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What's the most accurate portrait of polygamy? Well, it depends on what timeframe and what version of polygamy you have in mind.
Perhaps the realest of any media is Sister Wives, an addicting reality show about a large family in suburban Utah. This is an easy choice, obviously, because it is a reality show. I would argue, however, that the most accurate portrayal of polygamy - in this case nineteenth-century, church-sanctioned polygamy - is actually an old novel called The Giant Joshua (Maurine Whipple).
Set in St. George in the era of Brigham Young, The Giant Joshua is a poignant story of a relatively young girl who marries a devout, if complexly cruel, leader in the Dixie Mission. The nouns in the novel are redolent of early Utah history, and it is clear that the author did an enormous amount of research to capture the true drama of polygamy. The book received a mixed reception, but was hailed by none other than Eugene England as "not the great mormon novel, but the greatest."
Another potential candidate is Brady Udall's The Lonely Polygamist (also mentioned here by Scott Hales), which received an excellent review in an article called "The Great Mormon Novel: Where is It?" It's funny to me that the two candidates for the great mormon novel are both about polygamy and are both set in Southern Utah. That said, however, Udall's character, Golden Richards, is totally different from the protagonist in The Giant Joshua. Despite their differences, Udall's novel is totally infectious. Throughout the unfolding plot, you can't help but sympathize with the fringe polygamist, Golden, who haplessly stumbles through life with three wives and a brood of children. I really can't recommend this book highly enough.
Finally, there is Big Love. In some ways, Big Love seems to be the furthest from what might be called an accurate portrayal of polygamy. The characters live in large homes in a neighborhood that looks like Sandy, and they are assimilated into mainstream Utah culture in almost every way. Nevertheless, there are certainly groups of people who associate with the lives and struggles of Bill, Barb, Nicki and Margene.
? Or use the library's laptop and projector to hit the 
gives one the sense that South Park's version of how Joseph translated the Book of Mormon is much closer to historical fact than what one might believe from church illustrations of that process. All of this lends credence to the idea that not only are Mormons easy victims of financial scams, but they may also be easily hoodwinked by other forms of intellectual, emotional, or spiritual duplicity.