‘Rednecks’ Vacation In The Hamptons

Last August, a tight-knit family of 13 from Louisiana rolled into East Hampton with two trucks and an RV—a deer skull fastened to its front, a dog and two chickens sitting passenger, and a four-wheeler hitched to the back.

What happens next is now airing on Country Music Television’s new reality series “My Big Redneck Vacation,” which debuted with the show “Bayou Billionaires” last month as the highest-rated night in the network’s history, according to executive producer Lewis Bogach.

“I don’t know if the Hamptons is ready for us or not,” Jared Thomas, one of the show’s stars, says during episode one. “We’re gonna find out. We’re gonna make an appearance, that’s for sure.”

From the creators of “My Big Redneck Wedding,” the fish-out-of-water series follows the adventures of the loud-mouthed, unintentionally hysterical Clampet family, as they are called in the show, who trade in their modest Shreveport digs for a $4.5 million home in East Hampton for the summer, marking their first-ever trip to the East End. Once here, the family gets a taste of the high life—from wine tasting, polo and golf to teatime, etiquette lessons and a Hamptons wedding—but not without bringing a whole lot of backcountry with them.

For those who are concerned about the possible exploitative angle, at least some of the family members are in on the joke.

“If you think we’re having fun, it hasn’t even gotten started,” self-declared “girly girl” of the group, Michelle, who was engaged to Mr. Thomas at the start of the taping and is now his wife, said during a telephone interview last week. “But the premiere? Oh my god, I’ve never laughed so hard in my life. I was laughing at myself, I forgot I did some of that.”

The family’s two-day trek had a rough start. They packed up—the suitcase ratio, woman to man, was five-to-one, Ms. Thomas said—and got ready to hit the road. But they had to find their destination first.

“Where’s the Hamptons? I don’t see it,” Ms. Thomas says in episode one, holding up a huge map with the help of several family members.

“It’s not even labeled on the map: Hamptons,” the 23-year-old later said over the telephone. “We didn’t know where the heck we were going. We figured once we get to the water, we’re somewhere. If I was leading everybody, we probably would have ended up in California for all I know.”

After a short RV breakdown, the family soon made it to their final destination. In celebration, they honked their horns and yelled, “Rednecks in the Hamptons! Hello New York!” out the windows.

The family’s excitement only grew once they saw the house: a 4,500-square-foot, five-bedroom, four-bathroom manse complete with a media room, wine cellar, pool, tennis court and dock on Three Mile Harbor. The home cost $90,000 to rent per month, Mr. Bogach said.

The similarities between the family’s full-time southern homes and their summer abode started and ended with the wooded and rustic look of the 3.6 acres of land the East Hampton house sits on.

“I was speechless, pretty much,” Ms. Thomas recalled. “I still am speechless. That house was insane. It blew us away. The whole way there, I was driving in my truck and my stomach was in knots. ‘What am I going to be staying in? What if it’s a shack and all of us have to live together?’ All these emotions, and we were just like, ‘Oh. My. Gosh.’ It was insane. It was a relief.”

Upon arrival, the men took charge. To settle a dispute over who would get the master suite, they had a shooting contest—with bows and arrows. To Ms. Thomas’s delight, her husband hit the turkey decoy that the family had brought with them right between the eyes. The Clampets then got to work redecorating the living room by taking the artwork down from the walls and replacing it with mounted deer heads.

Next, the women went shopping for dinner supplies at the Hampton Market Place in East Hampton. Ms. Thomas tries to pronounce some of the food labels and gives up. They smell the cheeses and scrunch up their noses in disgust.

“It smells like feet,” one of the women says. “It’s a vein, it’s cheese with a vein.”

When planning the dinner menu, they ask the butcher for rattlesnake and nutria, which they refer to as a “nutra rat,” a large amphibious rodent also known as a “river rat.”

“You’re not from around here, are you?” the butcher, Steve, says.

The total for the stop was approximately $80, a shocking price to the Louisianans.

“There, a marinade was $11. Back home, the same size is $4,” Ms. Thomas reported. “Everything was like that. It was a dramatic difference. We’d spend $300 on three bags of groceries. Back home, we spend $300 and we’re leaving with three cartfuls.”

But regardless of the cost, and the culture shock, Ms. Thomas said she’d come back to the East End in a heartbeat, if only to visit the friends she and her family made while they were here—friends she never thought they would make.

“You hear about people. You have the picture in your head of what hoity-toity people are, and we’re like, ‘Great,’” Ms. Thomas said. “We’re so outgoing and we want to meet everybody, whoever you are. But we want to make sure we’re welcomed. So we all had the, ‘Are we going to fit in? How far are we not going to fit in? Will they hate us?’”

And there was certainly an adjustment period, she said. But before long, the neighbors were mud riding and partying with the Clampets like they’d known each other for years, she said.

“We have guys bringing over their bows, if they have them, and they shoot targets,” she said. “Went mud ridin’, end up riding four wheelers with us. It’s a blast. They have a blast. Or they’re really good fakers.”

The neighbors also came to Mr. and Ms. Thomas’s wedding, which will air on episode nine of the show. In fact, the guests filled up the entire seating chart.

“Oh my, we invited everyone we met,” Ms. Thomas recalled. “’Hey, want to go to a party? Come to our weddin’! I don’t know your last name but c’mon, it’s going to be fun!’”

The decision to get married in the Hamptons happened in real life exactly as it played out during episode one: extremely fast and spontaneously around the dinner table, Ms. Thomas said. She’s always been an “on the whim” kind of girl, she said.

“Why would you want to ruin a vacation with a weddin’?” Mr. Thomas’s brother, Chris, asks the couple.

“What do you think, Jared?” Ms. Thomas asks.

He thinks for a few seconds and then says to his future wife, “Like I told you from the beginnin’, I done my part, I did what I had to do. You tell me where to be there, I don’t care.”

“Okay!” Ms. Thomas exclaims.

“Holy ...,” the censor bleeps out Chris’s next word.

“Are you excited?” Ms. Thomas asks.

“I’m tickled to death,” Mr. Thomas says.

For the wedding, Ms. Thomas is referred by her etiquette coach, Manhattan-based Patricia Napier-Fitzpatrick, to hire celebrity wedding planner Michael Russo, also from Manhattan.

“I just don’t know about a fella telling me how to do no weddin’,” Mr. Thomas says.

“Patricia, our etiquette coach, told us that, by far, he’s the top dog,” Ms. Thomas says.

After meeting, the couple and Mr. Russo decide that the Thomas reception shouldn’t be a stereotypical, ritzy, Hamptons wedding. But the wedding planner is thrown for a loop when the family suggests that the cake should be decorated with deer heads and that the menu feature squirrel, rabbit, duck and “gator.”

“Duck is fine. I’ve never, I don’t think I’ve ever had squirrel,” Mr. Russo says. “I think the two things in question would be the gator and the squirrel.”

During a telephone interview last week, Mr. Russo relived his initial bewilderment.

“I was like, ‘Squirrel? Ewww!’” he laughed. “I couldn’t even bear it. But you know what? Everyone has their things. To each their own. Who am I to judge? And in the end, I think I pushed more for the deer head and the antlers for the cake than they did. They were just like, ‘Oh, we can just have a regular cake,’ and I said, ‘Really? If we’re going to do it, let’s do it.’”

As for the rest of the wedding, Mr. Russo and Ms. Thomas were tight-lipped. The wedding planner said the menu was “quite eclectic,” and the bride said it was a beautiful day—and more than that, it was two cultures combining.

Viewers will just have to wait to see how the big day—and the rest of the redneck family’s vacation—plays out over the next couple of months. Mr. Bogach said preliminary talks have already begun about a second season with the same family in a different location.

But there are still seven episodes to go before the inaugural season comes to a close. Mr. Russo, for one, will be tuning in, he said.

“As you continue to watch the series—I’m just a sap so I cry all the time—it gets emotional,” he said. “I came there and they could have easily judged me based on everything that goes on in my life, and they didn’t. They just accepted me for my crazy self.

“We become a family, everyone does,” Mr. Russo continued. “Other than the funny factor of the show, because it really is comical, you see friendships develop. It’s a great message for everyone, to just sit back and look at other people for who they are. And that’s it. Much more than just the title.”

New episodes of “My Big Redneck Vacation” air on Saturdays at 9:30 p.m. on Country Music Television. Episodes are also available at cmt.com.