Obsessed with reality TV? You’re not alone. While other, less intelligent people might write it off as trash, its fans know the truth — it’s a modern-day sociological study! Shows like Selling Sunset, Keeping Up With the Kardashians, and The Real Housewives are an examination of class, culture, fame, and the inherent complexities of female friendships.
And we wouldn’t have these programs without the editors — the ones who break hundreds and hundreds of hours of content down into the most compelling narrative. Editors are crucial in every genre, but they’re of particular importance when it comes to reality TV, as they are essentially writing the story as well by choosing what clips, soundbites, and storylines to focus on.
Fanversation got the chance to speak to the man behind one of the most popular, riveting, and truly wild shows on the air: Jon Griggs of The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives. Griggs reveals the one reality program he’s obsessed with, his response to when reality stars complain about getting “villain edits,” and some behind-the-scenes secrets of the ultra-popular series.
FANVERSATION: Hi! I’m Taylor.
JON GRIGGS: Taylor. You’re well-named, because that’s the name of one of the ladies on the show.
It sure is! One of the most iconic.
TFP.
Legendary. I’m so excited to talk to you, because I love the show. I binge it right when it comes out. I’m curious, for you, were you a reality TV fan before getting into this space?
Excellent question. No. Nor am I necessarily. And I don’t mean that disparagingly at all. It’s not necessarily my genre, which is interesting. There are a lot of people on our edit team who are huge fans. A show that I did before this one was Luann & Sonja: Welcome to Crappie Lake. That’s one of my favorite shows. I love comedy. And the edit team that I was working with, they grew up Housewives fans. They grew up with these ladies and loved them, and that passion that my team had was amazing. I’m like, “I don’t know.” [Laughs] I mean, I knew about them, but…
And how that fits in with the work I do is, you don’t have to be a fan of what you’re working on. Your job is to create the show for the vision of the showrunners, and in that way, I don’t need to be in love with it to be able to bring out the best story and the best drama and the best comedy. So that’s the way I love it.
That being said, my wife recently put on Project Runway. I didn’t know the show, but I sat down and watched half an episode, and I was hooked enough to watch the series, so maybe I’m going back on my original answer. I think the shows are put together really well. They’re very compelling if they’re done right.
That leads really well into my next question, because I love the editing style with the TikToks and flashbacks for receipts purposes and things. How did you go about developing that visual language and style?
Great question. Seriously. So, I was that supervising editor on Season 1, and I’d worked with one of the EPs before — I’d actually worked with most of them — Brandon Beck. We knew we were going to start Season 1, and we had just finished this show about a ranching family. We started discussing, “Who is the star?”
We knew that we were going to have to use the TikToks. And at the time, we were like, “How are we going to incorporate this? How are we going to use it?” And Brandon, the EP, said, “I want you to create some style panels to incorporate the TikToks.” So I came up with this — the three-panel system with a variation of colors on the side, letterboxing it to give it a little bit more. I know that’s completely not the social media aspect ratio, but I wanted to give it a twist and put it into old cinema — kind of elevate it visually. There were two styles we did. One was a video — “old video,” we call it — with the sound effects and glitches, and then the other one was more film stuff. A lot of those things that you see, “available, unavailable,” once you start, that’s old film stock. It’s overlaid on it with some flashes, too. It’s kind of nice to see that stuff, and people seem to like it.
I feel like editing for reality TV is different, because you’re writing the show as well in many ways.
Very much so.
I feel like sometimes the stars of reality TV will try to blame the editing. “Villain edit” is a commonly used phrase.
“Villain edit.” [Laughs]
What is your response to that, and what are some misconceptions that people have about reality TV?
That’s, again, a great question. Editing is extremely powerful. I can make you say whatever I want you to say if I really wanted to. There is a great video that someone put together on YouTube where someone’s made The Shining into a romantic comedy trailer, and it shows you what you can do with editing and music. You can completely change the tone. That being said, yes, if we wanted to make someone say something, we could.
I like to think that on the shows that I work on, there is a boundary. If what they’re saying or how they’re being portrayed is not true to the situation or to their real character, I think the audience will notice. And I’ll be honest, if I feel it’s going too far off, I’ll put my hand up and say, “No, this is not what we should do and what we want to do.”
It’s kind of similar to the question, “Is it fake?” I like to say, “They’re not actors. A lot of the people on reality, if they had to deliver lines, you’d know right away.” [Laughs] Whitney’s probably going to hate me for saying that, because I know she’s got aspirations.
It seems like such a daunting task, because you have these hours and hours of footage to craft in a way that it makes sense for the audience. For this show specifically, because you have all of the all of the tea—
All of the tea! You’re talking to an Englishman. [Laughs]
Yes! All of the tea. Were there any specific storylines that didn’t make the cut in the end that you wish people would have seen?
Yes, that does happen. It happens a lot. I’ll give you two examples. I think I can talk about them. The great thing about those girls? Anything in an NDA, they put out on TikTok anyway. And there was a reunion special they did, and I believe some of this came out. So Season 1, there was a wonderful interview with Conner, Whitney’s husband, talking about abuse when he was a child. There were floods of tears, and it was heartbreaking. We had it in one of the earlier versions of the show, but the problem was, when it came to that first season, it ended up not being critical to the story. It was really about the women — less about the men — and basically, it didn’t make the cut. I felt terrible for Conner, because I’m like, “Here you are. You’re going on the show, you’re revealing everything — your darkest secret — and it doesn’t even make the cut.” I’m like, “How on earth did he feel?” Of course, you can’t talk about it, so I was super happy once it did eventually come out in the reunion.
There are a lot of things that don’t make the cut for obvious reasons. But that’s another answer to the question of, “Is it scripted?” Well, if it was, we wouldn’t shoot so freaking much. We wouldn’t shoot that much footage. They’re shooting that much footage because the production team is trying to follow what they think are going to be juicy storylines, and they don’t always pan out.
Another one was a storyline in Season 2 with Layla. Her having an orgasm was a storyline all season, and we shot a scene with the ladies trying to help her out, particularly Whitney. They took her to a sex shop.
That checks out.
Exactly. Because that’s what you do. They all tried on lingerie. It’s super funny. They’re doing an impromptu fashion parade, and Layla, she’s beautiful. She’s wearing these high heels, she’s in this elegant lingerie, and she falls over. I think it’s Demi who says the line, “Baby giraffe down.” It was the funniest scene, and it didn’t make the episode because it didn’t propel the story.
Release the deleted scenes! We need that.
We need that.
The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives is available to stream on Hulu.
— Taylor Gates