Saturday, February 18, 2012

‘Jerseylicious’ is back with bigger, badder battles and hairstyling backdrop

Olivia Blois Sharpe models cone hair on “Jerseylicious.”


SOME VIEWERS may look at “Jerseylicious” as another reality show that overinflates ordinary drama, in this case involving a beauty salon, and blows it up into silly fun, in this case playing off the stereotype of everything about Jersey girls being overinflated in the first place.
Nor can there be any denying that the fourth season of “Jerseylicious,” which kicks off Sunday, is overrun with Jersey girls and pumped-up drama.
There’s enough eyeshadow in this hour to throw the whole planet into darkness for a week.
On the action-adventure side, there’s a showdown between Gayle Giacomo, who owns the Gatsby salon in Green Brook, and Cathy Giove, who along with Anthony Lombardi is opening a rival salon. That’s not really a spoiler because it would only have been surprising if Gayle and Cathy did not eventually have it out.
The gratifying part is that they do it at a party, in front of a lot of people they’d both like to impress.
The funny part is that by having this catfight, maybe that’s exactly what they accomplish.
Where would Teresa Guidice be today if she hadn’t flipped that table? Probably not on “Celebrity Apprentice.”
Just saying.
Anyhow, my point here is that some viewers may see all this as just another cheerfully low-budget reality show. Some viewers, after three seasons, may not be immediately able to tell Olivia, Tracy and Gigi apart.
Me, I see it all as educational TV, because when I was growing up, I missed all this stuff.
And I don’t mean this is about me. I mean it’s about every guy who had the same deprivation, the same total void in our education about beauty salons.
All the years I was growing up, I went to a barber. My Dad’s barber, at Central Barber Shop. He was named Patsy. Years after I left town, I read that Patsy was arrested for running numbers.
It was a different world. So “Jerseylicious” is all new information to those of us who don’t realize it’s a big deal when Olivia the makeup artist tries to do hair, or that there’s a special art to blowing out extensions.
Some of the other dramas on the show this season are more universal, like Anthony getting itchy for his new place to open, or Gigi and Tracy figuring out what to do about being unemployed.
See, they were worried about job security at Gatsby, so they talked to Anthony and Cathy about working in the new place, and when Gayle found out at the end of last season, she fired them.
On the brighter side, Gigi’s boyfriend Frankie is back. If you think the girls in this show are Jersey stereotypes, take a glance at Frankie.
“Jerseylicious” may be overstating Jersey things slightly. But say this: What the show promises, the show delivers.

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