Malibu native David Katz is working to bring the genre of reality TV to this seaside town.
By Michael Aushenker / Special to the Malibu Times
Orange County has them. Beverly Hills has them. Miami and Atlanta, too, and even Washington D.C. did for a while.
So why not Malibu? Housewives, that is. As in reality TV show-ready housewives.
After the producers of the yet-unsold “Malibu Wives” sent out an open casting call asking contestants to “put your best stiletto forward and show us how amazing your life is,” a stream of local ladies between the ages of 35 and 55 dropped by Charlie’s restaurant on Pacific Coast Highway to deliver their best Bethenney Frankel.
About a dozen contestants showed up on Friday afternoon for what was one of two casting calls to fill the six lead roles of “Malibu Wives,” a collaboration between producer David Katz’s Ambitious Films banner and Planet C Studios, where Katz is head of development. (The second audition will take place June 10 at Universal Studios.)
In the glass-encased back room at Charlie’s, “Wives” producers Katz and Nancy Lopez set up a camera and asked a bevy of questions to their aspiring reality stars which prompted some interesting answers.
Question No. 1: “In the five years you’ve been living here, what’s the craziest thing that’s happened to you?”
The first girl on film, Halle Cupcott, offered an anecdote about the time when actor Gary Busey pulled up in his car next to the one with her and her girlfriends and said, “‘Let’s race!” And they did, she said.
“Gary Busey is a little cuckoo!” Cupcott added.
Question No. 2: “Who do you think is the biggest b**** in Malibu?”
A soccer mom/former alcoholic mentioned the name of a “Beverly Hills” star before rethinking her answer and deciding the person she named, who she had met once, was “nice.” She identified her neighbor instead.
Of course, there were people at the audition who might fit that stereotype of affluent, aging divas; plastic surgery-enhanced women with outsized personalities. However, there was also a good share of surprises that upturned such expectations.
Example: Some of the “wives” who appeared were not particularly trashy and self-centered, and, in some cases, not married.
Copcutt, for instance, is 36 and single. Her 92-year-old grandfather had a good reason as to why she has not yet found a husband. Quoting him, she said, “‘You know why you’re not married? You talk back!’”
Copcutt’s perfect date? Attending a fundraiser. All of her friends in Malibu are charity-driven, she said.
Copcutt’s greatest goal: to publish a magazine that helps parents with special-needs kids. While Copcutt does not have children of her own, she told The Malibu Times that she drew inspiration from four friends, each from a different financial bracket, grappling with their children’s challenges, from autism to epilepsy.
The second Malibu woman to audition, Veera Mahajan, was also unmarried, but only recently. She told Katz and Lopez that five months ago she opted out of an abusive marriage, packed her bags, and headed to Malibu, where one of her adult sons is attending school.
“I didn’t know anybody here,” she said. “I wanted to take a chance. A lot of women are not able to do that. A lot of men are not able to do that!”
Another surprise: Charlie DiLorenzo, the restaurant’s namesake, on a whim, auditioned for a role.
Production assistant Brian Rudenberg played public relations, shepherding contestants from filling out forms up front to auditioning in back.
While “Malibu Wives” is not affiliated with the popular “Housewives” programs, Katz said his show’s concept was in that vein.
“This is something that is based on a winning formula,” he said. “We’re not reinventing the wheel here.”
Working as producer on her first reality show, Lopez, Katz’s Ambitious Films partner (they co-produced the Andy Dick comedy “Kissing Strangers”), singled out the original “Housewives” show, “Orange County,” as her favorite from the franchise. With “Malibu Wives,” she said she’s looking for “everything and anything” in her contestants. A recent alumnus of Pepperdine University’s business school, the South Bay-raised Lopez said her four years living in Malibu would inform her show.
Meanwhile, Katz, who is the founder of the Malibu International Film Festival and the son of producer Marty Katz, grew up here.
“This is a place where people come to dress down,” Katz said, adding that it’s also a place “where people pay $50 for a sweater that looks worn out.”
Two potential Malibu wives under consideration right now were familiar when they reached out to him.
“Coincidentally, we had been next-door neighbors,” Katz said of the Kanner sisters, Kim and Linda, Malibu real estate entrepreneurs. “They are characters and that’s what we are looking for.”
After each audition, contestants shared their feelings regarding the possibility of being on the show and their lives here in Malibu. Mahajan, after mere months in her adopted Malibu, has made fast friends with those who appreciate her artistic tendencies.
“The people here are so nice,” she said.
Mahajan found out about the “Wives” audition from Di Lorenzo after curating an art show at her restaurant.
A soccer mom who used to sell real estate and is now “newly sober with a whole group of AA friends” was asked by the Times how her husband and children felt about having their lives potentially paraded onscreen before millions.
“We did have that conversation,” she said, and it was OK. “I’m going to bring a real aspect to the show.”
One of the last women to arrive made a strong impression: the confident, voluptuous-looking Cindyann Sant Angelo. For anyone who grew up in the late ‘80s/early ‘90s, Sant Angelo, a self-proclaimed “video vixen,” is a living monument to music-world trivia. She is the first voice heard on Jane’s Addiction alternative-rock classic album “Ritual de la Habitual” (that sultry Spanish introduction of the band preceding the first track “Stop”) and she’s also the bombshell who mimes the hook on the video for the rap classic “Bust a Move.” (The Red Hot Chili Peppers’ Flea plays bass on that Young MC song, and Sant Angelo has also appeared in the Chili Peppers’ “Higher Ground” video.)
“Perry [Farrell] saw me and said I was the most beautiful girl in the world,” she recalled of how the Jane’s front man handed her the “Ritual” gig.
Now, the brash, flirtatious Sant Angelo was gushing about her cute boys, ages 4 and 6, and proudly noting how three years ago she started Mermaid’s Cove, an all-women sober-living facility.
Of course, given her resume, which also includes roles on “Married With Children” and “CSI: Miami,” Sant Angelo came equipped with a something that might give her an edge on “reality” television: acting ability.