Can a TV reality show that takes wives from different families and has them swap places for a couple of weeks be a positive, uplifting experience?
That's what the producers of ABC's "Wife Swap" insist is their goal.
"People take part in the program because it's an adventure," said executive producer Stephen Lambert. "We talk about the fact that going to live somebody else's life will give you a chance to see the way in which they live their lives, and it might help you reflect on the way in which your family works."
Lambert and his partner, executive producer Jenny Crowther, imported for American viewers the hit show they've produced in Great Britain. (And, by the way, they have been distressed to see their idea ripped off in a much more exploitative way by Fox's "Trading Spouses.")
"I think that the experience of living with another wife or the wife coming in and living with a different husband makes people think again about their relationships and the way they bring up their children," Lambert said. "And we're not saying every show leads to a major transformation in people's marriages, but it has done that in many cases. And even when it doesn't lead to a big transformation in people's marriages, it tends to kind of just reaffirm people in terms of what's going on in their marriages and makes them feel good about the fact that they're in that marriage."
Crowther added that "that extends to the whole family. We're finding that kids appreciate their moms as well. Especially the older kids. The teens really are glad to have their moms home. They want to help more."
Which is not to say that "Wife Swap" isn't about entertainment, as is every other show on commercial television. And it is entertaining in its way — a way that can suck you into watching out of morbid curiosity, if nothing else.
Tonight's episode (9 p.m., Ch. 4) features a lower-middle class woman from New Jersey, Lynn Bradley, who switches places with a multimillionaire from Manhattan, Jodi Spolansky. And, while it's watchable in a can't-look-away kind of way, it's also got some of that why-did-they-subject-themselves-to-this quality.
Spolansky and her husband, Steven, quite frankly, don't come off real well. He knows it; that's why he didn't do any publicity for the show, she told TV critics.
Jodi Spolansky, a spoiled rich girl whose nannies spend far more time with her children than she does, doesn't quite get it.
"I think it was fairly accurate in the way that I was portrayed and how I live my life," she said. "But I think after you watch the show, you also get a sense of who I am as a person. And I'm not just a shopaholic that likes to spend money and go for dinners."
Well, not really.
Which is not to say that there's not some growth that comes out of this. Brad Bradley comes across as the ultimate male chauvinist pig as the show begins, basically expecting to be waited on hand and foot by his wife — who, in addition to doing all the work around the house, runs a firewood-cutting business and drives a school bus. And he expects his faux wife to do the same.
But he and the two teenage daughters do come around.
"The biggest change that I've seen in him is that he's helping me out around the house and helping me do the firewood. . . . He appreciates me a lot more than he used to," Bradley said.
Spolansky, on the other hand, vows at the end of the show to spend more time with her children, ages 7, 6 and 2. Which shouldn't be hard, given that she spends maybe half an hour a day with them (and her husband half that). But it's hard to find time, what with all the shopping, going to the gym, getting manicures and eating out.
"I do (spend more time with them)," she insisted several months after taping the episode. "But for those of you who are not from New York and don't live in the city, well, living in the city and having kids is a very different lifestyle than living in the suburbs or rural America."
Ah, yes, living in the big city with all that money means it's sooooo hard to spend time with your young children.
Like so many others who appear in reality TV shows, Spolansky is oblivious to how pathetic she comes across.
Frankly, if adults want to go on TV and make fools of themselves, they have nobody to blame but themselves. Whether they ought to be subjecting their children to the scrutiny of national television is a different question.
One that ought to be answered — no.
"I think the reason that we decided to ultimately do the show is because my kids are very independent," Spolansky said. "They're very used to being with different people."
Again, these independent kids are ages 7, 6 and 2. But they are being raised by nannies.
Perhaps any horror you might feel about her behavior is just part of the show.
"At the heart of the show is really the notion that what's normal for one family, another family will find completely abnormal — possibly downright strange," Lambert said.
Strange indeed.
E-mail: pierce@desnews.com