Reality TV mines every cringeworthy, pearl-clutching, toe-curling corner for entertainment but there can be few shows where a grown woman on a first date is described as having “fanny flutters” by her daughter.
That her daughter, less than kilometre way in a secret bunker, is watching her mother’s date live on CCTV, is even more unusual.
Welcome to My Mum, Your Dad, a new Nine reality TV series hosted by comedian, author and radio and TV broadcaster Kate Langbroek, where commentating on mum’s burgeoning ardour for a tanned bloke in pale chinos is par for the course. (Nine is the owner of this website.)
Comedian, author and radio and TV presenter Kate Langbroek hosts dating-show-with-a-twist My Mum, Your Dad, in which single parents go on dates that their grown children watch via CCTV.
My Mum, Your Dad places eight single parents in a luxury retreat in the Australian countryside and prompts them to find love the second time around. They must date to stay on but the most alarming aspect is their grown-up children who, having nominated them to be part of the show, secretly watch their parent’s every move.
Upping the ante, the children, all aged in their 20s, act as unseen “dating consultants”, completing challenges to decide who goes out with who, what they do on dates and who leaves the show.
“Find me a sexy step-mumma” says Kayla, waving off her 48-year-old construction business owner dad Shane after driving him to the luxury retreat.
“All you know is your marriage of 28 years,” Sam says to his mother Mel, a 56-year-old parent-of-three whose cheating husband’s ways have left her low in confidence and petrified of dating. “You need to get out of your comfort zone.”
Langbroek, who makes her debut as a TV host, says the rawness and vulnerability of adults looking for love, unaware their children are watching their attempts, moves the action from cringeworthy to admirable.
The children want to see an unfiltered version of their parents, says Kate Langbroek of the set-up that allows them to watch mothers or fathers on intimate dates.
“Wanting that for your parent, being aware they deserve romance and long-term commitment, that’s incredible,” she says. “When you have children, you’re so used to editing yourself around them.
“It starts off with wanting to preserve their innocence, or not wanting to upset them, or just myriad reasons. But then, suddenly, they’re grown-up children going, ‘Do you know what you need mum? You need to find someone to love.’
“These are older people who are looking to find a partner, who haven’t been able to pull it off. They’re looking for magic. Magic doesn’t always happen, but sometimes it does.”
My Mum, Your Dad, which features four mums and four dads, is not without its orchestrated embarrassments. There are shared spa dates, “intimacy” lessons involving ticklish feathers and dads in their late 50s whispering about “going deeper” before gyrating on tabletops in leather bikini briefs. Their mortified children watch in the surveillance room.
Whenever I walked into a room they all went, ‘Ooh’ … I found that really funny because I live in a house and no one respects me there.”
Equally, there are moments when the single parents reveal their past. Most weep talking about former marriages and relationships and why trying again is hard and terrifying. The children cry too.
“I’m just scared,” Mel says, mid-tears. “Because I loved my husband so much but he cheated on me.”
Langbroek, who has long been fascinated by other family’s dynamics, was absorbed by people opening up publicly, mainly because it is rare.
“It was revelatory for almost every participant on the show,” she says. “Being in the house gave people the time to self-reflect, which we don’t always have time for. You’re working, or with your kids or doing all the things life requires.”
Langbroeksays it felt natural to play host. She also discovered how reality TV presenters come to represent mother and amateur psychologist for the show participants.
“Whenever I walked into a room they all went, ‘Ooh’,” she says. “It was like the teacher coming in. I found that really funny because I live in a house and no one respects me there.”
Unlike other reality TV shows, My Mum, Your Dad’s focus on people’s lesser qualities is light. Langbroek was particularly struck by the maturity and protectiveness of the children watching mum or dad attempt romance.
“The kids don’t have to watch their parents kissing if they don’t want to,” she says. “They’re not forced to go into the surveillance room. But they also want to see an unfiltered version of a parent they’ve never got to see before. That’s so intriguing that they are happy to do that.
“They’re not watching their parents f—-ing. We’re not monsters. They see their parents operating as sentient beings who have feelings of attraction to someone else.”
The crucial end-point of My Mum, Your Dad is the finale’s Blessing Ceremony, a gathering of paired-up adults and their children, with the latter approving or disapproving the match.
“In some cases the children know their parents better than the parents know themselves,” Langbroek says.
Single mum Mel (pictured with her son Sam) has low self-confidence after parting ways with her cheating husband.Credit:Nine
Each parent’s story and love quest is relatable but Langbroek reckons Mel, mother of Sam, is someone to look out for.
“I defy anyone not to be moved by her,” she says. “Her story is just so heartbreaking in its magnitude and humanity. She has no artifice, she doesn’t hide her vulnerability. She’s just a shattered woman.
“But also you see what a beautiful person she is because you see how beautiful her son is. And he loves her.”
Behind all the stereotypes explored by My Mum, Your Dad – cringeworthy reality TV, single parents bereft of love, strangers semi-trapped in a luxury mansion – the shining stars, in Langbroek’s view, are the children.
“I love them all, almost without exception,” she says. “It’s an affirming thing for other single parents, or all parents, who are wondering about their kids, ‘Oh my god, how are they going to turn out?’
“Well, the answer is, ‘Amazing’.”
My Mum, Your Dad is on Nine, Monday, 7.30pm and 9Now.
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