Mrs W Tivo'd this just for me 
The cast of "Jersey Shore" includes Nicole Polizzi, third from right, Mike Sorrentino, second from right, and Jenni Farley, fourth from left.
“Jersey Shore,” MTV’s new reality show about the exploits of eight fist-pumping, eyebrow-waxing, industrial-strength hair-gel-packing, lip-gloss-smacking, liquor-chugging summer roommates in Seaside Heights (only one of them is actually from New Jersey, FYI), features Nicole “Snooki” Polizzi, a 22-year-old from upstate New York. She's a tanned, tiny yet top-heavy brunette with a carefully tended follicular meringue atop of her head. But she didn’t always look like this.
“I was just a normal girl,” she says. “But when I started going to Jersey, I met girls that were guidettes. I started the poof. I definitely changed. I got a lot of talk around town, why are you dressing like this? Why are you blasting house music from your car? A lot of people make fun of you hanging out with guidos who might even look prettier than you do.”
Polizzi does not mean this as a cautionary tale.
MTV didn’t send out an advance screener for the show, which premieres Thursday at 10 p.m. But teasers from the show drew fire last week from UNICO, the national Italian-American service organization, whose president, André DiMino, objected to the generous use of the term “guido,” both by MTV’s promotional gurus and the cast members themselves.
“It’s a derogatory comment,” DiMino said in an interview with The Star-Ledger last week “It’s a pejorative word to depict an uncool Italian who tries to act cool.”
But cast member Mike Sorrentino, 27, an assistant manager of a gym from Staten Island who has a nickname for his abs ("The Situation"), says that guido is just a term for “a good-looking Italian guy.”
As for living up to the rest of the stereotype, Sorrentino shrugs it off. “It just so happens that some of the clubs we’re going to down here on the East Coast, you will see a fist-pump here and there. A lot of people on the East Coast have spiky hair. I used to be a fitness model. I don’t really feel the need to defend myself for having a six-pack.”
Polizzi, who is studying to become a veterinary technician, also doesn’t get the furor. “I don’t take offense to it. I feel we are representing Italian-Americans. We look good. We have a good time. We’re nice people. We get along with everybody. I don’t understand why it would be offensive.”
MTV has defended the show by saying that the cast members take pride in their ethnicity, and that “Jersey Shore” “depicts just one aspect of youth culture.” The show is the brainchild of Ocean County boy Anthony Beltempo, who politely declined an interview request and directed us to the MTV press office.
Not everyone in the cast is Italian-American. Jenni “J-WOW” Farley, 23, a nightclub promoter from Franklin Square, Long Island, says that “guido” is a cultural phenomenon that transcends race or ethnicity. (Okay, she didn’t phrase it quite so precisely.)
“There’s no negative connotations,” she says. “It’s how you portray yourself. At the end of the day, I still work, I still have my own house, I have a car. On top of that, I’m able to live the lifestyle.”
Both Farley and Polizzi would like to extend their 15 minutes with a spinoff; Farley wants the cameras follow her to the Hamptons, and Polizzi, to accompany on her quest for love. But she says she’ll have to find it elsewhere: “People go down there for three things: to party, to go to the clubs and to hook up with a lot of girls. You’re not going to find your dream guy at the Jersey Shore.”
The cast of "Jersey Shore" includes Nicole Polizzi, third from right, Mike Sorrentino, second from right, and Jenni Farley, fourth from left.
“Jersey Shore,” MTV’s new reality show about the exploits of eight fist-pumping, eyebrow-waxing, industrial-strength hair-gel-packing, lip-gloss-smacking, liquor-chugging summer roommates in Seaside Heights (only one of them is actually from New Jersey, FYI), features Nicole “Snooki” Polizzi, a 22-year-old from upstate New York. She's a tanned, tiny yet top-heavy brunette with a carefully tended follicular meringue atop of her head. But she didn’t always look like this.
“I was just a normal girl,” she says. “But when I started going to Jersey, I met girls that were guidettes. I started the poof. I definitely changed. I got a lot of talk around town, why are you dressing like this? Why are you blasting house music from your car? A lot of people make fun of you hanging out with guidos who might even look prettier than you do.”
Polizzi does not mean this as a cautionary tale.
MTV didn’t send out an advance screener for the show, which premieres Thursday at 10 p.m. But teasers from the show drew fire last week from UNICO, the national Italian-American service organization, whose president, André DiMino, objected to the generous use of the term “guido,” both by MTV’s promotional gurus and the cast members themselves.
“It’s a derogatory comment,” DiMino said in an interview with The Star-Ledger last week “It’s a pejorative word to depict an uncool Italian who tries to act cool.”
But cast member Mike Sorrentino, 27, an assistant manager of a gym from Staten Island who has a nickname for his abs ("The Situation"), says that guido is just a term for “a good-looking Italian guy.”
As for living up to the rest of the stereotype, Sorrentino shrugs it off. “It just so happens that some of the clubs we’re going to down here on the East Coast, you will see a fist-pump here and there. A lot of people on the East Coast have spiky hair. I used to be a fitness model. I don’t really feel the need to defend myself for having a six-pack.”
Polizzi, who is studying to become a veterinary technician, also doesn’t get the furor. “I don’t take offense to it. I feel we are representing Italian-Americans. We look good. We have a good time. We’re nice people. We get along with everybody. I don’t understand why it would be offensive.”
MTV has defended the show by saying that the cast members take pride in their ethnicity, and that “Jersey Shore” “depicts just one aspect of youth culture.” The show is the brainchild of Ocean County boy Anthony Beltempo, who politely declined an interview request and directed us to the MTV press office.
Not everyone in the cast is Italian-American. Jenni “J-WOW” Farley, 23, a nightclub promoter from Franklin Square, Long Island, says that “guido” is a cultural phenomenon that transcends race or ethnicity. (Okay, she didn’t phrase it quite so precisely.)
“There’s no negative connotations,” she says. “It’s how you portray yourself. At the end of the day, I still work, I still have my own house, I have a car. On top of that, I’m able to live the lifestyle.”
Both Farley and Polizzi would like to extend their 15 minutes with a spinoff; Farley wants the cameras follow her to the Hamptons, and Polizzi, to accompany on her quest for love. But she says she’ll have to find it elsewhere: “People go down there for three things: to party, to go to the clubs and to hook up with a lot of girls. You’re not going to find your dream guy at the Jersey Shore.”
