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MAY
2000
DISPATCH ARCHIVE
Mummy's
the word
It was hocus-pocus
time in tiny Bawiti, as a major American network purported to discover a
golden mummy, live!
By Tarek Atia
A lot of people might consider the events that culminated in Bahariya
Oasis early Wednesday morning as a farce. Any live TV program purporting
to discover a mummy, live on screen, was bound to be cliched and an
outrageous set-up. And in many ways it was. Opening the Tombs of the
Golden Mummies Live! was "the second time in recent years that Fox
has mined ancient Egyptian history for compelling subject
matter..." says the web-site. Mined it for money is more like it.
The show fell smack in the finale
of the all-important May ratings sweeps, and competing against CBS's top
game show, "Who wants to be a Millionaire," was a formidable
challenge indeed. Would Ancient Egypt be up to the task?
In the pre-press for the show,
co-producer Leslie Greif said, "I can only tell you that the man
inside the mummy [which will be opened up live for the cameras] is
dead." Then he added wistfully: "Just think of the ratings we
would get if he were alive."
The $3 million production costs
included a mobile clinic and a chef, specially imported from LA. They
brought in satellite phones and satellite uplinks, and nearly half a
million kilograms of equipment to create a TV studio in the middle of
nowhere.
A town with only one telephone
line was suddenly transformed into a broadcast studio sending out live
feeds to TV stations around the world for two hours of all-important
prime time TV as a crew of around 150 technicians, producers, and the
chef from LA, descended on the sleepy, dusty town in Bahariya Oasis,
some 400 km from Cairo.
Actor Bill Pullman of
Independence Day fame would be "discovering" the mummy with
Zahi Hawass, Director-General of Giza Plateau. Veteran announcer Hugh
Downs and Fox Sports reporter Lisa Guerrero were the co-hosts.
Fox had everything covered. There
was a separate team standing right outside the "location"
filming live promos to Fox affiliates across the US -- doing the
all-important lead-up to the show, pumping the audience's
expectations.... We're only hearing the announcer's side of the
conversation as he speaks with the 5 and 6 O'clock news anchors in
Cleveland, Ohio, Miami, Florida, etc...
"I understand they found
something very very special," he's saying, a big grin on his face,
"just earlier today, that will be opened tonight, someone who was a
ruler in the area, so it's going to be special today." David Moss
does this over and over again. Live with another affiliate, Moss is
almost bursting with this false excitement. "You know when you are
a little kid who is reading a book about mummies and you think the mummy
is going to get up and come alive... well tonight, it's going to happen
for real, live!"
Behind him are palm fronds, fire,
a pleasant setting that is supposed to be a dead ringer for a real
archaeological site.
This idea of set is important
after all, and an essential question arises: Is this a
"location," in film lingo, or a "dig site," in
archaeological terms. That is the question here, and the answer is
blurred -- for the time being, at least, it is a little bit of both.
True, there are antiquities below
ground here. But for now this place is all about the razzmatazz of
American TV.
The announcer is on to the next
affiliate.... "A donkey was once walking across the sand and
accidentally discovered a golden mummy. Earlier today Dr Hawass and Bill
Pullman were down there, and they discovered a mummy. They were brushing
it off, and there was a glitter of gold... it's exciting... Folks are
going to get to experience that same thing, tonight, live!"
Donkeys are braying -- they've
been brought in to add ambiance to the set. It is an interesting balance
between the promotion of Egypt and pickling the country's image in the
same cliched stereotypes -- donkeys, mummies and mystery.
The show features a segment on US
professor Bob Briar's attempts to mummify in the modern age. Hollywood's
zest for movies about Egypt is discussed with actor Samuel L Jackson.
"How many of those films scared you, or just got you excited about
Egypt?" Samuel asks, joking that he might make a sequel of his
famous hit Shaft in the future called "Shaft meets the mummy."
Another surreal moment: Lisa
Guerrero describes the wine-making region of ancient Bahariya as the
"Napa valley" of Egypt, falling into the trap of comparing
Ancient Egypt with modern America. The show also speaks of Cleopatra but
mostly shows the film and theatre versions of her. The one segment on
modern Egypt, hosted by Omar Sharif, is cut short, for time
considerations.
Guerrero expresses some concerns
about respect for the dead: "I'm sure they never imagined that
they'd be dug up and judged like this. Death and spirituality is such a
private thing. If I were a descendant of one of these people, I'd be
bothered. We're trying to be respectful, but the other side of the coin
is that there are things to be learned, and science can be
advanced."
The show begins at 3.00am sharp
Egypt time, 8.00pm Eastern US standard time. Clearly, the network wants
to retain the viewers by going for a guerrilla filming technique.
"Shock-educational TV"
is what the network calls it. Down in the tomb, Pullman and Hawass
immediately open up the sarcophagi. There's not as much suspense as in
the previous Fox special, which purported to discover a tomb near the
Pyramids, also live. This time, they just get straight to the business
of opening up the mummies underground.
The show makes it all look so
simple, with archaeologists and movie stars discovering the tombs of
mummies, to the delight of couch potatoes across the world.
Zahi Hawass, referred to as the
"animated" Dr Hawass on the web site, is indeed the star here,
while everyone else is an extra.
Hawass says Fox likes him because
he can provide an American-style commentary on history. "No other
Egyptian archaeologist can give them that... This needs action, and easy
to digest information." At one point on the show he claims that
"this is the most interesting moment in the history of
archaeology."
At another point, Pullman asks
Hawass how much these mummies are worth, and Hawass says, "It's
priceless. This is history. We learn from history, we never sell
it."
That said, the Supreme Council
for Antiquities got $100,000 from Fox for the right to film, an increase
on the $65,000 paid for the previous special at the Pyramids. And the
potential spin-offs for tourism could be tremendous. No one knows
whether Bawiti will soon be deluged by tourists wanting a piece of the
action for themselves.
First published in Al-Ahram
Weekly, May 2000
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