Call it a brief and quite shocking lesson in history

May 27, 2015 12:34 GMT  ·  By

Reality show Holiday in the Protectorate made its debut in the Czech Republic earlier this month. More precisely, it was last Saturday, May 23, that the first episode aired. 

The show, comprising a total of 8 episodes each lasting precisely an hour, is set to run until June 13.

The topic: life under the Nazi regime. That's right, this reality show documents the struggles of a family fake-living under fake-Nazi rule. It doesn't sound very entertaining, does it?

Historians certify to the show's authenticity

Oddity Central tells us that the show's 8 hour-long episodes were all shot back in 2014. The family featured in it was selected from hundreds of volunteers and offered a $40,000 (€36,600) reward in exchange for living under German occupation for 2 months straight.

Food rationing, hunger pangs, terrifying air raids, having Nazi informants show up and their home and bully them, and frequent interrogations are just some of the ordeals the family agreed to endure hoping to win the cash prize.

The show's creators even hired historians, architects and psychologists as consultants to make sure that the reality show would be as authentic as possible and that the family would, in fact, spend weeks of their life living as if under the Nazi regime of World War II.

“I wanted people to see what hardships ordinary people had to go through to survive Nazi occupation. It was interesting to see how people make decisions under such psychological pressure,” explained director Zora Cejnkova.

Not everybody appreciates the thought 

Holiday in the Protectorate director Zora Cejnkova might have had the best of intentions when she decided to make a reality show revealing what life under Nazi rule was like, but this hasn't spared her heavy criticism.

Au contraire, she's been accused of turning one of the greatest tragedies in the history of mankind into a source of entertaining and, in doing so, playing down the horrors of World War II.

“People know what went on and how bad it was,” a critic of the show said. “What are they going to do next? Big Brother Auschwitz?” they went on to add.

The show is scheduled to run until June 13
The show is scheduled to run until June 13

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Reality show depicts life under Nazi rule
The show is scheduled to run until June 13
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