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Blood of Zeus
Creativity abounds here, but those artistic measures can’t blur the obvious issues that families are sure to discover.
When a married couple wanders into an intractable argument, who’s the tie breaker? How about a panel of three celebrities, plus a comedian host tossed in for good measure. That’s the premise behind NBC’s Jerry Seinfeld-produced show The Marriage Ref.
Each episode of this offbeat reality/talk show hybrid features video vignettes of four couples describing the impasses they’ve reached. “Tonight we’re going to watch real couples in the middle of real-life arguments, obviously augmented for television,” host Tom Papa tells us before one first-season episode. “And we’re going to give them the one thing they’ve always wanted: a winner.”
As you might expect given the medium, the conflicts being dealt with here are hardly toilet-seat or toothpaste-tube related. No, the roadblocks these couples are ostensibly trying to navigate are a lot, um, weirder.
Susan wants her husband to get rid of couches from a previous marriage because she doesn’t like the thought that Don had sex with his ex on them … but she’s unwilling to part with the prosthetic leg of her deceased first husband.
Paula withholds sex from Alan, her husband of 28 years, until he agrees to clean up the house. Tony claims that Laura treats their five-foot-long pet iguana better than she does him—including bathing it in the tub, making it gourmet salads and dressing the lucky lizard in hats and scarves. Amber is upset with Jamie for spending more time with his giant pumpkins than he does her. And on and on it goes. It’s a silly, often tabloid-esque (read: made for reality TV) collection of marital minefields.
Which begs the question: Who would you want to resolve such critical conundrums? Maybe a high-powered team of proven marriage counseling professionals like … Alec Baldwin, Kelly Ripa and Cedric the Entertainer?
If you’re a regular reader of TMZ—or even if you’re not—it’s obvious that Hollywood celebrities are probably not the first folks you’d go to for marriage advice. And in Season 2, The Marriage Ref seems in on its own joke. When panelist Ricky Gervais says he’s been “living in sin” with his partner for 25 years (“What’s the point in getting married?” he asks) and Julianne Moore says she married her husband only after her second child was born (“It seemed kinda messy not to,” she admits), it’s pretty clear that these judges actually aren’t the best judge of anything related to marriage. “A lot of celebrities like to do everything backward,” Jerry Seinfeld says. “They like to put the wedding at the end of the relationship.”
But judge they do, poking fun at struggling couples (each show features three pugilistic pairs) and sometimes themselves along the way. After these star-studded tribunals dissect and mock the merits of each aggrieved party’s case, they render individual verdicts. Once a “winner” has been chosen in each case, the three righteous spouses stand before the studio audience, who then votes one of them, in the words of Papa, the “rightest of the right.” Winners get a $25,000 check—and a billboard in their hometown proclaiming their No. 1 status.
In theory, all of these reality TV shenanigans are ultimately pro-marriage in their message. The show takes pains to illustrate how much the aggrieved hubbies and wives love each other (minus that one thing), and most of the conflicts seem to be played for laughs. Likewise, most couples appear to take the celebrities’ verdict with all the gravitas (or lack thereof) it deserves.
But for some couples, appearing on The Marriage Ref may be more serious—and far more damaging. According to The New York Post, former contestant Howie Kohlenberg blames the dissolution of his 14-year marriage on the show. After he and his wife, Christine, were guests on the program, she became obsessed with fame and eventually ran away with a Canadian producer, he says.
“Jerry, Mr. Billionaire, I blame,” Kohlenberg says. “And his show.”
Clearly, then, The Marriage Ref isn’t necessarily a boon for marriage—and that’s true for folks watching at home, too. The show’s bizarre, voyeur-friendly conflicts are matched only by the equally bizarre jokes and advice dished out by each episode’s guest celebs. (One man has already been “advised” to trade sex with his wife for sex with a prostitute … or his mother.) You know things have wandered far off the beaten path when Gervais observes, “This is the weirdest show I’ve ever been on.”
But as Papa says, that’s kind of the point. “Does this really make any sense?” he asks. “None that I can see. But it’s fun to do, and someone wins a prize.”
That someone, though, isn’t you.
“Ricky Gervais, Julianne Moore, Jerry Seinfeld”
Jim Wasserman is upset that his wife, Jaib, invites her mother from Thailand to stay for months at a time. The panelists crack jokes hinging on the heritage of both Jim (who’s Jewish) and Jaib (who’s Thai). “It’s funny ’cause it’s racist,” Gervais quips.
Amber Johnson can’t believe her husband, Jamie, spends more time with his giant pumpkins than he does with their family. She also says he visits bigpumpkins.com far too often—a site Amber calls “pumpkin porn.” “Hold on, what has she caught him doing?” Gervais asks. He suggests that Amber should “just get fat and sit in the garden” if she wants Jamie’s attention. And when he hears how Jamie breeds the pumpkins, Gervais compares him to a pimp.
This episode’s final couple, Cory and Kristen Bush, are struggling with Cory making inane, embarrassing bets with his friends—including one in which he needed to run around the neighborhood in his wife’s sports bra. Seinfeld and Gervais compliment Cory on how well he filled it out. We see footage of Cory and his friends drinking beer and showing each other their (clothed) rears.
Panelists say “a‑‑” multiple times, and we hear God’s name used in vain.
“Madonna, Ricky Gervais, Larry David”
The subject of sex is pulled into almost every conflict. And one battle in this episode is about sex—specifically about the fact that a wife isn’t interested in participating until her husband cleans up his slovenly ways. Larry David cracks, “This woman is lucky anyone would have sex with her.” His counsel? “I’ve got one word for this guy: prostitute.” Later, David laments his own discovery in marriage that his wife’s breasts weren’t his to do with as he pleased.
Other sexual references include comparing the costs of a housecleaner and a prostitute; Madonna’s observation that an iguana is phallic shaped; references to sex in dating and on a couch; and David’s suggestion that a man leave his wife, move in with his controlling mother and have sex with her. Bleeped vulgarities include one use of “bulls‑‑‑” and a reference to male anatomy. God’s name is taken in vain a couple of times.
“Jerry Seinfeld, Tina Fey, Eva Longoria Parker”
A husband who loves manicures and pedicures and calls himself a metrosexual triggers a slew of quips about homosexuals and transsexuals. Eva Longoria Parker makes a joke about shaving sexual body parts. And Papa asserts that if he were a woman he’d be a lesbian.
That last jab arrives shortly before Papa “rules” that a man’s grooming habits take precedent over spending time with his kids. He makes a visual nod to smoking dope.
After serving as an associate editor at NavPress’ Discipleship Journal and consulting editor for Current Thoughts and Trends, Adam now oversees the editing and publishing of Plugged In’s reviews as the site’s director. He and his wife, Jennifer, have three children. In their free time, the Holzes enjoy playing games, a variety of musical instruments, swimming and … watching movies.
Paul Asay has been part of the Plugged In staff since 2007, watching and reviewing roughly 15 quintillion movies and television shows. He’s written for a number of other publications, too, including Time, The Washington Post and Christianity Today. The author of several books, Paul loves to find spirituality in unexpected places, including popular entertainment, and he loves all things superhero. His vices include James Bond films, Mountain Dew and terrible B-grade movies. He’s married, has two children and a neurotic dog, runs marathons on occasion and hopes to someday own his own tuxedo. Feel free to follow him on Twitter @AsayPaul.
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