We’re big fans of having a lot of thoughts here at Vogue, and when it came to Reality Check: Inside America’s Next Top Model—the new three-part Netflix docuseries about the critically important piece of aughts history that was ANTM—there were no musings we wanted more than those of someone who was actually on the show and lived to tell the tale.
Sarah Hartshorne, a comedian and the author of You Wanna Be on Top? A Memoir of Makeovers, Manipulation, and Not Becoming America’s Next Top Model, competed as Cycle 9’s “plus-size contestant,” and at our behest, she recently sat down to watch the Netflix series, which features interviews with host Tyra Banks (duh), co-creator and producer Ken Mok, judges J. Alexander, Jay Manuel, and Nigel Barker, and several former competitors.
Here, without further ado, find all of Hartshorne’s thoughts about the first episode of the docuseries, from the thrill of seeing old friends onscreen to the fury of witnessing a rosily rewritten version of the show’s history.
- Oh, dang, they are starting with the Tiffany clip. Let’s fucking go.
- I have always suspected that Tyra has, in fact, in her life yelled at a girl like this, I just don’t think it was on camera.
- Aww, Whitney! I love her. She looks so beautiful!
- Victoria! My love! She totally disappeared from the internet and I truly love that for her. I hope she is a frolicking sea nymph on acid somewhere.
- Dani looks so good.
- Ambreal!!! Sorry, this is going to be a lot of me getting excited to see my friends. But just imagine if someone made a documentary about your high school and it was broadcast to millions of people.
- Shout out to Mr. Jay’s surgeon and aesthetician, dang.
- Ooh, ok, Tyra is finally sitting down. Great entrance shot. Much buildup. Very drama.
- She’s so pretty.
- She looks like a sexy detective. Solve crime, but make it fierce!
- They are showing an article that I was in and carefully edited my picture out of frame, LOL.
- I always say, they put America’s Next Top Model on Hulu in 2020 thinking everyone would have this fun, nostalgic time and then were SHOCKED that, instead, we saw it for what it really was.
- First mention of Tyra living in Paris as a model! We used to joke on set that if we took a shot every time she mentioned it we would simply pass away. To be fair, if I had modeled in Paris, I would never shut up about it either. The closest I came was shooting a catalog in Switzerland and I rarely shut up about that.
- Dang, she sounded so different when she was younger.
- This inspirational music over the first Ken Mok sighting is… a choice.
- “I came out of my mother’s stomach wearing high heels.” Miss J is so iconic.
- Very ominous music introducing Mr. Jay. Teacup emoji.
- Man, I wonder if the filmmakers appreciate how much B-roll footage they had, working with someone who has been in front of the camera since she was 16 years old.
- I just googled the filmmakers and their previous work is about murderers and pedophiles so they were probably grateful to be working with Tyra for a lot of reasons.
- I totally forgot America’s Next Top Model was on UPN first. It was the CW by the time I rolled around, and then when it switched to Oxygen they had a HUGE party at Gotham Hall in NYC with almost every single contestant, judge, and B-list celebrity of the time. I got so overwhelmed I had a small panic attack in the bathroom and Joanna stepped over me to leave (truly no shade, would have done the same). Jade was really sweet to me, though.
- Tyra saying, “If Top Model wasn’t picked up, what would I do? Where would I go? What would I be?” Ummm… an internationally acclaimed supermodel?
- That said, I do relate to her excitement at someone wanting to bring her idea to life. The hardest thing about modeling for me was being the least creative person on set. I watched photographers, makeup artists, and stylists execute their artistic visions and then I… did what they told me to. I’d imagine it would feel pretty good to get a yes like that.
- First Adrienne Curry sighting. I wonder if they will cover her NOT getting her prize money. In many ways, they are responsible for her terrifying TikTok Lives.
- Watching all of this pre-show footage of the girls brings back visceral Y2K memories of the little camera they sent to my dorm building for me to record myself getting the phone call that I was going to be on the show.
- Shannon from Cycle 1 is here. OK, pink feather cuffs. Was she the super-Christian one?
- Yes.
- She was “saved” at 10? Christianity is so weird.
- Ebony from Cycle 1 saying her skin WAS popping as though it does not, in fact, continue to pop…
- If Ken gets a positive edit from this documentary I am going to be so pissed.
- The captions described the music in Gisele’s intro as “angelic” and I love it. Fuck subtlety.
- Adrienne is so pretty.
- How many times did Tyra have to say, “You are still in the running to be America’s Next Top Model” over the years? Did anyone do a tally?
- I did a tally: 315 episodes, but let’s assume that at least 23 of those were recap episodes, because they did them every season… which brings the grand total to 292, not including any extra takes.
- They waxed the girls?! My cycle we were all shaving all ding dang day, and they got a free wax?!
- Mr. Jay talking about being shady while his fillers literally cast shade.
- Aww, I love to hear the J(ay)s talk about their friendship. By the time I came along, they barely interacted.
- I’m bored. Maybe my attention span is too short for documentaries. Am I stupid? Or maybe I just don’t need the exposition because I’m deeply familiar with how this particular sausage is made.
- Ebony was gay? Boredom gone. Interest piqued. I hope they were nice to her about it.
- They were not.
- She got to see her girlfriend?! They got to have visitors?! We barely got phone calls!
- Oooh, I’m so excited for the Janice Dickinson stuff because she wasn’t a judge of my cycle and people always ask me about her.
- Aw, Shannon’s and my eating disorders started at the same age! Twins!
- I’m hungry. Lunch break!
- Tyra isn’t even on the billboard for the first cycle? That’s wild.
- I wonder who pushed for her to be more prominently (some would say insanely) featured everywhere.
- The first few cycles were really a whole different experience, both inside and outside of producing the show.
- Like, I at least had an idea of how it would be received by the audiences. They were just going in raw.
- Not Tyra logging into AOL chat rooms. It is literally too much early ’00s nostalgia at once, I am overcome.
- DAVID BOWIE WATCHED ANTM?!
- SORRY, I KNOW THIS IS ABOUT MR. JAY’S NICE MOMENT WITH HIS FRIENDS AND I HATE TO MAKE IT ABOUT ME, BUT… WHAT ARE THE ODDS HE WAS STILL WATCHING BY CYCLE 9?!
- DID DAVID BOWIE WATCH ME ON TV?!
- Remember when Jimmy Kimmel was a huge douchebag?
- Not Tyra saying she wants to change how the industry talks to women about their bodies and then saying Giselle has a wide ass. The call is coming from inside the house.
- I do feel very lucky that the worst things the judges said to me, they said to my face.
- They have all that money to get the “top stylists in the world” and then they don’t know how to SHAVE A WOMAN’S HEAD?! I did a better job shaving my mom’s head! (Not cancer, she’s just a badass.)
- How are they constantly baffled by Black women’s hair, even at the most BASIC level?!
- Ebony said, “I remember, on the show, thinking to myself, ‘Oh my God, there’s so much I want to say, but I really had to be still,’” and I felt that to my bones. All of the exuberance and silliness that they cast me for were unavailable to me while I was filming. My entire nervous system knew that staying quiet and still was the only way to stay safe. To add being a gay, Black woman on a brand-new show, where, even after all of that stillness and silence, they still called her angry and aggressive? I can’t imagine. She is so much more composed about this than I would be.
- Wait, are they commenting on her, as mentioned, POPPING skin?! Wild.
- Asking a girl, “Where is the self-esteem?” after tearing her down? That is the entertainment business in a nutshell.
- Tyra is so sweet and young and proud in these Cycle 1 interviews. It’s very tender, like seeing home movies of your family members from before you were born.
- Janice would have really hated me. I feel good about that.
- It is so weird that Ken is giving “aw, shucks” vibes when most of the time that I saw him he was screaming at somebody.
- Aww, Shandi. She’s so cute! I love her!
- Wait, her boyfriend told her to go on the show in the first place?! Eep.
- OMG, she yelled, “I don’t want to work at Walgreens anymore!” and I yelled, “I don’t want to work on a blueberry farm anymore!”
- Wait, are there no pictures of Tyra in the house on other seasons? They were EVERYWHERE in our Cycle 9 house.
- I do love to see Mr. Jay dishing it out to Janice. That must have felt better than drugs.
- I do not understand the Nigel hype. He’s a great photographer, but why does everyone act like he is sex on legs?!
- Hearing Ken Mok say that girls with “very difficult family backgrounds” were “coming to the show to get validation,” like he wasn’t part of seeking us out and exploiting us, makes me want to go full straight-dude and punch a wall.
- THEY BROUGHT A PSYCHIC ON THE SHOW?!
- That’s worse than the dermatologist they brought on to teach us about body image.
- I’m sorry, I’m not over this. WHAT does a psychic have to do with fashion? This is wild.
- The Cycle 2 trip to Milan reminds me of Jay Manuel’s book, which is insane in the best way. I am so glad I not only got to buy and read it, but I also got to write it off on my taxes because it was “research.”
- Wait, Shandi was blackout drunk when The Thing happened?! I did NOT know that. And the whole scenario was orchestrated by the producers?! Why am I not surprised?
- Perfect cliffhanger ending. No notes. I literally yelled at my screen. Fuck, that is good TV.