Pretty much ever since they started showing "The Surreal Life", I didn't think I would ever watch a show on VH1 again. I prefer "The Soup" greatly to "Best Week Ever" and everything else on the network is crap. But then came a show that has transcended all other voyeuristic celebrity shows. I gave you "Kid Nation" as the best new show of 2007 and now I give you the next best show that you're not watching -- "Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew".
I have no interest in watching very marginal celebrities find some girl that they're going to dump as soon as the cameras stop rolling or getting drunk together and acting stupid. There is major drama, however, in watching them try to better their lives. Jeff Conaway ("Taxi", Grease) is so messed up on cocaine and prescription medication that he has seizures during withdrawal. Daniel Baldwin is such a rehab veteran and in so much denial over his drug abuse that he disrupts everything by trying to play psychologist to everyone else. Mary Carey struggles with the fact that her profession in porn is what is leading her into drug abuse. Another celebrity cries talking about her father's abuse. Another is on video smoking crack. Yet another tells, unapologetically, a story about how he moved his girlfriend (who he thought dead) into the driver's seat after a car accident so she could take the fall for the DUI. All the while, technician Shelly (the secret star of the show) deals out tough love and brutal honesty and Dr. Drew presides over the whole program, getting to the bottom of the patients' addictions and fighting off bad influences like Conaway's girlfriend.
If it sounds like I'm exaggerating the gravity of some "Celebreality" show, I'm not. This one really is that remarkable. Give it a couple of minutes, you'll be hooked.
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