Allen Funt

What was the first reality TV show?

The are a few contenders, and with line between "game show" and "reality show" not exactly clear, we're gonna venture our answer: Candid Camera.

The long-running institution started all the way back in 1948, when a Jew named Allen Funt took his radio show, Candid Microphone, and adapted it for television. The rest is broadcast history: for the next seven decades, in multiple incarnations (and, yes, with numerous interruptions, but nevertheless), Candid Camera had sneaked up on its unsuspecting targets.

Just think about it, without Candid Camera, there might be no Real World, no Survivor, no American Idol, no Dancing with the Stars, no Bachelor...

No Paris Hilton, no Kardashians, no Donald Trump on The Apprentice...

You know, it's best not to think about it.