Home, crazy home with the Osbournes

By FRANCES GRANT

Every neighbourhood must have its crosses to bear and Beverly Hills has its share in the form of aged shock rocker Ozzy Osbourne and family.

When this tribe move into LA's premier address, they bring not only a camera crew to transform their life into a reality family sitcom, but also their personal effects in cartons labelled "linen", "dead things" and "death heads".

Within minutes of arrival, crucifixes are adorning the wall and crosses carved out of the door. A "death head" garnishes the front entrance, much to the horror of the neighbours.

Even the empty swimming pool takes on the aspect of a chasm of Mordor.

"We'll never be able to sell it," mock-wails Mrs Osbourne, obviously chuffed with the immediate stamp her brood have put on the place. Yes, there goes the neighbourhood, Beverly Hills 90210 to Beverly Hills 666.

From the show's opening scenes it was just like a real-life version of the The Addams Family. While Morticia, sorry Sharon, directed the unpacking, you kept looking around for the Thing.

Pretty soon the clan had hired a security guard who was offering any takers a feel of his blood clot and behaving pretty much in the same gothic league as the Addams' zombie butler.

But this is not how The Osbournes is packaged. It's an MTV show so naturally comes wrapped in post-modern irony, with the cheesy titles and graphics of one of those sweet family sitcoms from TV's age of innocence. It even has a role for the nanny.

The show has been a hit overseas and it's not hard to see why. The appeal of the incongruities embodied in this lot is enormous.

When he's not snarling and chewing up the stage, Osbourne looks ready to be packed off to a home for the bewildered. He's hopelessly inept with the domestic gadgetry and as dazed as any parent by teenage daughter Kelly's "wobblers".

The show reveals such endearing scenes as the metal legend getting hopelessly entangled in the arms of the makeup chair by the long black fringes of his sleeves.

Last night's opening episode offered such amusements as Sharon telling us what a sensitive soul son Jack was while the boy is strolling round in the background dressed in fatigues and stabbing a box with one of dad's bayonets. Kelly's withering disdain for the excruciatingly uncool behaviour of father, the man many regard as a rock icon, was straight from the manual of teen drama.

This is a family who like to watch the "War Channel" while cuddling the family cat, whose distinct unease is a stark reminder that this is the domicile of a man who once bit the head off a bat on stage.

Yet for all the bleeped-out language and the fighting, the Osbournes are a doting and caring family at heart. Nanny doesn't want son Jack to watch a documentary on marijuana; mum and dad tell the kids not to drink, take drugs and if they are going to have sex to please use a condom.

In one of his more lucid moments, Ozzy declares fondly to his family: "I love you all, I love you more than life itself, you are all f*** mad."

At one stage, Sharon suggests the family are in need of a good roundtable discussion - a moment which was typical of the charm of the show.

Behind the death head doorknocker, the alarming weaponry and the obvious mistrust of the family pets, the Partridge Family is lurking.

* The Osbournes, TV2 9.30pm Tuesday