Hugh Grant: "Reality TV is For Freaks"  4/24/06

British actor Hugh Grant has compared reality TV participants to creatures in a freak show, claiming he gets an illicit pleasure out of watching them.

Grant stars as a reality TV competition judge - modeled on American Idol's Simon Cowell - in upcoming film American Dreamz, opposite singer/actress Mandy Moore.

He says, "I think real people are always more interesting than fictional people and even the best dramatists can't create anything as fabulous as the women on (reality TV show) Wife Swap.

"Those real people to me are very, very interesting. American Idol takes it a step further and brings in all kinds of other things that I'm susceptible to and slightly ashamed of - like enjoying cruelty and someone else's humiliation.

"There's a freak show element about it."