Scripted to feel more like a sitcom than a traditional reality TV show, Leave It to Niecy follows the newlywed and husband Jay Tucker as they try to stay sane raising teenagers and keeping their blended family together.
PHOTOS: Celebrities with Reality Shows
TLC approached Niecy and Jay after the success of their wedding special last year. “I said, ‘I’m a lover, not a fighter. We laugh every day, make love and try to make money. I don’t know if that’s enough,’” Niecy tells ESSENCE.com. “They said, ‘it absolutely is.’ I said as long as we’re not in a place of manufacturing that sort of drama found on reality shows because I just don’t have it in my life.”
Leave It to Niecy features Nash’s three children — Dominic, Donielle and Dia — her mother Miss Margaret, and Jay’s son, Romallis. “Another thing that inspired me to do this show is because there are a lot of blended families out there,” she continues. “I’m not trying to tell you that we’re perfect, but we’re trying. If there is something that we stumble across in our journey that we can help you get it figured out on your end, then it was all worth it.”
PHOTOS: Niecy Nash and Jay Tucker’s Wedding
The show follows Niecy and Jay from the time of their wedding to the time they move into a home together. The new family structure has been a new adjustment, especially when it comes to Niecy’s children’s relationship with Jay. “Honey, Rome was not built in a day,” she says. “There has been a process in him getting to know the family. The truth of the matter is, if you got the right man, then he’s not just dating or marrying you, he’s dating and marrying your family.”
PHOTOS: Celebrity Blended Families
Luckily, the transition has been a smooth one. So smooth that Niecy and Jay have started calling her ex-husband “our ex-husband.”
“We have developed what we call a trifecta meeting with my husband, my ex-husband and myself,” she says, laughing. “We talk about the kids to figure out what they’re going to do this summer and all this other mess. We’re all cordial because we all have to be.”
Here’s a sneak peek of Jay giving Niecy’s daughter Donielle her first driving lesson.