Can You Relate to Lauren Conrad?

Photo by David Aguilera/BuzzFoto.com

Today I was reading an article (“Run For The Hills”) in the new issue of New York magazine about Whitney Port’s reality show The City.  Though the article primarily focuses on the circumstances that led Whitney from regular life as a USC student to a supporting role on The Hills to finally starring in her own show it also brought up a very interesting point about LC.

“While the network continues to portray Lauren as a kind of universal Everygirl on The Hills—currently filming its fifth season—the reality is that she now leads a life few of her fans can relate to. She earns an estimated $1.5 million a year, only a fraction of which comes from her reported $75,000 episode fee.”

This thought actually crossed my mind while I was watching the season four finale of The Hills.  In the scene where LC and Lo show up at the hotel launch party we see that the event coordinators have a red carpet set up and there’s a bunch of paparazzi on hand.  But the cameras definitely didn’t show Lauren and Lo walking the carpet which they probably did because they are celebrities after all.

“Liz Gately, an executive producer of both shows and senior vice-president of series development and programming at MTV, admits that it has become increasingly difficult to edit these developments out of the show. ‘It’s harder for us,’ she says, ‘to find those moments when she’s the Lauren going through more universal and relatable experiences.’”

What do you think, should MTV just give up the charade and let us see LC’s life as it really is or should they continue to pretend that she’s not rich and famous?  I’m pretty sure that fans of The Hills are fairly aware that Conrad is a star seeing as how we’re the ones that are buying the magazines and reading (and writing) the blogs.