‘Princes’ get dose of reality, sort of

“The Princes of Malibu,” coming Sunday on Fox, is a sitcom dressed up as a reality show, or so-called reality show, which probably makes it a so-called sitcom.

Which isn’t a bad thing, given where sitcoms are. In fact, “The Princes of Malibu” is some kind of monster, a hybrid of reality and sitcom-ery that can be terrifyingly on the money in the way it gets at the culture clash between a superrich boomer parent who earned his lavish lifestyle and his privileged, pleasure-gorged stepsons.

Even if the execution is a transparent setup, the characters are all believable -- mega-successful music producer David Foster as the ineffectual disciplinarian, his wife, Linda, as a career trophy girl, and his two layabout stepsons, Brody and Brandon, the product of Linda’s first marriage to Bruce Jenner, as fresh princes of Malibu.

You need only get past the idea that everyone’s playing at bits of prearranged theater to enjoy the show. Make no mistake, it’s a caveat -- reality series are increasingly shaped to guarantee maximum story and conflict, even if revelations to this effect about such series as “Wife Swap” on ABC have proven only that the genre is impervious to scandal. Audiences, apparently pre-jaded, and networks, attracted by reality’s quick-and-dirty economics, keep the populist fictions coming. Only the Writers Guild of America has called on reality producers to begin providing writerly wages and health and pension benefits to the twentysomethings working long hours behind the scenes on these shows, crafting story lines and engineering laughs.

Union solidarity isn’t a forgone conclusion, for it assumes the writer on “Two and a Half Men” would be willing to accept that his work is tantamount to the “field producer” on “The Princes of Malibu.” It’s a stretch, but here the field producer has a good case; forgetting that you can’t believe most of it would have happened without extensive story meetings, rehearsals, blocking and up-front negotiations over DVD rights, “The Princes of Malibu” is one of the funnier shows to come to Fox since “Arrested Development.”

It even sounds like “Arrested” -- same tongue-in-cheek voice-over narration, same sound effects. Same dysfunctional family, only this one’s more convincing -- with better real estate and more resonant themes.

“Every year, millions of American kids move back home from college,” the unnamed narrator (who identifies himself as a “friend and neighbor”) says at the show’s outset. Meet Brandon and Brody -- good old boys, Malibu style, with seven semesters of college between them. Now they’ve moved back to David’s $40-million, 28-acre Malibu estate, dubbed Casablanca, to throw hot-tub bacchanals, run up his credit cards on Nobu sushi and drive golf balls toward his recording studio.

Well, when in Rome. David spends most of the first episode in a toothless state of pique about the boys’ profligate ways, establishing his character as some combination of David Geffen and a New Agey patriarchal grouch. The show veritably announces its theme when Linda, reliably out of it, says, “In other cultures, you know, young people stay in their home until they get married.”

“We’re not living in China,” David says. “We’re living in Malibu.”

They’re lying on chaises, on vacation, and they will jet back home to discover Brandon and Brody throwing a party for 300. The show presents the contrivance -- are we really supposed to believe that David spontaneously walked in on this house party totally unawares, and that the kids pulled it off all by themselves? -- as David’s last straw; the next day, in the kitchen of Chez Casablanca, he announces a set of disciplinary measures (no more credit cards, no more using his toys).

To the boys, you can see, he’s this overreacting Canadian fellow whom their mother married to keep the good life going. So they’re a bit nonplused, the way he’s trying to harsh their mellow. As Brody saliently observes, David doesn’t even use most of his toys.

But it’s Brandon who brings the larger point home. “I didn’t ask for this life,” he says. “It was not a question before I was born. This is my situation, and I’m doing the best that I can.” You start to see him as a psychological refugee of wealth and privilege.

Later, while dining with a clan of friends at Nobu, someone suggests the boys sell their sperm on EBay. They are, after all, the spawn of Bruce Jenner; it’s seemingly all they have to work with. Precisely at this moment, back at the compound, David is canceling their Nobu account and taking them off his credit cards, sticking Brandon and Brody with a $700 dinner bill.

Everyone at the table laughs, as if it’s a prank. And it is -- a reality show prank played on its media-literate players. On “The Princes of Malibu,” everyone is in on the jokes.

The jokes that, no doubt, were brought to you by a hard-working group of don’t-call-them-writers.

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‘The Princes of Malibu’

Where: Fox

When: 8:30 p.m. Sunday

Ratings: TV-14 D, L, S (may be unsuitable for children under age 14 with advisories for suggestive dialogue, coarse language and sex)

David Foster...self

Linda Thompson...self

Brandon Jenner...self

Brody Jenner...self

Executive producers, Gary R. Benz, Brant Pinvidic, Spencer Pratt. Creators, Brody Jenner, Brandon Jenner, Spencer Pratt, Brant Pinvidic.