Jon Taffer Transforms Couples in 3 Ball’s Marriage Rescue

Ross Weintraub, 3 Ball Entertainment CEO and Marriage Rescue executive producer, talks to TV Real about the Bar Rescue spin-off.

Jon Taffer has swanned into more than 150 struggling watering holes, whipping them into shipshape with his brutal honesty and exacting demands over the course of Bar Rescue’s six-season run. This summer, Taffer has turned his sights—and uncanny ability to right messes of peoples’ own making—away from sticky bar floors and toward failing marriages in the 3 Ball Entertainment franchise-making spin-off Marriage Rescue.

Over the years, Bar Rescue has appealed to audiences not solely for the curious fly-on-the-wall attraction of seeing Taffer’s blustery approach that’s equal parts abrasive and compassionate, but also for the rooting interest the show provides viewers as they see the down-on-their-luck bar owners get another shot at running a viable business.

Bar Rescue is “a series about second chances,” says  Weintraub. “We’re rooting for them to turn things around and overcome whatever adversity they’re facing. So, at the core of each episode is an underdog story with real heart behind it. And there’s a lot at stake.”

In Marriage Rescue, with married couples giving a last-ditch effort to find a reason to stay together, there’s even more at stake for audiences to invest in. Yet despite the winning formulas at the center of both Bar and Marriage, without Taffer and the power of his personality to stage rousing rescues, a crucial element would no doubt be missing.

“He’s direct, brutally honest and has no patience for excuses,” says Weintraub. “It’s satisfying for viewers to see someone be so unapologetic when identifying problems and calling people out on their BS—doing whatever’s necessary to get the job done. At the end of the day, he really cares about these people and wants them to succeed.”

And, as Weintraub sees it, mending fractured relationships requires a similar skillset to getting bars back on their feet and fits perfectly into Taffer’s wheelhouse, with almost half of the establishments he’s saved on Bar Rescue involving some sort of partnership. Alongside witnessing the physical renovation of a bar that emerges from Taffer’s unorthodox boot camp poised and positioned to turn a profit, viewers have seen the changes in the bar owners themselves, who hopefully walk away with a new mindset and better partnerships to take their business into the future.

It’s this latter aspect of the show that provides a pivot point for Taffer’s most recent gig as a marriage counselor transforming troubled unions into ones set up for newfound wedded bliss. While the bars are gone in Marriage Rescue, very much still present is Taffer’s signature approach to solving a crisis. “Jon doesn’t claim to be a couples’ therapist, and we address early in the show that this series is for people who have tried traditional therapy and haven’t found success,” says Weintraub.

Each episode of Marriage Rescue sees Taffer counsel two separate couples on the issues that have driven a wedge into their relationship and threaten to split them up for good. In order to find the right couples for Marriage Rescue that would engage audiences and stand a true chance at a meaningful and affecting transformation, 3 Ball Entertainment took its vetting seriously.

“We’re looking for people who have genuine problems, but also genuinely want to overcome them and continue their lives together,” says Weintraub. “It’s a major red flag if a couple doesn’t seem to have any interest in resolving their issues. Indifference isn’t entertaining, and it offers Taffer nothing to work with. When looking at a bar (and its owner), the major problems are usually fairly easy to identify. However, when speaking to couples about their relationships, the real issues aren’t so black and white. Sometimes couples don’t want to share the full story, and other times, they think they know what their problems are when in reality, it’s something else entirely.”

Ramping up the intensity of the process—and giving Taffer a bit more oversight of the couples he’s aiming to reboot—the marital boot camp takes place in the Caribbean, far away from the distractions of the pairs’ everyday lives. This provides Taffer “a level of control over the process that he wouldn’t have if we simply visited each couple’s home,” says Weintraub. “He’s able to shape their entire week without certain ‘daily life’ distractions derailing his work.”

During the week, the couples are set specially tailored tasks that are designed by Taffer and Marriage Rescue’s production team to root out the problems within their marriage. As part of their counseling, each couple goes through a “Relationship Stress Test” that’s taken at the outset of the trip and a “Relationship Improvement Test” that occurs later on in the process.

“Both sets of challenges force the couples to step outside of their comfort zones, by placing them in extreme scenarios in which they must work together and support one another,” explains Weintraub. While the first serves as a diagnostic, the second is a progress report that helps the couples—and Taffer—continue on the way to harmony. After all, they are operating on a tight timeline. “Jon has a week to invoke change in a couple that’s been married for years and already set in their ways. It’s no easy feat.”

With the addition of Marriage, Rescue is now a bona fide Taffer-led franchise. If Taffer’s turn as a marriage counselor proves even marginally as successful as his stint as a bar savior, it’s not out of the question that the newly established franchise could expand. What else could Taffer try his hand in rescuing? “Really anything and everything,” says Weintraub. “Jon will get results in whatever scenario you put him in. You have a problem with your child not eating? Bring Jon over for dinner, and by the end of the meal, your kids will be eating their greens.” So, Picky Eater Rescue next?

Weintraub added that should an exciting and appropriate prospect emerge, 3 Ball Entertainment would be more than willing to explore the possibility because it would get at what the company does best: telling stories of transformation. “One of the hallmarks of our company has been ‘transformation,’” Weintraub says. “That core element can take on a different form for different projects, and of course, it’s front and center in Bar and Marriage Rescue.”