House Husbands of Hollywood

In my relentless quest to bring you the best in reality show cheese, I submit for your edification: HOUSE HUSBANDS OF HOLLYWOOD. It premiered last week (and I imagine is repeated endlessly) on something called the Fox Reality Channel (as opposed to the Fox News Channel which bears no resemblance whatsoever to reality). Upfront disclaimer: One of the participants is a good friend (Charlie Mattera) so I am hoping the show does well. But that doesn’t stop me from laughing and cringing in all the wrong places, which of course is my criteria for a truly great reality show. So I can recommend it heartily.

HOUSE HUSBANDS OF HOLLYWOOD is a nine part series that follows five hubbies who are stay-at-home dads (or in one case, stay-at-home dog sitter) while their high-powered wives work. If the series gets picked up for another season it will be re-titled DIVORCED HUSBANDS OF HOLLYWOOD.

Let’s meet them shall we?

My buddy Charlie. His wife is a psychologist so she doesn’t want to be shown on camera for fear of compromising patient relationships. Okay, I buy that. But we do hear her over the phone. Every morning she leaves Charlie a to-do list on Hello Kitty stationery. And then throughout the day as he’s cleaning the kitchen and picking up the toys and unloading the dishwasher she calls to make sure he also folded the laundry. We see Charlie changing a wet diaper (it wouldn’t be a pilot without it), hanging out at our gym with his BFF Ryan O’Neal, and pushing little Ryan’s stroller (yes, his baby is named Ryan). We also see him conferring with a priest. Y’see, Charlie has a dillemma. He used to be a bank robber and spent 8 1/2 years in prison. How does he break this news to the in-laws? Hmmmm. That’s a tough one. But he’s genuinely charming and funny and what does it say about a husband-wife relationship when you’re rooting for the felon?

Billy Ashley used to be a Los Angeles Dodger. One of his home runs landed on Jupiter. He looks like a bad-ass wrestler. Now he wrangles two pre-teen daughters while wifey Lisa applies make-up to the stars and launches her own line of beauty products. Well, actually…Billy runs the business. He’s on the phone all day trying to hawk the “ultimate eyecream” and the “ultimate moisturizer.” My guess is former teammates were not on the other end of the line.

He’s a man surrounded by tweens. His two daughters with a ‘tude, and then his wife makes him assist in a little in-home seminar with the neighborhood twelve year old girls where they discuss menstrual cycles. You see the look on his face and just know he’s thinking “Oh, why didn’t I just get hit in the head with a Roger Clemens’ fastball?”

Remember Tempest Bledsoe from the COSBY SHOW? She’s now grown up and we’re told still a successful working actress (which was news to me). Her husband is Darryl M. Bell (yeah, the kid from DIFFERENT WORLD). She comes off the best of the wives (only slightly naggy) and he’s very funny. He’s going to make his next spouse very happy.

Poor Grant Reynolds. He’s married to Jillian Reynolds – scatterbrain co-host of GOOD DAY LA, and eye candy for FOX NFL SUNDAY. Once a Marine sniper, he’s currently a failed actor (excuse me…”aspiring” actor) who is now chasing after his toddler daughter (who is adorable, by the way). His three salvations: racing motorcycles on the open road (understandable death wish), deciding which of the two moms at playdates to eventually fuck (they can’t mention his name without their legs flying apart as if they were spring loaded), and although he’d never admit it, the little passive-aggressive joy he receives when his daughter rushes to his arms and screams whenever mommy tries to pick her up. This is the family I worry about. Marine sniper, remember.

And then there’s Danny Barclay. This schlemiel gets the shit beaten out of him the most and he doesn’t even have a kid. After watching Danny’s blonde shark self-centered wife for three minutes I wanted to borrow Grant’s M-16. In fairness though, Danny doesn’t help his cause. He was a promising pre-med student who chucked it all to become an out-of-work actor. I bet the in-laws would have preferred Charlie’s rap sheet. Danny receives an email from Katherine (don’t call her Kat) every morning with the subject heading TODAY. It lists all of the chores he is required to do TODAY. He tries to put a kegorater in the kitchen and that goes over well. Faster than you can say castrating bitch it gets shipped off to the garage.

In a futile and pathetic attempt to reclaim his manhood, Danny sets up a “man cave” in the garage. Beach chairs and little tables are set up to create a haven of testosterone. The rest of the house husbands come over (I hope they have babysitters. I’d hate to think the wives are taking care of the kids) and it looks like Bart Simpson’s treehouse club. Worse is when Katherine (not Kat) comes home early and parks her car in the man cave. No male can watch this segment without his testicles retreating so far up his body that tweezers are needed to retrieve them.

A huge majority of the real housewives and mothers are not like this. But then they don't get reality shows.

Ultimately, HOUSE HUSBANDS OF HOLLYWOOD will have a happy ending. Those kids (and dogs) are being raised by loving dads. In the meantime, there are toilets to be scrubbed, bickering to be had, and fun bad reality television to be made. Start checking off that list, boys.