How ‘Cue the Sun!’ by Emily Nussbaum Got Made

In this week’s edition of Endnotes, we take a look at Pulitzer Prize winner Emily Nussbaum’s Cue the Sun! (Random House, June), which documents the surprising history of reality TV.

Here’s how the book came together.

Emily Nussbaum, Author

“Cue the Sun! is the untold origin story of reality TV—it’s all about the wild, spaghetti-against-the-wall experimental period, from the early radio days to the invention of the Survivor format to the rebranding of Donald Trump. It’s a thoughtful look at a subject people too often dismiss as trivial.”

Suzanne Gluck, Partner, William Morris Endeavor

“When I began working with Emily, I made a two-book deal with Ben Greenberg at Random House, for a collection of her most memorable New Yorker pieces as well as this history of reality television. So Cue the Sun! is the long-awaited second book in the deal. You’ll never watch reality television the same way!”

Ben Greenberg, V-P and Editor-in-Chief, Random House

“Emily is a joy to work with. She did a gigantic amount of reporting, talking to showrunners, casts, crews, executives—everyone. Emily and I would check in and talk it all through, then she would draft chapters and send them to me for notes, which I would send back, and then we would discuss them on the phone. The process took a few years, and I think we ended up with the book we had both been envisioning.”

Michael Morris, Associate Director of Art/Design, Random House

“After experimenting in many directions—some conceptual illustrations and then all type options—we finally landed on a photo. We felt it was important to show reality TV actually being captured with an image that was unexpected. The photo is from the filming of a 1973 reality show called An American Family. This book explores not only current reality shows but also examples like this that don’t automatically come to mind nowadays.”