Treatment

DOCUMENTARY TITLE: $erving Pretty Privilege

TAGLINE:

Pretty Pays!

Literally.

LOGLINE:

This film explores the concept of “pretty privilege”, the direct link it has to the hospitality industry and its impacts towards numerous aspects in this business sector.

THEME OF THE FILM:

This film will explore the concept of “pretty privilege”, the direct link it has to the hospitality industry and its impacts towards numerous aspects in this business sector.

SYNOPSIS/TREATMENT (around 500 words):

We explore what it means to be pretty and what this privilege is, who mainly benefits from this concept and how it is embedded into British society’s everyday life through secondary research involving the study of pulchronomics, employment and wage statistics, the ‘halo effect’ and qualitative data from online forums voicing their opinion. 

The documentary has a strong focus on the hospitality industry and how this ideal is used by both sides of the business: The establishments themselves, who benefit both financially and through reputation/appearance as well as the workers, who receive additional benefits within their job. The documentary focuses on certain individuals connected to the industry as real life examples: Emily, a female university student working part time in hospitality who describes herself as “not conventionally attractive”, Kenzie, a female university student who also works part time as a server and hostess and Greg, a part time bar manager with previous experience in the events and entertainment industry.

This second segment of the documentary takes a strong focus on the hospitality industry and how this ideal is used by establishments to benefit themselves. It explores both the negative and positive aspects involving pretty privilege in the workplace through interviews, from both the perspectives of female servers Emily and Kenzie as well as bar manager Greg. The three both share their experiences of treatment by customers both good and bad, as well as its variations depending on their looks per day. Their contrasting opinions on the matter are also included, showcasing different points of view into the issue when questioning the ethics in this industry.

Finally, the documentary summarises the points made by combining and comparing both primary and secondary research, allowing the audience to draw their own conclusion. It seeks to not only raise awareness on the significance of this matter and inform viewers about the advantages and disadvantages pretty privilege can have but to also allow viewers to decide for themselves whether this is more of a positive or negative issue. It asks the audience to consider the ethics involved and how this may impact society as a future further down the line. 

FILM STYLE: 

This documentary is both informative and investigative. As this is still a relatively new concept in society, the informative aspects of the documentary will be the interviews conducted to gain more knowledge and insight into the matter. This documentary will be filmed in the expository mode by using a “voice of god” narration, introducing the topic to viewers and providing some general information in the form of qualitative and quantitative data. It involves heavy research into the subject, both secondary and primary through various forms of media and written sources as well as the interviews. 

TARGET AUDIENCE:

Although the subject itself can be considered as quite universal and has an impact on both genders, the primary audience would be females with an age range of 20 to mid 30s. This is due to how the documentary focuses on the hospitality working sector which would mainly relate to those in employment. Even though males do face similar issues and benefits with pretty privilege, my research has shown that there is a significant contrast and females are generally impacted by the subject a lot more, which is why viewers of their demographic would be more inclined to watch. I believe as this issue is quite universal despite differences in race, cultures and locations, the type of female viewer could be quite varied but would have a stronger interest with the class E-D demographic as those in a higher class can bypass this biased treatment based on appearance via their wealth, as suggested in podcast episode ‘is pretty the ultimate privilege’ (Bobo and Flex, 2020). 

However as this documentary is set in the UK, it is likely the majority of the audience will be from this geographic location due to aspects such as the documentary’s promotional reach and available access to it (may not be available in other countries) or personal identification (seeing people from the same area). In terms of psychographics, I believe the aspirers are the main audience type as they concern themselves with status, appearance and image which falls in line with aspects of pretty privilege (your worth and treatment by others depends on your appearance). 

LENGTH OF VIDEO:

The documentary is estimated to be about an hour and 45 minutes in total overall in order to cover all aspects. A long duration is preferred due to research into shorter documentaries on this topic like The Art of Seduction: Not Pretty, Really (Mark McKinney, 2006) did not provide enough in-depth information and detail to resonate well with the audience, the subject was not explained well enough and the overall documentary only discussed surface level issues.

OBJECTIVES:

• Create an interesting, informative and investigative documentary for the intended target audience

• Inform the audience on the subject, provide them with an understanding

• Explore both the negative and positive effects of this through interviewees sharing their experiences with a strong focus on the hospitality sector 

• Have the audience question this ideal in society and how they may change or consider their current ideals around this concept