I’m not proud of this fact, but over the course of the past 24 hours, and in defiance of a to-do list a mile long, I binged all eight episodes of Byron Baes, Netflix’s “first Australian reality show”. This is, obviously, what you are supposed to do with a show like Byron Baes, which is not a product to be savoured or lingered over. It is wholly contrived, full of horrible characters and premised on an idea of life in which words such as “wellness” play a meaningful role. It is also expertly designed to suck you into the drama and offer you respite from the real problems of the world.
If there’s a squeamish element to watching Byron Baes, it is the knowledge that the show works by encouraging a specific response in audiences that might be summarised as hate therapy. The cast are all young, affluent and deluded to one degree or another, identifying as designers and influencers, and living in a coastal town that was at one time a hippy surfing community. A few years ago, American movie stars began moving in – the location is stunning – and the place became promptly appalling. As an Australian friend told me: “It’s been ruined by Hemsworths and Damons” – after which, the deluge: hordes of crystal-waving, linen-wearing Instagrammers who, inevitably after a few seasons, attracted the attention of Vanity Fair. In 2019, the magazine did a long piece about various eco-entrepreneurs in Byron Bay, one of whom specialised in “ethical bed linens for babies” while another eschewed the US because of its “consumerism”. That piece was the springboard for the show, and here we are.
Fifteen years after the Kardashians first aired, it is curious to consider the evolution of the format, and the psychology of those who take part in it. Every episode of Byron Baes is organised around an event, either a product launch or a party, at which a confrontation between two or more characters is preordained. The show’s participants are, directly or otherwise, incentivised to compete for screen time through drama and to bring about various staged disagreements. The rest of the cast then picks a side and jumps in. It is a whisper away from being scripted and an enjoyment of the show is watching a group of people turned so inside out with self-consciousness that their performances are on a par with Mrs Overall in Acorn Antiques.
And it’s cleverly edited to build in some surprises. Initially, I thought Hannah, who helps her parents run their online interiors business, was unremittingly awful, only to discover she’s among the most sympathetic characters in the cast. Jess, a designer, seemed vaguely self-aware for two episodes before descending into pot-stirring hell. Alex, a proxy for the regular person, rolls his eyes and barely belongs in this show, and Jade is straightforwardly dreadful throughout. Meanwhile, various large, male dimwits move around the landscape like those boulder people in Frozen II. Observing these characters is an old-school pleasure reminiscent of the first few seasons of Big Brother, with the added fascination of knowing that every one of them signed up fully aware of what they were getting into.
Unlike TV talent shows, which prey on the genuinely desperate, it is hard to see much exploitation here, beyond something very broad about what happens when interior life is scooped out by Instagram fame. A theme of the show is authenticity, and the Byron Bay locals like to distinguish themselves from people from, for example, the Gold Coast, who are disparaged for having “spray-on dresses and fake lips”. With many lumbering cues, the show’s audience is invited to consider that Gold Coasters, with their tans and tiny dresses, live a more authentic existence than the parade of shallow oddballs in Byron Bay.
Each character has, very obviously, made the calculation that exposure and the opportunities that come with it are worth the cost of derision. Elle throws a fundraiser to draw attention to the destruction of ocean life, at which she serves tuna canapés and is delivered cleanly to the audience on a plate. Jade, who presents like a creation of Sacha Baron Cohen’s, is exposed for allegedly buying his Instagram followers in Turkey. There are no politics in this show, except for something nebulous about unchecked privilege and the adoption of good causes for likes, an impulse, after all, not exclusive to Byron Bay. The show is a padded room, like one of those places you can pay to enter to safely break things and work out your anger. Netflix, by offering these people up for a universal disparagement unriven by the usual conflicts and divides, is practically providing us with a public service.
Emma Brockes is a Guardian columnist
