Stranded in ‘Surreal’ estate

Yet another reality show that makes roommates of strangers, “The Surreal Life” is back Sunday night for a second season on the WB. The twist here is that all the participants are celebrities, which is not to say “stars.” And though they range from Erik “Ponch” Estrada to porn legend Ron Jeremy to TV evangelist Tammy Faye Bakker Messner to the man formerly known as Vanilla Ice to a “Baywatch” babe and a reality-show alumna, we can assume they have this much in common: Each craves attention, and none of them had anything better to do for the 12 days it took to shoot this series.

In the opening episode, the participants are collected in a yellow tourist trolley from “appropriate” locations around Hollywood (Messner -- we’ll just call her Tammy Faye -- is fetched from the wax museum, Estrada from a doughnut shop -- because he played a cop, see -- and “Real World” party girl Trishelle Cannatella from in front of a strip joint) and hauled up to the Glen Campbell estate (owner not in evidence), its interior a nightmare in red, neon, and checkerboard, the living room dominated by Warholian multiple portraits of the principals. “Crappy,” Tammy Faye calls it, using the strongest word in her vocabulary. There is a hot tub, a swimming pool, a leopard-skin billiard table, and five beds for six people -- you do the math, as they must as well.

They are stranded here without cars, cellphones or personal assistants, though Jeremy brought his turtle. Apart from Tammy Faye, none of them seems to have taken a book, and I think you can guess which one she chose.

Over the course of the series they will be occasionally put in a van and taken somewhere and made to do things -- they’ll visit a nudist camp, be put to work in a coffee shop (under the supervision of Gary Coleman).

In the premiere episode they go shopping at the Los Angeles Farmers Market, which despite some difficulty in the sausage department, is pretty much a nonevent. The lack of actual matter is compensated for by rapid edits, cheesy special effects and pop-up factoids, and by having the contestants, or whatever they are, comment on the action every other minute, making drama out of air.

This year’s cast has been somewhat modeled on the first, which included Corey Feldman, Motley Crue’s Vince Neil, MC Hammer and Emmanuel Lewis. Shallow but popular rapper Rob Van Winkle a.k.a. Vanilla Ice is this season’s Hammer, but he is also this season’s Neil; Tammy Faye is also this season’s Hammer, in his current Christian incarnation; “Baywatch” babe Traci Bingham is this year’s “Baywatch” babe Brande Roderick; “Real World” vet and “Playboy” model Trishelle is this year’s “Survivor” vet and “Playboy” model Jerri Manthey.

The show is starting out, oddly, as a testament to the wisdom, or at least the equanimity, that comes with age and experience. Ron, Erik and Tammy Faye seem -- and seem is all they can do in a context such as this -- like grounded people, sure in the knowledge of who they are, respectively secure in their bad hair, cheesy images and scary mascara, and unapologetic without being arrogant. They are polite and accommodating. Tammy Faye especially is a model of Christian charity and surrogate maternal concern.

But they are not being paid to be polite and accommodating and charitable; they are there to make each other at least a little bit miserable. While there is, for instance, an automatic fascination in watching Ron hanging out with Tammy Faye -- on whom he almost seems to have a crush -- they get along far too well. Shows like these depend on bad behavior and an air of crisis.

The designated troublemakers here are the younger set -- Trishelle, Rob, and Traci -- for whom self-knowledge has not yet transcended self-involvement. Trishelle is a self-proclaimed lush who has come “to tear it up and have a great time.” Rob/Ice, who believes humans came from space, “has an anger problem,” Ron thinks, and is still not over his old bad haircut, which looks at him accusingly from his picture on the living room wall. Traci, meanwhile is nearly accused by Erik of being a “plant,” put there to wind them up. She is there to wind them up. That’s why she was cast -- that and for her telegenic cleavage. They’re all plants.

In future episodes, we are briefly shown, Sally Jesse Raphael will come to harangue them, Traci will get drunk and make out with Andy Dick, and Tammy Faye will cry.

*

‘The Surreal Life’

Where: The WB

When: Premieres 9-10 p.m. Sunday

Rating: The network has rated the program TV-14DL (may not be suitable for children younger than 14, with advisories for suggestive dialogue and coarse language).

Featuring...Tammy Faye Bakker Messner, Erik Estrada, Ron Jeremy, Rob Van Winkle, Traci Bingham, Trishelle Cannatella

Creators, Cris Abrego and Rick Telles. Executive producers, Abrego, Telles, Mark Cronin, Jay Renfroe and David Garfinkle.