A literal prince and a nerd seek love from Patti and her team.
It’s Opposite Day on this edition of The Millionaire Matchmaker as Patti’s bachelors include a European prince with a 1,000-year-old family lineage (a.k.a. old money) and a dotcom nerd who came into his money by getting in early at Groupon. Only on a reality dating show could these two diverse specimens of testosterone ever come to meet in the same room.
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Mario Max is the German prince who was promised, and holds his jaw in this really weird way that makes you think it might be wired on the inside – and if not, then he’s just smarmy. He runs some kind of company that sells luxury things online and travels all over the world for his business to attend posh events. He’s ready to settle down, and he’s not looking for gold diggers who just want him for his title. Since he’s so busy, he wants Patti to find him the perfect woman.
Patti’s not that impressed with his family crest jackets and name dropping, so she tells him she’ll set him up with a mixer but he’s not to tell any of the women that he’s a prince. Max lights up like this is the most brilliant rouse he’s ever heard and is happy to oblige. Really? Max can’t be bright if this is the first time not sharing that fact with potential dates has come up.
On the other end of the spectrum is geeky, sweet Daniel. As an early coupon writer for Groupon, Dan benefited from the rise of the Chicago-based company and now has plenty of dinero but no one to share it with. He works a lot and then goes home to his turtle, comic books, puppets, and arts and crafts. Listen, if Patti held his mixer at Comic-Con, Dan would be rolling in attractive cos players and simpatico geek gals like a player, but unfortunately his dating pool for this show is in Los Angeles.
Patti tells Daniel he needs to be “man-ified” and cleaned up so he can exude more confidence and come out of his shell. Daniel agrees like a gentleman, and then gets swept through a whirlwind body cleansing and external reinvention. Patti buys him new clothes, which look very dapper, and then sends him to a hipster barber to tweeze, shave, and sculpt the hairiness off Daniel so he looks like his age of 27.
At the mixer, Max has shed his boat jacket while Daniel looks like a new person awkwardly wearing a Timberlake-style fedora. Patti throws the boys into her woman pit, which Max swims through with ease. Daniel… not so much.
Max quickly picks two standout mini date candidates – Erika and Clark. While Erika was relaxed on the mixer floor, she and Max are super awkward face-to-face. However model Clark is sassy and worldly from her time spent in Italy and she gets Max to open up and remain relaxed.
Meanwhile, Dan manages to click with two women (whose names he blanks on) – Shereena and Krystyna. Shereena is a party girl who signs for the deaf. She and Dan have a sign language alphabet race and have art in common. She thinks she can get him out of his shell. Krystyna feels the same way but she goes a little too far by asking Daniel to dance with her on the mini date. You could practically hear his mind shouting, “Danger, Danger Will Robinson!”
At mixer’s end, Max selects Clark and Daniel picks Shereena and the dates are on!
Daniel meets Shereena in downtown LA to go gallery hopping. She arrives wearing clothing that Dan says makes her look like a break-dancer (ha!). “They have a great time looking at art and Daniel clearly knows his stuff. Shereena then lures Dan to a bar where she makes the lightweight drink a shot and then an Old-Fashioned. She downs them like a champ while Daniel looks like he wants to throw up the fire water in his throat. They leave and then meet for dinner and Shereena is all glittery, sparkly in a dress that Daniels says is shedding on his new shirt. They have dinner where Shereena gets super shy Daniel to peck her on the lips, and is a good sport when he backs away from her looking like he was forced to kiss his turtle on the lips.
She knows this date has no chemistry but she says she hopes she can help him come out of his shell. He agrees and admits to Patti later that “bit off more than I can chew” with her. Patti knew as much but she’s confident the very game Daniel has learned a lot so he can open himself up to the love he’d like to have.
Elsewhere, Max picks up Clark in a limo and presents her with a brand new dress she can wear at their private ballroom dancing lesson at the Biltmore Hotel. She’s wowed and impressed, but not as much as Max when he sees his lady in her blue gown. His face screams “Jackpot” at first glance and then he whisks her to the dance floor for some awkward waltzing.
At dinner, Max’s jaw reveals to Clark that he’s actually a prince, and then later on camera she fists a victorious, “Jackpot!” He’s a smitten kitten and goes in for some awkward kisses that look like she didn’t love. The next day, Max was wearing a hoodie (with no family crest!) and a replica of Daniel’s fedora. Completely relaxed and happy, Max hails Patti’s wisdom and says they will be dating some more. A royal wedding to come? Patti thinks it could come true.
Some stats and info about The Millionaire Matchmaker – “The Prince and I”
TV SHOW – The Millionaire Matchmaker
SEASON/EPISODE – Season 5, Episode 3
NETWORK/STREAMING SERVICE – Bravo
GENRE – Reality TV, Dating Shows, Trashtastic TV
STARS – Patti Stanger, Destin Pfaff, Rachel Federoff, Daniel Kibblesmith, Mario Max
This review was originally published on TV Geek Army.