Dark Side of Reality TV Episode 1
Dark Side of Reality TV Episode 1 - The Swan
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00:00Four months ago, these nine women were given a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to change
00:11their lives forever.
00:14The Swan was makeover TV promising to turn ordinary women into fairy tale princesses.
00:23If someone wanted a boot camp of transformation, this was the best of the best.
00:28The way it was described was, if you're given everything you can to better yourself, can
00:34you do it or would you do it, which sounded great, hey, why not?
00:38Have you ever wanted plastic surgery and I'm, yes, yes, yes.
00:45Free surgery, you know, I mean, everyone's dream.
00:48A handful of self-confessed ducklings are chosen to spend three transformational months
00:53in L.A. with access to top-notch therapy, personal training, life coaching, and to
00:59top it off, more than $3 million of radical plastic surgery, culminating in a magical
01:06beauty pageant.
01:07It seemed like the greatest television program of all time, potentially.
01:13I was so, so excited, so excited.
01:18Show time.
01:20When reality kicks in, it becomes a grueling nightmare.
01:23This is not what we'd signed up for.
01:29This was a 90-day war.
01:31You have to think military.
01:3224-7 commitment.
01:33Was it borderline dangerous?
01:34Absolutely.
01:35Mostly just what I think about is just how much I want to go home.
01:41Next thing I know, she's crawling down the hallway screaming for help.
01:45Oh, is this a Frankenstein experiment that we're doing on these women?
01:49I don't know what I'm doing.
01:51Matt really scared the crap out of me.
01:53Come on, hit it.
01:54Get on it.
01:55I did everything I was supposed to do.
01:58Absolutely sadistic and gross.
02:01There's a circle of hell that we're going to be in because of producing this show.
02:05It's the early 2000s, and reality TV is shaking up the television landscape.
02:2316 real castaways, 39 days, $1 million.
02:27It was pretty fresh at the time.
02:29There wasn't a glut of reality shows like we have now.
02:32Will you accept this rose?
02:33Of course.
02:35The goal of most of these shows was the more sensationalistic, the better.
02:40It didn't take a lot to become a massive ratings hit.
02:45Tragic girl to the left.
02:48Hi.
02:49I'm Mary Alice from Ambush Makeover.
02:51Are you interested in a makeover?
02:53And in those early days, self-improvement and personal transformation and growth
02:58was permeating reality TV at the time.
03:01They were based on the premise that they won't just change your life,
03:05they will save your life.
03:08They will make your life worth living.
03:15Extreme Makeover was a very popular show,
03:17which really set the bar for transformational shows.
03:25A person would get a major makeover, literally from head to toe,
03:30and it was unbelievable and unbelievably successful, too.
03:36Hoping for that kind of success and more,
03:39in early 2004, a new show promises to take transformation TV to another level.
03:45The Swan.
03:47We're very pleased to have Nellie Galan with us.
03:50It's the brainchild of former Telemundo Network exec
03:53and reality TV pioneer, Nellie Galan,
03:56who sees an opportunity to marry together two of America's great obsessions,
04:00beauty and televised drama.
04:03Nellie Galan is a brilliant Latina entrepreneur
04:07who is inspiring.
04:10You could tell one of these people who just has a big heart and really cares.
04:14I have to do a shout out to all the Latinas in the audience.
04:18I think there's all in the wheelhouse of Nellie Galan
04:20and how she lives her life and how she wants to elevate women.
04:24I love the story of how I came up with The Swan
04:27because it's a lesson to all women
04:30that in your darkest moment, there is light.
04:37I read the story of The Ugly Duckling
04:39and it said the ugly duckling was always a swan and didn't know it.
04:43The light bulb went off in my head and I said,
04:46oh my God, this is a TV show.
04:49Galan takes her plastic surgery beauty pageant pitch
04:52to Mike Darnell, VP of Alternative Programming at Fox.
04:57He was this sort of evil genius of reality TV
05:00who brought us things like Alien Autopsy and Joe Millionaire.
05:05No stranger to pushing the boundaries of reality TV,
05:08Darnell knows a ratings winner when he sees one
05:11and gives Galan the green light.
05:13The Swan program began with a nationwide search
05:16among more than 200,000 hopefuls,
05:19all looking to fulfill their fantasy
05:22of going from ugly ducklings to swans.
05:26Have you ever wanted plastic surgery?
05:29Have you ever wanted to have your own dietitian,
05:32nutritionist, physical trainer, therapist, life coach?
05:37And I'm, yes, yes, yes.
05:41I'm Cindy Engel and I was a cast member on The Swan season one.
05:46People just don't understand what it feels like to feel ugly.
05:52At the time I heard of The Swan, I was in my early 30s.
05:55I was living in San Diego.
05:57I was mostly interested in the plastic surgery.
06:00I nursed for a number of years.
06:03My breasts pretty much looked like wet tube socks.
06:06You know, they were just very much misshapen.
06:10We're in San Diego.
06:12Everybody's on the beach.
06:14Everybody has the perfect body.
06:16And so I'm like, I'm in San Diego.
06:19I want a San Diego body.
06:21My older sister was listening to the radio
06:23doing this casting call and they're going to be in Denver.
06:26She said, it's called The Swan.
06:28It's going to be for you.
06:29And that's when I asked her.
06:30I said, well, do you think I'm ugly?
06:32I'm Tonya Cook and I was a cast member on season one of The Swan.
06:37In the past three years,
06:39there's been some tragic events that have happened to me.
06:43I had, you know, just lost my job.
06:46And then I had lost my brother in an accident.
06:50And right after that, my husband and I were getting a divorce.
06:54I just felt like everything was against me.
06:58Well, when I heard that the show offered a career coach,
07:02I was more enthused about that than anything.
07:05I wanted to have more self-confidence in myself
07:08and be able to do something a little different with my life.
07:12For these women stuck in a rut,
07:15The Swan offers a tantalizing upgrade.
07:18If you're given everything you can to better yourself,
07:21can you do it or would you do it?
07:23Which sounded great.
07:25Hey, you're going to help me get everything I want in this world.
07:28Why not?
07:30My name is Belinda Bazant.
07:31I was a cast member on season one of The Swan.
07:34I was excited about the idea of getting whatever I wanted done,
07:37like an extreme makeover.
07:39This is free surgery, you know? I mean, everyone's dream.
07:43All I wanted was to be happy again,
07:45and looking good was the key to getting that.
07:48Oh, I love it!
07:51Okay, let's cut it out.
07:53We're going to go ahead and do the nose.
07:55If looking good is the key,
07:57the show needs an expert surgical locksmith.
08:00Luckily, they have one of LA's finest.
08:03I must say, in the last week I've been going,
08:05why am I doing this?
08:07I don't want to piss off Nelly, and I don't want to piss off Fox.
08:11My name is Dr. Terry Dubrow,
08:13and I was one of two surgeons on season one and two of The Swan.
08:18I'm going to tell you everything you ever wanted to know
08:20about breast augmentation in two minutes.
08:22Ready?
08:23I love plastic surgery.
08:25I love the opportunity to help people improve their self-confidence,
08:30and I've seen transformational changes
08:34where a person goes from someone who felt like they didn't really belong
08:39to someone who now had great self-confidence
08:43and it really changed their life.
08:45The casting process includes rigorous medical and psychological assessments
08:50to make sure the chosen few are fit to take part.
08:54Then, after several months...
08:56Congratulations, you've been selected as one of the swans.
08:59...a handful of lucky women receive the life-changing news.
09:03You're going to be a swan.
09:05Are you serious?
09:06No.
09:07Finally, they're like, okay, you're selected.
09:10I was ecstatic.
09:11Oh, my God, I have it.
09:13It was a great opportunity because when is it ever going to happen again?
09:19Never saw it in a million years.
09:21It would have happened to me.
09:23I was stoked.
09:24I was like, I made it.
09:25I can actually take a few months, not worry about paying bills,
09:30making money, the kids.
09:32A few months, 100% focused on me and myself.
09:37It was an exciting thought.
09:39This is going to be great.
09:41So I get a call, and they said,
09:44we're going to send a production crew to San Diego.
09:47We're going to film you and your family for a day.
09:49We want you to go back to L.A. with us that very day
09:53because it was just film, film, film.
09:55Okay, let's go.
09:58The prospective swans are flown to L.A.
10:01and set up in an apartment complex, eagerly awaiting their new life to come.
10:06They sign contracts giving production permission
10:08to film every aspect of their transformation.
10:12And if they don't like it, they can leave at any time.
10:16Welcome to the swan program in your new apartment.
10:18The program begins now.
10:21All the contestants were slowly trickling in,
10:23and they're like, these are the rules.
10:25We have to stay in our apartments.
10:27Everything was going to have a schedule.
10:30We had to turn in our cell phones.
10:32They would always send someone, okay, time to go do this, time to go do that.
10:36I thought when we got there, it's like California.
10:38Oh, cool, I can go for a swim, you know, go walk by the ocean,
10:42you know, that kind of stuff.
10:44We didn't, that was all offhand.
10:46I didn't really think about that too much at that point.
10:49Looking forward to it, so this is going to be great.
10:53But of all the restrictions, there's one that no one saw coming.
10:57Oh, no, there's no mirror.
11:00Oh, the mirrors, that was a fun thing.
11:02Every reflective surface from our swan's apartments to the gym,
11:06to the doctor's offices were treated.
11:08I had a little vanity box that had a mirror on it.
11:11They took it and wrapped paper around it.
11:14They let us know that we're not allowed to see ourself until our reveal,
11:18which would be months down the road.
11:21They're like, you're not going to see a mirror until this is over.
11:24It was shocking because they didn't tell us that.
11:27If they were self-conscious about their looks before,
11:30that won't be a problem for the next three months.
11:33I was just so, so excited because we weren't focusing on our outer self.
11:38We would spend the time thinking about our inner self,
11:42who we are, who we want to be,
11:45and how we want to succeed and reach those goals.
11:48This program begins now. Wow.
11:53As the women get acquainted with their new normal,
11:56producers hit them with another twist.
11:59Once all of us showed up together,
12:02they put us in another room with everybody that was going to be involved in the show,
12:06and they dropped a bombshell on us.
12:08They said, okay, you're going to have all this done.
12:11You're going to have your reveal.
12:13And at the reveal, someone's going to go home.
12:17This is a competition, and we're looking at each other kind of, what?
12:23I think everyone was in shock when they realized it was a win or lose situation.
12:28I still thought I was doing it for myself,
12:31and this was all about my goal and my transformation.
12:34This was not the concept we were given when we agreed to do the show.
12:44But will her transformation be enough to get her to the pageant?
12:49Find out next on The Swan.
12:52When I was on the show, it was clear there was going to be a competition.
12:56So it was, yeah, it was no surprise to me.
12:59My name is Michael Addis. I was a producer on season one of The Swan.
13:03Tonight, two average-looking women will go head-to-head in pursuit of their dream.
13:10It's TV, man.
13:12I mean, you know, I don't think it would have given you a satisfying conclusion
13:17to have women feeling better about themselves and not turned it into a contest.
13:25I don't know how that show ends other than a competition, like it or not.
13:31You want to see who's the winner, you want to see who's the loser.
13:34It's a sport, and everyone loves a good story.
13:37Kathy is actually a very beautiful woman underneath all the, dare I say, less beautiful features.
13:43I'm here as a minor trying to excavate that.
13:47Your nose is too big for your face.
13:49After being hit with the news that their transformation will be judged,
13:53the would-be swans move on to the surgical assessments.
13:57In her face, of course, we do her nose, take the bump off, refine the tip.
14:01Where they start to learn how reality TV really works.
14:05They made us look frumpier and uglier than you were,
14:09especially with what we called our famous granny green screen shoot.
14:13We had to stand up on stage in front of the green screen.
14:15So they went out and they bought men's T-shirts,
14:18then they cut them so you didn't have any support,
14:21and then they bought underwear two to three sizes bigger than you were.
14:24So when you put them on and then they did that spin, that's when you're like,
14:28cool, that's ugly.
14:30Belinda's plan features several procedures, starting with her face.
14:34I had to go buy a pair of glasses because I wore contacts,
14:38and they wanted you to look as ugly as you could possibly look.
14:43TV theatrics aside, the potential for change is huge.
14:48Let's have a look at your breast. Do you mind standing up for me?
14:51I felt like I was a blank canvas,
14:55and he was just going to create this beautiful piece of art.
15:00The nose is just too long and too droopy.
15:03And he's up close and he's looking, and he asks me,
15:07okay, what is it that, you know, you want done,
15:10and I just have an issue with my nose, I just want my nose done.
15:14So that was a given.
15:15Breast augmentation, yes, we're going to do that.
15:18Tummy tuck, yes, we're going to do that.
15:20And he's like, well, we could also do this, we could do that,
15:25we could probably do something here, maybe touch up this.
15:28At that point, I was still totally invested and wanted it,
15:31was excited to have it done, was looking forward to it.
15:34I wanted to see how they could change me.
15:37She wants a breast lift, she needs ankle suction, she needs a lot of training.
15:41At the same time, it was kind of bizarre when you have, you know,
15:45two different surgeons and a dentist all pointing out your problem areas,
15:49you know, we can fix this, and we can fix that,
15:51and we can make this look beautiful.
15:53Let's talk about the body.
15:54This is sort of the fatty deposit we talked about.
15:57So, you know, hearing that is just emphasizing that
16:00and making it more pronounced that we do need this help,
16:03that we do need this show, because we're damaged and need help to be fixed.
16:07Now your nose, let's talk about it, because that's sort of the number one thing.
16:10Yeah.
16:11It was a feeling of, I'm excited that they want me,
16:14but I'm also feeling like, no wonder my ex-husband left,
16:18and no wonder I lost my job.
16:19I wasn't keeping up, you know, my looks and stuff.
16:22So, yeah, it was a kind of a feeling of sadness, too.
16:27All right.
16:29Showtime.
16:31You see how nice and golden the fat is.
16:34It's a lot of cheeseburgers in the tube.
16:38The cast are raring to go under the knife,
16:40but surgery is a painful process, and they're about to have a lot of it.
16:45It was mainly, if anything, was this liposuction that caused the pain.
16:49The way they violently jabbed that sucker in there from your knees to your breasts, you know,
16:54and everything has been beat up and stabbed and jabbed and sucked and you name it.
17:01For me, the tummy tuck was the hardest part,
17:05because Dr. Hayward cut away five pounds of fat and skin, and that's a lot.
17:13My belly button had stitches all around it.
17:17It is as painful as it sounds.
17:19You're sleeping with your knees up, and you're walking like this,
17:25because if you go too fast, you could easily rip those sutures apart.
17:30He wanted me to do a full facelift, where they cut in behind here and pull you way up,
17:34and they pull that skin as tight as they can and then sew it up here,
17:38and then they staple it back together.
17:41So that was the most painful.
17:45I feel kind of like I got hit by a bus.
17:48The surgeries are so grueling, they don't sit well with some of the producers, either.
17:53I was a bit queasy about watching, you know, what they were going through.
17:59Really pain?
18:01Every part of my fucking heart.
18:05I remember joking with the other producers at the time that,
18:08well, there's a circle of hell that we're going to be in because of producing this show.
18:14Is this a Frankenstein experiment that we're doing on these women?
18:18Are we doing these operations to kind of then say,
18:22It's alive!
18:23and then present the person?
18:25Please keep meditating.
18:29I don't want to wake up.
18:32The premise of the show was, you need all these things, you're going to do all these things.
18:37The higher number of things that are done to you, the more dramatic the reveal.
18:42My name is Jennifer Posner. I'm a media critic.
18:44I truly believe that The Swan is the most sadistic of all of the reality shows I've ever seen.
18:51Your inventiveness, your creativity, your talent, your skill, your ambition, none of that matters.
18:56It is just about, do you look plasticized enough?
19:06Are your lips plumped up enough with fillers?
19:09Do you have veneers on your teeth?
19:11Have you taken enough fat out of your ass and put it in your boobs to be a swan?
19:16Before I pass out, take good care of me. Make me beautiful.
19:21I really didn't know that I could say no to some of the procedures being done.
19:27It's not like they said, you're doing this, you signed up for this, so we're going to do what we want to do with you.
19:32It was just sort of like, well, I'm here and you're giving me this opportunity.
19:39And if you see something that needs to be tweaked or fixed or whatever, you're the surgeon, you know best.
19:45Okay, I'm, you know, I'm going with it.
19:48I'm ready to win.
19:51And I could be competitive and I really wanted to make it to the pageant.
19:56So I was going to do everything that I needed to do or everything I was told to do to get to the pageant.
20:10Look at the size of my wand.
20:15That's not fair.
20:18So initially the producers, of course, wanted us to do all the surgery in one session.
20:23But we weren't going to do that.
20:26We weren't going to expose the patients to 24 hours of plastic surgery.
20:31Because the last thing we wanted to be is on the cover of Time magazine with us in white coats and stethoscopes saying reality TV has gone too far.
20:41And I used to have nightmares about that.
20:47Even though it was gloriously interesting and exciting and fun, it was exhausting.
20:53I think in the two weeks of everyday surgery that we did, we did something like 200 plastic surgery operations on these patients.
21:03That was more than a typical plastic surgeon would do in an entire year we were doing in a two to four week period.
21:09But we felt as safe as it possibly could be.
21:13And truth be told, it was.
21:16We're going to make sure that her breasts balance her belly.
21:19The race to be crowned the swan is on, with each woman undergoing multiple procedures in record time.
21:26But not everyone is keen on getting so much work done.
21:30So in terms of this bump, you decided to leave it alone.
21:34Yeah, both my girls have the same bump.
21:37The nose is kind of an inherited thing.
21:39My dad has the same nose and my two daughters both have the same nose.
21:44I still wanted to have that family resemblance, but just tweak it.
21:50Don't change it drastically.
21:52I'm a bit disappointed.
21:54In the consult, we agreed that taking the bump off her nose would make her look a lot better.
21:58Sometimes when I think about it, I start shaking right now.
22:01Because when you talk to doctors, you always think of them as on your side.
22:07That they're in your best interest.
22:10And they're going to really work to do what you want them to do.
22:15And that didn't happen.
22:17A lot of the cases, what we're doing is a combination. It's part of a team approach.
22:21A couple of the producers told me that Dr. Hayworth and Dr. Dubrow were going to tag team me.
22:29I'm like, what do you mean tag team me?
22:31They're like, you're the oldest.
22:33And Dr. Dubrow is the body guy.
22:36Dr. Hayworth is the artist.
22:38He's going to remake your face.
22:40They said they were going to have you be one of the oldest people to be on the pageant.
22:45And eventually go on to win it.
22:47And I said, well that'd be great.
22:49And she said, not if you don't do that.
22:51I got really kind of freaked out.
22:53I said, I need to talk to somebody.
22:56This is scaring me.
23:00Tanya requests a meeting with Dr. Hayworth.
23:03I put together this long sheet about these questions I had for him.
23:08And how I didn't understand why they were going to do this stuff when I didn't really want it.
23:14I had my legal pad with all my notes on it, talking to him about it.
23:18And he took that notebook and he threw it down.
23:22And he said, then have Dubrow do your surgeries.
23:25And walked out.
23:28And so the poor girl that brought me to the doctor's office, she said, are you okay?
23:34And I said, yeah, I kind of feel empowered.
23:37I really can't speak to the interaction between Dr. Hayworth and Tanya Cook.
23:41But this was an extreme makeover type transformational show.
23:46And so the idea theoretically was to have a complete makeover.
23:52A massive change.
23:54But if the patients felt pressured to be transformed, they didn't share that with me.
24:00Had I known about it, I would have said something.
24:03So that's not really something I was ever made aware of.
24:09Eventually the surgeries end.
24:11And the women take their stitched up body straight onto the treadmill.
24:15Come on Belenda, you ready to do the count?
24:17Okay, now you get warm enough.
24:19Come on Belenda.
24:20My surgeries were two weeks apart.
24:22And within a week or two after that, you're at the gym working out full time.
24:27I wasn't aware of the amount of plastic surgery that many of them were taking on.
24:32And I remember seeing them that first week and they were swollen.
24:35And I was like, geez, who is this?
24:37That's ten.
24:39My name is Greg Como and I was a trainer in season one of The Swan.
24:45I know you got it.
24:46Cheerleader time.
24:47The girls, as far as I know, maybe only a few of them had ever engaged in a little bit of fitness.
24:52But not really.
24:54And I think it was tough on them.
24:57I know it was tough.
24:59They had no choice to do what they were asked to do.
25:05Looking back at how they did it and what we went through, it amazes me that that was allowed.
25:12It was a lot of pushing ourselves.
25:14You're going to be in here two hours.
25:15I'll put you on a treadmill, get a good sweat going, and we get you right over to the weights.
25:20You happy now?
25:21I tried to be compassionate with them.
25:23They were hurting.
25:25They were in pain.
25:26I mean, there were some big risks with the time frames.
25:30Because of hemorrhaging and bleeding internally, all those factors come into play.
25:35The biggest thing that would haunt me day in and day out was,
25:38God, I don't want to be the one here that someone dies in my care on camera with a blood clot.
25:45Was it borderline on the cusp of being dangerous?
25:49Absolutely.
25:52Exhausted from their radical physical overhaul,
25:55the women turned to the much-anticipated life coaching for some emotional support.
26:00We had a life coach that was hired to be on the show.
26:04Something happened, I don't know what.
26:07Something happened, and then she wasn't there.
26:10And so in steps Nelly.
26:12So now she's going to be our life coach.
26:15Happy, so I hear there's a little black dress that you wanted to fit into.
26:18Where is it?
26:19We need right here.
26:21Nelly is the executive producer of The Swan,
26:24and she was very successful at a young age at Telemundo.
26:29So she was going to take that knowledge and help us with that.
26:35Nelly Gallon was the perfect life coach
26:38because she was a young Latina producer
26:41who really understood how to inspire people to be the best versions of themselves.
26:47So Christina, there's something I'm not happy about.
26:49You are the only Swan in the program that has gained weight since you got here.
26:54I think I saw her once or twice, and it was very brief.
26:59Our visits, our appointments were sometimes canceled,
27:03moved often, and sometimes just not even rescheduled.
27:07To this day, I can't tell you what I got from it
27:09because I don't think I got anything from it.
27:11Tanya came into this program wanting to look 10 years younger.
27:14I just want to give her the opportunity to reconsider her decision.
27:18And Nelly's quote-unquote life coaching to Tanya?
27:22Do more surgeries.
27:24Do you think you're going to regret your decision when you get home?
27:26Because we can bring Dr. Dubrow back in to do more surgery.
27:29I was disappointed because I was looking for a career coach,
27:32and I realized that it was more about the plastic surgery and less about anything else.
27:38No, no, no, no, no, no, no.
27:40No more cream cheese, no hot dogs, no pork chops.
27:43The party's over.
27:45If you don't change your eating habits, you're going to be a toad when you get home.
27:49Nelly Gallan was the showrunner.
27:51She was the one who dreamed up this bozo, fake, manipulative fairy tale,
27:56but then she posed as a life coach.
27:58People have been trying to weigh you, and you have a fit.
28:01I don't want to be weighed.
28:02And she was there on set to make producer-type decisions
28:07about how the contestants would be treated, not to be their advocate.
28:11I just want to go home.
28:14Are you quitting?
28:16It was like this weird, almost military-style,
28:20break people down before you can build them up,
28:23but the building up never really even happens on The Swan.
28:27To make it to the pageant, you can't be over the weight you came in with.
28:31I mean, it's not going to happen.
28:33It's so unethical.
28:35It would be laughable if it wasn't so horrifying to me.
28:40Tonya, what's happening?
28:42I think today has been real.
28:43No, it's not just today.
28:45The pressure to meet the competition's demands proves too much for one contestant,
28:49who just can't take it anymore.
28:52Tonya was a little unsure of herself.
28:54She wanted to be able to talk to her husband whenever she wanted to.
28:58We found out Tonya had a cell phone and a mirror.
29:02Swan Security received information from a number of sources
29:06that one of our competitors was hiding a mirror.
29:10She snuck a mirror in.
29:11Oh, God forbid.
29:12That's it.
29:13You got it.
29:14There's our mirror.
29:15And she was making phone calls to her husband.
29:17And then they made it look like that's why she got kicked out.
29:23But there's more to Tonya's abrupt departure than shown on TV.
29:29I came out of my room one day, and she had, like, a surgical bandage
29:32wrapped around her chest.
29:34And she's like, I need to get out of here.
29:37And the next thing I know, she's crawling down the hallway screaming,
29:41someone help me, someone help me.
29:43And she's knocking on random people's doors.
29:45Someone eventually opened the door and, you know, obviously called 911,
29:49and they took her to a hospital.
29:51She's telling them that she was kidnapped and she's been held against her will.
29:54And just things went horribly wrong with her.
29:57Tonya's troubling exit comes just days before the women's televised moment of truth.
30:13Oh, my goodness.
30:14You look incredible.
30:16The day has finally come for the women to reveal their brand-new look,
30:20not only to the nation, but also to themselves.
30:23When you're ready, the curtain will be drawn back,
30:26and you will see yourself for the first time in three months.
30:29Step up for me, please.
30:32A nail-biting moment for them and the audience
30:35who followed their punishing journey to get here.
30:38Finally get to see what I look like.
30:40Was it worth it? You know, am I going to recognize myself?
30:43Is it going to be me?
30:44There's so many things going through your mind at that point.
30:47What if when that mirror is exposed and the curtains open
30:52and they hated what they saw,
30:55I remember standing there in the line going,
30:57please like what you see, please, come on.
31:01I was just so anxious.
31:05Oh, my God.
31:10Oh, my God.
31:17I see my whole self for the first time,
31:19and it's amazing, it's shocking, it's kind of like,
31:23wait, who is this?
31:25Oh, my God.
31:27It's like, oh, that's not me anymore.
31:30This is me. This is the new me.
31:33I was kind of surprised at how swollen my nose was,
31:36and I was thinking, oh, my God, my nose is bigger now
31:38than it was when I went in.
31:40I love it.
31:41But I thought, this is good. This is good. I like it.
31:47I felt like I was a lot smaller, which was nice,
31:51and, you know, luckily the other stuff was more subtle.
31:55You know, I didn't have dramatic face changes.
32:01I'm beautiful.
32:04But real emotions don't cut it when it comes to TV.
32:08A little acting is required.
32:12Nelly said, you know, I want you to get up there
32:14and I want a big emotion.
32:17She's like, okay, when you see yourself,
32:19just react, you know, be emotional.
32:22The producer just says, when you see yourself,
32:24you need to cry, and I'm like, why?
32:27Oh, my God!
32:30Oh, my God, I can't believe it.
32:33We put all this money out for you guys,
32:35and I want to see some crying in the mirror.
32:38I want big emotions.
32:42There's a whole lot of emotion going on.
32:44It was just crazy, crazy experience.
32:46But then also, on the other side was that
32:50this is a competition.
32:53It all comes down to this.
32:55At the end of each episode,
32:57two women face off on who has transformed the most.
33:00The winner going on to the highly anticipated beauty pageant.
33:06During the show, Cindy and I had a really good relationship.
33:10We were buds.
33:11We would laugh a lot,
33:13and I remember we would make a lot of popcorn
33:15and just kind of hang out together.
33:17We bonded, and we respected each other
33:21and admired each other, and we had so much in common.
33:24One of you is about to move forward to the pageant.
33:27Could be crowned the swan.
33:30It was heartbreaking, heartbreaking.
33:34Why couldn't they pair us up with someone else
33:37that I didn't spend a lot of time with?
33:41When they brought us together,
33:43and we were holding hands and shaking,
33:46she glowed. She looked gorgeous.
33:48I looked at her, and I said,
33:50I think it's going to be you.
33:52Cindy Engel.
33:55So, to me, it's an ultimate cringe.
33:58We'll force women to get a zillion procedures at once.
34:01Rachel LaFraser.
34:02And at the end of every episode,
34:04there'll be one woman.
34:06Belinda Besant.
34:07After everything that she's gone through,
34:09she's still going to be considered not worthy enough,
34:12not pretty enough.
34:14She's still an ugly duckling.
34:16Tell me how you're feeling right now.
34:19Disappointed.
34:20Okay.
34:21It was devastating, because I've never won anything,
34:24so I think I really would like to be in that pageant,
34:27to be on stage and to actually say,
34:30I won something like that.
34:33I think I didn't win because I questioned the doctors,
34:36and I hadn't done near as much stuff as most of those people.
34:40I was just trying to stand up for myself,
34:42and that kind of made me disappointed
34:46that they didn't listen,
34:47or they based it on my not wanting to do all those surgeries.
34:53A woman is standing up for her boundaries.
34:55She wants to push back against something she does not feel
34:58she needs for her body, for her life.
35:01This is the type of example
35:04that should be lauded,
35:07but on a show like The Swan, that had to be punished.
35:10From Los Angeles,
35:12the most unusual competition ever devised,
35:15it's The Swan Pageant.
35:18As Tanya is sent home,
35:20Belinda and Cindy join the other face-off winners
35:23for The Swan Finale,
35:24a two-hour beauty pageant special.
35:29Now it's time to reintroduce
35:31the self-proclaimed ugly ducklings
35:33who have blossomed into full-blown bombshells.
35:38I think that all of us that went on to the pageant
35:41were a bit cookie-cutter.
35:44It was your typical pageant look,
35:47bright lips, big hair,
35:49kind of stereotypical, I guess.
35:51Seeing them prance around in lingerie,
35:54that was like, come on.
35:56They didn't get a chance to show how intelligent they were.
36:00They just wanted to show their new bodies.
36:05Turns out Cindy and Belinda just don't have what it takes.
36:09I knew well before the pageant ever happened
36:12that I was not going to be a winner.
36:16I didn't win the grand prize,
36:18but, you know, I was third contestant.
36:20This is it, girls.
36:23Are you ready?
36:24The show was trying to get us to feel
36:27like this was the fairytale moment.
36:29Our first runner-up is Beth Leigh,
36:33which means way to look great to you,
36:35our first-ever swan!
36:39It's the height of hypocrisy
36:41that a show like The Swan would be named after that fable
36:46when the moral of the show
36:48is that you should not have self-confidence internally
36:52unless you look like a weird, plasticized version
36:57of everybody else.
36:59And don't forget to live happily ever after.
37:03The transformation is nothing internal.
37:06It's only external,
37:07and you can't be the judge of whether you've transformed enough.
37:12It was absolutely sadistic and gross.
37:17The real horror comes after the cameras are switched off,
37:21as the women are forced to deal with the consequences
37:25of their extensive surgeries.
37:29No one gave us any indication of what we were walking into.
37:32They didn't give us any warning
37:34of what the upkeep would be for our surgeries.
37:37I've probably spent $10,000 on my teeth
37:40trying to get them upkept.
37:43It's even worse for Cindy
37:45as the complication she experienced
37:47during her post-show recovery continues to haunt her.
37:51When I had my breast augmentation,
37:53Dr. Hayworth was saying,
37:55do these sort of exercises, massage it,
37:57so that way the implant doesn't capsulate.
38:01So I was obsessively massaging.
38:04So I think at one point I got too aggressive with it
38:07because I felt and heard a pop.
38:10That same implant ended up deflating.
38:14It was saline, so it just kept leaking.
38:19Eventually, I went to Dr. Hayworth,
38:21and he's like, you know, yeah, real easy,
38:23I can fix it, we can change it out.
38:25But it was going to cost like $10,000.
38:29I was like, what the heck?
38:33I think I was expecting a better deal.
38:36I ended up having to get it fixed on my own,
38:40out of our own pocket.
38:42That's a lot of money that could have gone to something else.
38:52Extreme makeovers are certainly compelling television,
38:56but have these shows gone too far?
39:00While critics savage Fox's reality TV fable,
39:04The Swan is a massive hit with viewers.
39:09Even though the critics panned the show,
39:12everybody seemed to love the show.
39:14Everybody talked about the show.
39:16It was the most buzzed-about show, I think, that year.
39:21Look at The Swan.
39:23That's a massive audience that got what they wanted.
39:26Is it great for society? I don't know.
39:30It, you know, you're creating a show for an audience,
39:34and we got an audience.
39:36The Swan is back.
39:38You're going to be a swan.
39:40Oh, my God, thank you.
39:42In 2004, the show was quickly renewed,
39:45with a new flock of ducklings
39:47desperately seeking a televised transformation.
39:50Oh, my gosh.
39:52But season 2's ratings take a dive,
39:54and The Swan is culled,
39:56leaving behind a complicated legacy.
39:59Okay, so we're going to start the brow and the mid-face lift now.
40:03If you did The Swan today,
40:06the critics would still hate the show,
40:08but there would be 150,000 applicants for it overnight.
40:12I think she's going to be surprisingly gorgeous at the end of this.
40:15I really do.
40:17Having said that, I'm a lot more experienced now.
40:21I know a lot more about potential plastic surgery complications.
40:25Here's what we can help you with.
40:27We can take the implant out, release the scar tissue.
40:30I am the doctor on a worldwide television program
40:33where we highlight complications related to plastic surgery
40:37and help people with hopeless problems.
40:40And I wouldn't do that much surgery today as I did back then,
40:43but this was a dawn of a new era,
40:46both in reality TV and in plastic surgery.
40:55From the outside, we might judge and say,
40:58well, they're gas-lit or they shouldn't have done the show.
41:01That's a judgment that I don't think is fair to make
41:04with adult human beings.
41:06We did end up making people happy
41:11because these were their desires.
41:13And that's just truth.
41:16Like, that's just how they felt.
41:22Looking back, I don't think we were giving a great message.
41:27We weren't giving a good message.
41:30But I was so focused on myself
41:33that I never stopped to think about how someone else saw it.
41:38If people are negative about the idea, you know,
41:42give them a blank check to a plastic surgeon,
41:44see what they come up with.
41:46It's enticing to have that power
41:48to change what you don't like about yourself.
41:51So, you know, you can't be hypocritical.
41:55The whole show, to me, should have been about empowering women
41:59and not just focus on plastic, plastic, plastic.
42:04They were champions, man. They were champions.
42:07And I couldn't have done what they did.
42:09I mean, they stayed the course and busted their asses.
42:13They did.
42:14You know, I would tell each one of them,
42:15Jesus, you guys look beautiful.
42:17I mean, why was there one swan?
42:19To me, they should have all been swans.
42:21They were all gorgeous, all of them.
42:23The brand new Tonya Cook.
42:26And like the duckling from the fable,
42:29the swans have come to their own truth.
42:32It's what's on the inside that counts.
42:36It always puts a smile on my face.
42:38It always takes me back to that moment,
42:40which was scary but exciting.
42:46If I had the opportunity to do the swan again,
42:49I would do it all over again. I would.
42:51I'm doing really good and successful,
42:55and that's something I might not have done without the swan.
42:58So, it worked out really nice.
43:02It's just crazy seeing myself on TV,
43:05and the changes and stuff.
43:07Oh, you look amazing.
43:09Yeah, the boobs were big.
43:13I've changed a lot from my experience with the swan.
43:16I found out I was stronger than what I thought I was,
43:20and I could do more.
43:21I just feel confident and comfortable in my skin
43:24and with myself.
43:25It's been so long since I've seen it.
43:28I don't know that I've watched it in 20 years
43:32since it filmed.
43:34Oh, my gosh.
43:37Looking back, I don't regret doing the show.
43:39I just realize being happy is about who you are
43:42and not what you look like.
43:47None of those ladies needed the surgery.
43:49None of them needed to change.
43:51We all just needed to learn to love ourselves more
43:55inside than anything.
43:58We all just needed to learn to love ourselves more
44:00inside than anything.