• by Adam Buckman , Featured Columnist, November 5, 2021

Times have certainly changed since 2003, but Fox is nevertheless reviving “Joe Millionaire,” the early ’00s reality series in which a group of female gold-diggers competed to date and hopefully marry a handsome millionaire and live happily ever after.

The new “Joe Millionaire” will debut on Fox this coming January, the company said.

In the old show, the central figure in the first season (of two) was a bachelor named Evan Marriott (pictured above in a Fox publicity photo from 18 years ago). 

The scenario of the show, in which Marriott was directed to play the part of a rich eligible bachelor, was in fact a red herring.

The truth was, Marriott was an average Joe who worked in construction. He was not a millionaire, but the women who competed for his affection and, presumably, access to his money, did not know this until the very end of the show.

The new series has a longer title, “Joe Millionaire: For Richer Or Poorer,” reflecting a new gimmick -- namely, there will be two Joe Millionaires picking from this group of gold-diggers, one who is actually a millionaire and the other who is not.

Based on its unusual (if not outlandish) premise, the original “Joe Millionaire” was a cultural phenomenon in its first season before dying in its second. By “cultural phenomenon,” I mean that the show was much talked-about and covered in the press.

It was one of many reality shows that emerged from the Fox reality-TV unit in that era, including the equally phenomenal one-off show, “Who Wants to Marry a Multimillionaire?,” and various prime-time eating contests. 

But will “Joe Millionaire” fly in 2022? For starters, what about its premise which seems to base itself on the notion that the world is still filled with gold-digging women whose sole aim in life is to hitch their wagons to a rich man?

And speaking of new gimmicks, with the many cultural changes that have occurred in the world since 2003, why isn’t the gimmick of this new one that the central characters are Jane Millionaires who are being pursued by gold-digging men?

Back in 2003, no one to my knowledge decried the original “Joe Millionaire” as a sexist scenario -- at least not seriously.

If memory serves, I may have taken a whack at that subject, but like so many of the opinions I wrote then, this one was likely written more for the entertainment of readers than the enlightenment of them.

Today, we live in a much more hypercritical age (some might say a reactionary one) in which perceived slights or insults to this or that group are magnified on social media, often out of proportion to their actual offense.

It could be that the new “Joe Millionaire,” with its gold-digger scenario from 18 years ago, might come in for some of that.

Perhaps “Jane Millionaire” has already occurred to the makers of the new “Joe Millionaire” and they are hoping for subsequent seasons in which to turn the gender tables.

To cite a precedent, “The Bachelorette” was spun off from “The Bachelor” in 2003 (the same year that the original “Joe Millionaire” had its debut) -- giving women more or less equal time with men in this long-running match-making series.

So how about it, “Joe Millionaire”? Surely, 20 gold-digging young men can be found to participate in a “Jane Millionaire” version of the show.

Like “The Bachelor” and the original “Joe Millionaire,” making a female version of the latter should be a no-brainer, just like the shows themselves.