Say goodbye to New York City and hello to sexy South Beach,Fla., where two plastic surgeons run the show and the once famousfour are in re-run land on TBS.
With the edited version of “Sex and the City”showing at prime time on Sunday nights, viewers demand action, andnot the kind found on “CSI” or “FearFactor.” Viewers want the type that provides viewers withsexual, emotional and surgical excitement. But where? What?
“Nip/Tuck” serves as the new “it” show.With 3.3 million viewers weekly, “Nip/Tuck,” the No. 1cable television show to date, has earned Golden Goble nominationsfor best new series and leading actress in a drama for JuliaMcNamara (Joley Richardson).
Creator Ryan Murphy is responsible for the success of”Nip/Tuck.” On FX’s network website, Murphystates the show “cuts into the surface of the superficialworld on plastic surgery.” What began as a simple ideaoriginating from his view of plastic surgery serving as anexpression of self-loathing, quickly transpired into ‘theseemingly perfect drama.’
The show focuses on the lives of two 40-year-old men operatingone of the most successful plastic surgery offices in Miami. Dr.Sean McNamara (Dylan Walsh) and Dr. Christian Troy (Julian McMahon)portray the best friends caught in the superficial world ofachieving perfection.
McNamara feels his job “allows people to externalize thehate they feel about themselves.” Contradicted entirely byTroy’s view, Troy believes, “When we stop striving forperfection we might as well be dead.”
With an increasing emphasis on perfection, Americans findthemselves addicted to shows that nip and tuck away at theirinsecurities. First came “Extreme Makeover,” a realityshow which airs on the highly respected and beloved AmericanBroadcast Company. But competitor network FOX soon followed with”The Swan,” and just a step behind, FX proudlypresented “Nip/Tuck.”
Each episode opens with a potential client specificallyillustrating the ideal person in which he/she desires to become.The detailed surgeries allow viewers to get a very realisticpicture of modern plastic surgery.
Whether it is removing silicone implants full of heroine at gunpoint, fixing the work of a serial rapist who carves the faces ofhis victims or giving a man breast implants to help him betterunderstand his wife’s loss to breast cancer, nothing is outof the ordinary for “Nip/Tuck.”
Never knowing what to expect of “Nip/Tuck” keepsfirst-year Johnny Newbern wanting more.
“Nip/Tuck is the best thing that has ever happened to me;it has totally changed my life. The show gets better as it goes, soseason three is going to really blow people away. It is daring, andunique, and completely original — and people love it forthat,” Newbern said.
A younger audience may applaud “Nip/Tuck,” but itreceived its share of negative criticism among the professionalfield of plastic surgery when it debuted in July of 2002.
Dr. Loren Eskenazi, a San Francisco plastic surgeon, sharesextreme distaste for the show with her fellow colleagues. Ezkenaziblieves, “It’s like ‘Saturday Night Live’of plastic surgery. ‘Sex and the City’ was way morerealistic than this show.”
The misrepresentations begin in the first episode of”Nip/Tuck” when Troy performs a butt implant on afemale patient. Half-way through the surgery, McNamara interruptsto tell Troy his next appointment is waiting in his office and sayshe will finish the procedure himself. McNamara then discovers thebutt implant is upside down. Troy, responds with nothing more thana sly smile, “Sean you have saved my ass onceagain!”
A comment made by Troy during a breast augmentation served as awarning to women. “Seventy percent of our seven-figure incomeis from breast implants.”
Ironically, the American Society of Plastic Surgery nationalstatistics shows a 20 percent increase in the number of breastaugmentations performed in 2000 to 2003. This number meansapproximately 50,000 more women received breast augmentation in2003 than in the year 2000.
Dr. Bridie Barr, an SMU professor and avid”Nip/Tuck” viewer, feels “the show does a goodjob of de-glamorizing plastic surgery.” She says, “Itdoesn’t matter what you look like on the outside, you should,and need to be, happy with who you are because the inside is whattruly matters.”
Show creator Murphy agrees. Murphy chose each actor for specificroles on “Nip/Tuck” based on how he thought theaudience would perceive them. Murphy did not want models and knownactresses who had already received any form of plastic surgery.Murphy wanted real people the viewers would be capable of relatingto in some way. In an interview with Donna Freydkin in USAToday, he claims, “It’s about expressing sides ofpeople that maybe you haven’t seen on TV before.”
After two successful seasons, two Golden Globe nominations andtwo oh so sexy plastic surgeons, the anticipation for season threemight be described by TV moguls as magic.
