The Osbournes debuted on MTV in 2002, and according to Ozzy Osbourne’s son Jack in a new Yahoo interview, Ozzy was hesitant to let fans see his home life.
“So my dad did not really like doing The Osbournes, because he was coming off the heels of, you know, musicians didn’t do that,” Jack says. “Musicians always had this air of mystery about them, you know, and there was this very public persona, and it was calculated, and this, kind of, pulled that back. And I don’t think he liked that. I think he was like, ‘Whoa, the rock star thing … we’ve gotta hold that up. Like, I’m just, kind of, dad now.’ And I think he struggled with that.”
Jack insists there won’t ever be a fifth season, despite talk of a reboot.
“There’s been [discussion]. At one point it was gonna happen, but it’s too difficult to do now,” he says. “We’re all living in different houses. We’re all… I mean, no one wants to watch a bunch of old 30-year-olds, you know, shuffle around the house with their parents. It’s like, it wouldn’t be the same. Just because everyone’s rebooting something doesn’t mean you should.”
Besides, he adds, shows today are different than they were in the early days of reality TV, especially with the added pressure of social media.
“We were never asked to say anything. We were never told to turn up at this location, we need you guys to do this,” Jack says. “As the seasons progressed, they would be like, ‘Hey, we’ve never filmed a family vacation. Can we go on a vacation?’ That was as far as, like, the staging went. I think there’s so many components now which contribute to why a lot of these family shows have to script themselves.”
