainment.