Jerry Seinfeld's The Marriage Ref Finds Humor in Marital Conflict

With NBC still reeling from its Tonight Show debacle, replacing Conan O'Brien with Jay Leno after Leno's vapid 10 o'clock cheapertainment experiment became the peacock network's Edsel (or should that be Toyota), NBC is as starved for a hit show as a runway model for a cheeseburger. Sure the Olympics are proving a ratings winner for NBC, but they only come around once every couple of years.

With the sneak preview of The Marriage Ref on Sunday Feb. 28^th right after the Olympics closing ceremonies, (who knows... some people may tune into NBC expecting to see some curling action and discover curly haired Jerry instead), NBC is pinning its hopes on its King Midas of comedy, Jerry Seinfeld, to polish its tarnished reputation and heat up its tepid ratings.

It turns out that after 10 years of marriage, the once perennial bachelor Jerry Seinfeld discovered being married is a lot funnier than being single. (How many jokes can you make about blind dates and TV dinners?) Seinfeld developed the concept for The Marriage Ref around the pet peeves that turn once blissful newlyweds into snarling pit bulls.

The back story for the show is that Seinfeld and his wife Jessica (who is best known for sneaking vegetables into children's food) were having a typical married couple argument one day in the presence of a visiting friend, who grew uncomfortable witnessing the scene. She wanted to make a hasty exit, but Jerry asked her to stay and settle the dispute. "I need some help to settle this right here," he reportedly told her. "I need a marriage ref."

Whether the story is apocryphal or not, what wife hasn't wished for a marriage ref when her husband forgot to cover his leftover spaghetti in the microwave and left tomato sauce splatter all over the walls? In the actual Marriage Ref show, couples reportedly bicker over such problems as whether a husband should be allowed to park his motorcycle in the living room (it could always serve as an extra chair) or whether to stuff their dead dog (wouldn't a nice art print look better over the sofa?).

NBC's new comedy "reality" show, The Marriage Ref, will be structured around an actual fighting married couple, whose conflict is presented via video clips to a revolving guest panel, including such A-listers as Matt Lauer, Matthew Broderick, Martin Short, Madonna, Sarah Silverman and Larry David. The panelists will riff on the couple's problem and offer their two cents worth of advice, after which a man called "The Marriage Ref," a stand-up comedian and good friend of Jerry Seinfeld named Tom Papa, will settle the dispute.

The fact that many of the panelists, such as Madonna, are refugees from troubled marriages themselves is not a problem for Jerry Seinfeld. In an article in Philly.com, a TV critic is quoted as asking Jerry why he was using a panel of celebrities instead of experts. "Because experts are helpful," Seinfeld replied. "And that's not our thing. This is a comedy show."

Of course, NBC is hoping The Marriage Ref makes everyone laugh, especially its accountants. All the way to the bank.

Sources:

http://www.nbc.com/the-marriage-ref/ http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/television/2008790187_ztv26seinfeld.html
http://www.philly.com/philly/blogs/storm/Move_Over_Dr_Phil_Seinfeld_the_Marriage_Counsellor.html