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Reality shows are, as advertised, designed to make a show out of reality but where cameras are involved, there’s always something directorial going on. Actor Maira Khan, a contestant on Tamasha Ghar, let the audience in on what was going on behind the scenes through her experience as an insider.

On Tuesday, singer and content creator Ali Gul Pir shared a clip from his podcast featuring Khan as a guest. During the podcast, she mentioned that she felt manipulated by the production team, the “politics” involved in the show and the strict conditions they had to adhere to, such as staying up for 12 hours straight and being monitored 24/7. “Maira Khan has been acting since she was four years old and now she just got out of 40 days being locked in with 14 other people for a reality TV show called *Tamasha,”* Pir captioned the post.

The Main Hari Piya actor was selected not even two days before the show was to be shot and she told the ‘Waderai Ka Beta’ singer that her mother was against it. She asked her to re-think it because having watched Bigg Boss and Big Brother, she knew how tumultuous and uncomfortable it can get. “I got there and found out what a tamasha [spectacle] it can be,” added Khan.

The Cheekh actor explained why her calm and collected persona shifted to one that lashed out. Her migraine issue being triggered along with the lack of distractions in the form of TV or internet led to her feeling “mentally disturbed” and then came her “explosion”.

“We could not sleep, Ali. If we dozed off, the siren would go off. So you had to be up for 12 hours. You couldn’t lay down or close your eyes,” she said. Elaborating on the extreme nature of being a reality show contestant, she talked about being recorded even in the 12 hours allotted for rest. “We thought it was off time but they played it in [the] uncut [version]. We found out about this three weeks later that the nonsense we spewed after the lights are dimmed was actually being aired to the world. It’s available on YouTube, we’re strolling in our pyjamas, doing this and that, and everything is there. So privacy was slightly [an issue].”

It was to the point that Adnan Siddiqui, the host and judge, wanted even their restroom breaks documented. “Mics were only absent from the toilet and Adnan said, ‘It’s okay, we can set them up there as well. It’s only us who would be listening to the sounds, we should know what they’re talking about’,” she said.

“They used to listen to everything we talked about. We all noted that if, for example, me and you are sitting and talking about something, they will take something out of that and make a game of it. Our emotions, our moods, the way we live our lives in there, they would design games according to that,” said Khan, adding that none of it was scripted. “At certain points Aadi [Adeal Amjad] and I, particularly myself, I would feel like a lab rat because each person was monitored by teams of twos or threes. They would monitor your mood, your anger, everything about you. This is a part of reality shows, they manipulate your mind. In there we would get a task and out there our teams would get a task that today these two people need to fight or this needs to happen.”

The show began airing on August 20 on ARY Digital. The contestants also include actors Aamna Malick, Umer Aalam, Humaira Asghar, Mareeha Safdar, Saeeda Imtiaz, Saim Ali, singer Nouman Javaid, comedian Rauf Lala, choreographer Nigah Jee, model Faiza Khan and fitness trainer Sehr Beg as contestants.