ABC.com: Live From L.A.

SUPERNANNY - vs the Prescott Army

Holy cats, this week on Supernanny Jo helped out a family with not four, not five, but SEVEN kids.   Yes, the Prescott family has seven kids ranging from one to eight in age.   I don't know how those people do it, I can barely handle two kids and the dogs.  Man, I got tired just watching the show.

As you might imagine, mother Kadi Prescott certainly has her hands full with seven screaming kids - heck, she'd have her hands full if she was an octopus.  She's at the breaking point because... well, because she has seven kids!  They weren't even that out of control, really, but the sheer plurality of Kadi's brood was wearing her down.  She was snappy and irritable and relied too much on her oldest daughter to help with the other kids.  This was clearly a Code 3 Supernanny Situation.

I thought Jo might have to call in some back-up and get Marry Poppins and Mr. Belvedere to help out, but she went in to the Prescott War Zone solo.  And folks, that's why the show is called Supernanny instead of just Nanny.

In addition to the kid management issues, Kadi felt alone and unsupported in her new neighborhood.  Actually, the Prescotts had been living in the house for about a year and Kadi was so overwhelmed and maybe shy that she didn't reach out to any of the other mothers in the neighborhood.  Jo went door-to-door and rounded up all the moms in the zip code and marched them over to the Prescott house for an impromptu mixer.  That might have been a little awkward for Kadi, but she handled it well and was very friendly.  Perhaps she just needed a nudge in the right direction - although it made me wonder a little about the neighborhood.  Didn't any of these mothers introduce themselves when the Prescotts moved in?  Perhaps they did and Kadi just didn't follow through, but still, that seemed a little weird.

Speaking of weird, I love how Supernanny always has some sort of game or exercise that helps the family understand the lessons she's trying to impart.  "This hot frying pan represents anger.  Now I'm going to put it in your hands... LET GO!  LET GO!  Don't you see?  You've got to let go of your anger, you must drop your anger or it will burn you.  Now let's go to the hospital and get your hand looked at."  Okay, Jo probably wouldn't burn a mom like that... unless she thought it was the only way to get through to her. 

This week the weird symbolic game required Kadi to put one hand through a small hole in a sheet of plywood, where a wolverine would snap at her groping fingers.  No, no.  Kidding again.  Kadi had to pick up a ball, but her hand wouldn't fit back through the hole.  Each ball was labeled with something like "unrealistic expectations" or "your haircut*" and Kadi had to let go of the balls and everything the balls represented  in order to set herself free.  Deep, huh?

Am I the only person who thinks that Jo's exercises are designed not so much for the mom, but for the TV audience?  I mean, Kadi seemed like a smart gal, I'm sure she could grasp the concept without the use of teaching aids.  But maybe that's just how Jo rolls - you can't really argue with results.

And you certainly can't argue with Supernanny.  Because she will totally burn your hands.

*Kidding again.  Mom had lovely hair.

-- Dave Campbell

SUPERNANNY - Superbummer!

Jo visited the Tafoya family home in Arizona, where parents Holly and Jimmy had their hands full with three rowdy boys ranging from two to seven. The kids rampaged through the house, screeching and fighting like a troop of baboons. The Tafoya parenting style seemed ineffective if not downright harmful; mom had a laissez-faire attitude towards supervising the young boys and dad was just a fountain of anger around the kids. The Tafoyas needed a Supernanny intervention, stat.

During the observation day, Jo usually lurks in the background shaking her head disapprovingly at poor parenting or bugging her eyes out at some particularly heinous naughtiness. This time she actually had to intervene when Tyler, 5, rode his pedal cart out on to the street while mom was inside the house. Jo was outraged and took Holly to task for her lack of supervision. Holly clearly didn’t feel like it was a big deal at all, and she pointed out that “it’s not a busy street.” That one got a major eye-bug from Jo. She then tagged along while Tyler and James, 7, visited a neighbor’s house to play some good ol’ fashioned pornographically violent video games. I’m actually not sure what they were playing since the titles were blurred out, but it was rated “M” stuff and judging from Jo’s reaction, it was something like Torture Wagon III. Jo capped off a depressing observation day by witnessing a family dinner of chicken, potatoes, and smacking hosted by Angry Yelling Dad. It was a downer.

Jo laid into Holly and Jimmy at the parent meeting, as I was hoping. She took mom to task for lack of responsible supervision and harangued dad for lack of basic niceness towards his kids. Seriously, the guy was just angry and mean-spirited. However, I have to give the guy credit, he did seem motivated and sincere about changing his relationship with his kids. Holly on the other hand… 

Holly wasn’t really on board the Supernanny Express. She went along with the exercises and tried to implement some of Jo’s techniques, but it just seemed like – how can I phrase this diplomatically? – Holly’s value system didn’t seem compatible with Jo’s value system. They just weren’t on the same page about core issues like supervision, violent media, safety, discipline, and the North American Free Trade Agreement. Actually, I'm checking my notes here, and no, NAFTA didn’t come up.  But if it did I’m sure Jo and Holly would have disagreed about it.  

One of the things that did come up was whether it was appropriate to pump liquid hand soap into your kid’s mouth if he uses bad language. Guess where Jo falls on that side of the issue?  You guessed it - not a fan of squirting chemicals into childrens' mouths.  Holly had more of a pro-hand soap position, as you might imagine. Jo reamed her out for that one. “Are you insane?” she asked, shocked. It was probably a rhetorical question, but Holly got upset and walked out of the parent meeting. Eventually Holly returned but man, she didn’t seem happy about it. 

The show ended on its usual hopeful note, showing the Tafoya family frolicking together happily, but I don’t know if I’m convinced. I think there might be some problems there that might require more than a few weeks of Supernanny to address. Did anyone else get that vibe?  Hopefully I am wrong; I often am. 

On a completely unrelated note: I was really taken with the little pedal cars (seen right) that the little boys were dangerously driving around in the street whilst unsupervised.  Don’t get me wrong, I was concerned about the kids and all, but their little pedal cars were so cool. I would have loved one of those when I was a kid. I looked it up on Amazon and was disappointed to find that they don’t make them in my size. Maybe that’s the real reason I feel bummed out after watching this week’s Supernanny.
 

--Dave Campbell

SUPERNANNY - Vs. Cheeky Monkey

This Supernanny was a special celebrity episode featuring the beleaguered Wendy Wilson of the Nineties pop group Wilson Phillips, her husband Dan, and, of course, several out-of-control children. It just wouldn’t be Supernanny unless there were rampaging children.

Wendy and Dan recently had twins and were trying to juggle the demands of their babies with those of their rowdy little toddlers Leo and Beau, who were pretty darn cute but clearly needed a firmer and more consistent parenting approach.

Well, firm and consistent are Supernanny Jo Frost’s middle names. If they’re not, they should be. Jo dropped some knowledge on the family, imparting her doctrine of loving firmness, consistency, and communication. As usual, she worked miracles, particularly with young Beau.

Beau, age 3, was regressing in his behavior due to the arrival of the twins. Often toddlers with new siblings will revert back to more infantile behavior in an effort to get more attention from their parents. Beau was potty trained, but now he was dropping stink bombs in his shorts and peeing on the lawn. At one point, Jo said, “Look at this cheeky monkey, he’s springing a leak in the backyard!” I love British colloquialisms. Lil’ Beau also had a reliance on pacifiers. He couldn’t settle down and go to sleep without one stuck in his mouth.

Jo’s solution to the pacifier issue was charming. She showed the cheeky monkey an empty envelope addressed to Penelope the Paci-Fairy, a pixie who magically redistributes pacifiers to kids who need them, sort of like a binky Robin Hood.  She told Beau that if he mailed his pacifiers to the Paci-Fairy, she would mail him back a special envelope with a surprise the next day. For a second it didn’t look like Beau was buying the whole Paci-Fairy thing, but Jo really sold it, and he agreed to mail off his pacifiers to fairy land.

The next day Beau went to the mailbox and found feathers and glitter everywhere. Clearly the Paci-Fairy had visited. He got a parcel full of little toy animals, which seemed like a pretty good exchange. At the end of the show, Beau was going to sleep without pacifiers and with no fuss. It was super cute.

Compared to the previous week’s episode with the Daniels family’s wild kids, this Supernanny was a cakewalk, particularly since Wendy and Dan seemed so open-minded and grateful for help.  They seemed like a nice couple, didn’t they? The kind of folks you’d invite over for a barbeque – and you’d possibly get your back lawn watered in the bargain. 

 

--Dave Campbell

SUPERNANNY - More powerful than a normal nanny

Man, Supernanny had her work cut out for her in this episode.

Jo Frost, everyone's favorite British child-whisperer, is brought in to help the Dostal family, a not-so-happy couple with a five-year old son with sharp nails and a mean left hook.  Despite Mom's best efforts to impose some discipline, little Zachary chases her around the house, scratching and kicking and hitting like a mean little mandrill.  He draws blood, too.  The kid is not messing around.  I'm surprised Mom didn't invest in one of those lightweight mesh suits that SCUBA divers use when they swim with sharks. 

Jo quickly figures out what's really going on:  the Dostals are packing their bags for a one-way trip to Divorcetown and the tension in the house is rubbing off on the kids, Attack Zach and his sweet little sister who is overshadowed by her ballistic brother.  It doesn't help that Dad seems to have a short fuse and handles Zach roughly.  The whole family is seemingly falling apart.

Situations like this are beyond the scope of regular nannies.  What's needed here is a SUPERNANNY.  Ever since that freak accident involving an electrical storm, radioactive waste, and a pint of Guinness, Jo Frost has powers above and beyond normal British nannies.   She's immune to backtalk, she has a disapproving stare, and she can actually make children stay in the Naughty Corner.  Plus she can fly if she has an umbrella.

OK, I lie.  There was no freak accident, but they don't call her Supernanny for nothing.  In the course of one hour-long episode, Jo tames the mandrill-aggression of the little boy AND patches together the Dostal's marriage.  It's a miracle.

How do we know the Dostal family is going to make it?  At the end of the episode they show them all frolicking in a pool, which is visual shorthand for "they all lived happily ever after."  It's the same story with Wife Swap - at the end of the show the family is always together playing a board game or something. 

So keep your eyes out when you watch "family makeover" shows like Supernanny or Wife Swap:  If they're playing Monopoly at the end of the show, everything's cool.  If not - look out.

Now if I can just get Supernanny to help me with my violent cat...

-- Dave Campbell