Mtv's Mccarthy: Camera-Shy She Isn't

BURBANK, Calif. - As is customary of Playboy Playmates (which she was), game show sex symbols (which she is) and television sweethearts (which she aspires to be), there is always a camera in the face of Jenny McCarthy.

It's just hard to think of a model or actress who responds quite the way she does.

On a Burbank set, Jenny McCarthy turns, sticks out her tongue, arches her eyebrows, widens her eyes and grabs her right breast. "I'm ready for my close-up," she says with a laugh. Mr. DeMille would blush.

When MTV realized, during her stint on its dating game "Singled Out," that the 1994 Playmate of the Year was "more than just a letter turner," network senior vice president Lisa Berger says, executives looked for different avenues.

Their surprising choice, with the unsurprising name, is "The Jenny McCarthy Show," a half-hour showcase of - no kidding - sketch comedy. It premieres at 10 o'clock tonight on MTV.

"Sketch comedy is a risk regardless of who you have," Berger admits. "But we felt that with Jenny, this was a good place to experiment. Her biggest appeal is the ability to poke fun at herself - she makes light of her beauty."

Says McCarthy, "I have this nervous habit of sticking out my tongue and picking my nose. Is that wrong?"

"The Jenny McCarthy Show" consists of sketches, filmed in the same Burbank studios as "Singled Out," and comedic video segments taped throughout Los Angeles.

Though each of McCarthy's cohorts has a background in sketch comedy, for example with the Los Angeles troupe the Groundlings, most of the skits are scripted, not improvised. The cast is filming the entire 22-episode run back to back, for 16 hours a day, with shots of vitamin B-12 to keep McCarthy going and a fleet of writers employed to achieve an MTV-meets-SCTV sensibility.

Typically, McCarthy prefers to play characters that mock her image. "Helga, the German waitress with long armpit hair," she enthuses. "That's my favorite."