Full disclosure: in the summer of 2008, I lived with Jonnie Penn — who can currently be seen on MTV road-trip reality show The Buried Life — in a decrepit loft in Montreal. If I hadn’t watched him spend that summer editing hundreds of hours of film into The Buried Life’s first pilot, I too might have written the series off as another MTV reality-show contrivance. But that is hardly the case here.
The saga of The Buried Life began in 2006, with four guys embarking on a bucket-list journey. There was no network backing, little financial support (courtesy of a few sponsors) and no scripting. Last year, MTV picked up the show; the network ordered eight new shows using the show's original film crew, who produced and edited the episodes independently and maintained the raison d’être of the concept.
I recently spoke to Jonnie and fellow Dave Lingwood about how The Buried Life has affected their lives off-screen.
During the project itself, who was most skeptical and how did you deal with that?
Jonnie: Like any team, everybody took turns. I know from experience that each of us individually has had a few moments saying, “I can’t do this anymore.” Most of my moments came from living with you, Mike. When people ask, “What advice do you have to help me do the things I want to do?” we tell people our age to do it together, do it with your friends. You’re accountable to someone else and can’t drop out when you feel like quitting.
What were the moments that caused the “I can’t do this anymore” attitude?
Jonnie: Juggling relationships with the project has been disheartening. People our age are making decisions at this stage: am I going to spend the next 10 years of my life building out a career, whether it’s law school, or starting a business, or am I going to stick with the girl or guy I’ve been with? Now, this is the first time in four years that all of us are single. We’re not able to provide for anybody, and don’t have enough time. We’d be lousy boyfriends.
On the first Buried Life tour, you were working independently without MTV backing you up. Was that more difficult than this second tour?
Dave: I don’t think so. The first tour was organic. We took two weeks off at the end of the summer and had no idea what we were getting ourselves into. We did a road trip [and wanted to] make a documentary … We started going after the things on the list and asking strangers what they wanted to do before they died. We had this incredible reaction and we had a website that harnessed that energy. We started getting hundreds of emails around B.C. of people asking for help on their list, or offering help with things on our list. There wasn’t pressure; we just thought it was fantastic that we were striking a chord in people.
What has been the most moving life aspiration from someone you’ve met?
Jonnie: Two weeks ago, a girl on Facebook said, “I want to be cured of leukemia.”
Dave: We met a girl in Memphis, who was such a cool girl — putting herself through school [at the University of Memphis], working at an old folks' home — and she was a refugee from Hurricane Katrina. She lost her mom in the hurricane [and her mom] was shipped to a burial site in Denver. We raised enough money to fly her out to Denver and finally give her that opportunity to have closure and see her mom’s grave. I couldn’t have imagined how powerful that was until I was with this girl I hardly knew as she said goodbye to her mom.
How do you respond to negative press?
Jonnie: Negativity, at first, made us want to fight back. But now, it’s encouraged us to keep going and prove that we are legitimate. It’s one of the better things that has happened to us. There’s a huge stigma around MTV [shows] and people jump to conclusions about the show. But that’s a part of the game: it takes time. As long as we can keep our feet on the ground, we’ll continue to fight.
The Buried Life airs Monday nights, 10pm, on MTV.