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Although the Osbournes ultimately wield the ability to call "cut" if a situation gets too volatile or they're not in the mood to be on display ("Some days, I go, 'Guys, not now!' " Ozzy revealed), the family adamantly claimed nothing about "The Osbournes" is contrived or rehearsed. "It's not some sitcom where you have canned laughter, and after a funny line everybody holds the pose; that's not what we're about," Sharon insisted.
However, leave it to Jack, everyone's favorite disruptive teenage misfit, to draw the ire of his parents simply to spark a reaction.
"There were these people [MTV would] bring in just to stand in the background and laugh occasionally," he casually contradicted. "And they did give us these pieces of paper to read from ..."
The mohawked imp's shot hit its target. "You lie," Sharon lashed out, covering his mouth with her hand.
"He's got his funny head on tonight," Papa Oz said, employing the parental approach of ignoring a blatant ploy for attention until it goes away. The "oh no, not again" tone of his observation made it clear that it wasn't the first time he'd used this technique with his son.
The couple's bedroom and bathrooms were the only areas of the house off-limits to observation. While it's nice to have such sanctuary from the cameras' prying eyes, having only two rooms as a safe haven took some adjusting on the part of Ozzy, a bona fide rock star accustomed to doing what he wants, when he wants. Like when nature called after a 1982 show in San Antonio, Texas, he simply dropped trou and relieved himself on the Alamo memorial. Or like when he snorted a trail of ants from the sidewalk while on a tour with Mötley Crüe. Or when he chomped the head off a live dove while in a meeting with record company executives.
"[One night] I found myself in the dark," Ozzy pondered aloud, "sitting on the toilet going, 'I'm one of the world's most popular rock stars, and I'm sitting in my can in the dark trying to get some peace of mind. Because I know as soon as I walk out there, there are cameras in the walls, in the ceilings, in the bedrooms, plus the guys holding them."
Ozzy's propensity to get annoyed, coupled with intra-family turmoil, is one of the comedic lynchpins of "The Osbournes."
"No arguments," Sharon insisted during the interview to Ozzy and Kelly, who were disagreeing over which cameraperson was the clumsiest. "No evils. Please don't give each other the evil eyes." She then instructed her daughter, specifically, "No wobblers."
Wobblers, as those who witnessed its definition in the first episode, is what the Osbournes call Kelly's tantrums that sometimes result in days spent not speaking to her parents.
"I'm alright," Kelly reassured her mother.
Jack, who had remained quiet for far too long, joked, "She needs a hugging."
"I don't need a hug!" his sister spat.
The Osbournes weren't always such an affectionate lot. Ozzy and Sharon's early courtship was scarred by everything but the lovey-dovey exchanges portrayed on TV.
"You've seen the WWF?" Ozzy queried in response to a question about the couple's first date. "It was kind of like that."
"It was," said Sharon, straight-faced. "We used to drink and we used to beat on each other. It was crazy."
"You used to beat me up all the time when I was drunk."
"Sort of," she replied. "We were very wild in the beginning ... Very wild." She looked like she didn't want to elaborate.
Ozzy and Sharon's volatile relationship mellowed a bit at the birth of their first child, Aimee. The most unreal aspect of this reality show is the perception that Ozzy and Sharon have only two children. Aimee elected not to participate in the program and traded living in the main house for the restricted guest house. She's following in dear old dad's footsteps by pursuing a career in music, though her taste in tunes is closer to Enya than Entombed.
"It's just her choice," Sharon said of Aimee's decision to alienate herself from the project. "I mean, we're not like you have to do something that you're not comfortable with, and she's into other things right now. She's nearly 19 so she has her own life. And she just decided that right now it wasn't for her."
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Photo: Gregg Delman
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