Frat Chance
By Angel Cohn The home-improvement show that claims to be "unlike any other" is prepping for its third season by hitting the books — or at least the keg parties — at the University of California's Berkeley campus. As in previous seasons, two teams have only two days and $1000 to swap rooms and transform a space in each other's houses. An assertive designer is assigned to each team, and one handy carpenter has to be shared. Perky hostess Paige Davis attempts to keep the teams on the right track with budget and time reminders. A sorority-centered episode from last season is followed by the new "Berkeley: Prospect Street" — a college-themed episode — at 9 pm/ET as a teaser for the new season, which officially begins Sept. 7. But this time, instead of sweet sisters trading rooms, it's a battle of the sexes. Doug Wilson matches wits with two Alpha Omicron Pi gals to redo the chapter room in the Delta Upsilon fraternity while Genevieve Gorder hangs with the frat bros to give the sisters TV room a look that is less "Hello Kitty." While most shows have the residents specifying one thing they would hate to see in their new rooms, the only request by both teams is that nothing be painted "Stanford red", the color of their arch-rivals. Gorder helps her team get into the spirit by ridding the room of any potentially offensive items in a spur-of-the-moment bonfire. Meanwhile, Wilson has his work cut out from him as he and the sisters encounter not only a completely trashed room, but also a frightening aroma. Soon enough, though, he's got the gals throwing everything out the second-story window, including a couch and a beloved mounted deer head. Attractive carpenter Ty Pennington initially seems to have the Greek gals hanging on his every word, but once he hands them power tools they get down to business, sawing parts for new seating spaces. Meanwhile, Gorder uses her engineering students' height and patience to her advantage, painting time-consuming stripes on the walls. And just when things seem to be going smoothly, the feisty sorority sisters decide to torment Doug about everything from the color of the walls to the hanging beer lamps, and even manage to put a kink in his reputation for dressing well. This mostly entertaining episode, like many others of the series, focuses more on the human drama of how teams interact with the designers and react to their new rooms than on the how-to aspect. But the often simple, limited-budget projects can be inspiring for viewers and they make the show more compelling than Bob Vila and his team of contractors, who take months to redo a room. Also, the designers' clever use of "found" items from other parts of the house will have audiences looking at their old coffee tables in new ways. However, a hitch that the show seems to have run into as more episodes air is that the participants are increasingly more savvy to the way the show works and to each designers' quirks. That can cause some of the outrageous and unique ideas to be stifled in favor of something more mundane and expected. The crazy creations and unanticipated conflicts are what sets it apart from other, similar shows. Hopefully, adding new designers will stir the mix before the series begins to get stale and the tagline changes to "Trading Spaces: a show like every other." |
