Eric Nies credits The Real World: New York with saving his life

Entertainment Weekly

"If The Real World didn't happen and my life didn't go where it did, I might've been dead," said Nies in. teaser for Andy Cohen's E! docuseries For Real: The Story of Reality TV. "There were a lot of wounds I was suppressing from my childhood and I was on a self-destructive path. I was using a lot of drugs at a young age. I was able to look at myself and see the things I didn't like about myself that I wanted to change. In a way, The Real World kind of saved my life."