The Local Tea on Siesta Key

  August 24, 2017
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As some of you may not already know, we live 20 minutes from Siesta Key. In fact, all beaches nearby are 20 minutes from our house so, Siesta Key is arguably our beach.

In fact, if it weren’t for the cutthroat, free parking lot that fills by 10 AM, I’d go so far as to say it’s my preferred beach. They have a playground for kids, plenty of rinse stations, a restaurant-type-thingy I haven’t been to yet, multiple gazebos (literally 20) that you can rent for get-togethers, beautiful soft, white, cool-to-the-touch sand, and breathtakingly beautiful Gulf Coast water.

If you’re lucky enough to get a parking spot (meaning you arrived by 9:45 AM, seriously), you’ll find yourself among mostly retirees with some younger families and a FEW groups of youngins interspersed throughout.

What you won’t see is Alex Kompothecras or essentially anyone else from the cast of MTV’s Siesta Key.

Siesta Key cast Credit: MTV

Siesta Key cast
Credit: MTV

And maybe that’s because Alex’s dad is so filthy rich, he has his own personal portion of beach behind his house. But so, the reality of this reality show is that he’s just one rich kid in an otherwise older, wealthier, coastal town.

His friends, from the sounds of it, are actually from nearby Sarasota and they are not wealthy like, at all.

So, the only ritzy life these kids experience is literally entirely through Alex alone. You could pick up Alex and his 1-800-CALL-GARY-legal/medical-advice-hotline-founder-of-a-father, put him anywhere, and make a show about his Gatsby-themed parties.

But it won’t define its namesake town.

NJ friends: imagine if this show were called CAPE MAY with the same intro and characters.

It’s just not accurate.

I mean, I get these shows are staged and scripted. But Siesta Key is SO far from reality, it’s got me looking back on The Hills and Laguna Beach with fear and uncertainty.

For example, were there even any hills? Was Kristin’s car truly donezo or did it have more life in it?? Did LC actually have a smile and, perhaps worst, was the rest actually already written?

If you can even get beyond Alex’s REAL-LIFE association with animal cruelty incidents, you’ll see that his personality is just BURSTING. I can’t even type that with a straight face.

I think what annoys me is that there was originally no actual attraction on MTV’s behalf to Alex or Siesta Key at all, and that’s probably because it’s just a retiree coastal village and Alex is truly boring AF. Gilligan’s is like, one of two places you can go on a weekend night and actually see people under 50, so those who are in town visiting their rich grandparents might feel tempted to step away from racketball bonding time and have a brewsky with their peers. And so, Gilligan’s is exactly where Amanda’s bikini contest was held. There is basically nowhere else to goooooooooooooooo.

Dear MTV, if the location and residents are going to be lies, you have little left to draw us in. Some drama would have been perfect, but even this is missing. IN FACT, MTV, here’s an idea… film a pilot based on the actual locals. I experienced a hell of a lot more drama at my mom’s local community when I failed to yell “BINGO!” loudly enough. #truestory

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In fact, I thought it was intriguing that the cast members film a lot of scenes with their parents, but I’ve concluded that this is because the production company literally could not find any other young people within a 10-mile radius to incorporate into the scenes.

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In the pilot, Dark Eyebrows Girl (DEG) casually informs her hot boyfriend Garrett– as if he wouldn’t have already known, tee hee– that she got a job “bartending at the Casey Key Tiki Bar.” Oh wow, that does sound cool. Too bad that’s false. I had to Google this for myself. You see, when you go to Siesta Key beach (as DEG apparently was that day with Hot Garrett), there’s no casual place to walk up from the water and sit at the tiki bar and get served by a tall global fashion model. Turns out she “works at” Casey Key FISH HOUSE, which just so happens to have a small tiki bar outside, and it’s in OSPREY, FL.

This is not Siesta Key.

Some people don’t know that Alex’s wealthy father– whose hotline ads are posted just about everywhere in this area– simply admired his son’s lifestyle and hired a production company to film a pilot. MTV took the bait.

Unfortunately, the network couldn’t have foreseen the other bait-related incidents that would cause the cast to cancel their local premiere due to death threats and protesting. People must have humored the pilot, but ratings have unsurprisingly steadily declined since.

It’s okay, MTV. If it makes you feel any better, the show sucks without any regard to the negative publicity.

My prediction: No season 2.

Oh and I’m still gonna watch.

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