Reality Show Set in Newark Debuted Last Week

Following in the footsteps of Brick City, another Newark-based reality show has debuted this past week on a fledgling cable network.

Jersey Strong -- which appropriates the slogan adopted by many Jerseyans to show their resolve in the wake of last year’s Superstorm Sandy -- spotlights two Newarkers: Brooke, a gay trial attorney, and Jayda, a community activist and reformed gang member. The first episode was broadcast Saturday on Pivot.

Critics have given the show high marks for its spotlight on the lives of its two main subjects and for its fearlessly honest look at life in New Jersey’s largest city.

The show follows Jayda, as she contends with the trials of motherhood and her efforts to help others in the community, and the equally idealistic Brooke, who grew up in Central Jersey and, following a run-in with law enforcement in her teens, becomes an advocate for marginalized clients doing legal battle with powerful institutions.

The show also tracks the women’s relationships, Jayda’s with a still-active member of the Crips street gang, and Brooke with her girlfriend. 

“This is the state of the union in the  fall of 2013: When a TV network wants to tell a genuinely inspiring story about individuals working to improve the lives of their fellow citizens, it turns to a former gang member and a lesbian (a lesbian trial lawyer who smokes, even). The times they are a-changing. For the better,” online journal Slate wrote in its review of the show.