Pauly D says he enjoyed seeing the mini-me's running around with them in the Florida Keys.
Forget T-shirt time. It's baby time on Jersey Shore: Family Vacation!
Jenni 'JWoww' Farley, Nicole "Snooki" Polizzi, Pauly D, Mike "The Situation" Sorrentino and Deena Cortese spoke with ET's Rachel Smith ahead of the season 5 premiere Thursday night at 8 p.m. on MTV, and they all gushed about having their kiddos appear with them while filming in the Florida Keys.
Snooki brought her 7-year-old daughter, Giovanna "Sissy," JWoww her 7-year-old daughter, Meilani, Deena her 3-year-old son, CJ, and Mike introduced his newborn, Romeo, "to the aunts and uncles and their cousins." Pauly D doesn't have any kids, but he enjoyed seeing all the mini-me's running around living their best lives.
"The personality is the same too," the DJ tells ET. "It's like, that is a mini Jenni. That is a mini Nicole. When I see them together, playing on vacation, I'm like, this is amazing. And that's why I think that this season's really special, because the amount they get to share and you get to see. I love seeing them as moms, so you get to see that."
Snooki's back this season, and bringing Sissy with her helped with the transition from real life to reality TV.
"This time I brought Sissy, so I was really happy to actually bring a child so I'm not, like, homesick," she says. "I'm actually content going to sleep, hugging a baby. So, to see Meilani, they were living their best lives, drinking [virgin] margaritas, chilling by the pool, laying on the beach."
JWoww says the cast having children has had a major impact on the show as far as how and when the show is filmed. She tells ET she appreciated the fact that production was great about working around the kids' vacation from school, which facilitated their appearances.
Jersey Shore premiered in 2009, and it instantly became a pop culture phenomenon. The show spawned several spinoffs, including Snooki & JWoww, The Pauly D Project and Double Shot at Love. So, it's no surprise that, after sharing their lives on television for over a decade now, some cast members feel more than comfortable seeing their kids grow up on the show.
"I wouldn't mind if they all had their own show one day," The Situation admits, to which Deena agrees. "Yeah, back-in-the-day type Jersey Shore. I would chaperone," she quips. "As they get older, I'll just show him some things not to do like I did back in the day."
Like, drinking. When asked if they can still party hard like they used to, JWoww's quick to answer.
"No," she says, before Pauly D interjects, "The hangovers are longer."
Snooki reveals the gang goes hard one night this season, "though we were hungover for two days." That being said, JWoww admits that, ironically, she drinks now more as a mom, but with one caveat. "I just pace myself," she says.
But no doubt this season is slated to present plenty of adorable moments. The Situation, who had to quarantine for his son's first Christmas after contracting COVID-19, said he enjoyed the closeness they experienced after the parents introduced the babies to the cast.
"Such an amazing moment when we were able to document that," he says. "Everyone got to meet. It was very special. We took tons of photos and we were able to document it for MTV. It was pretty cool."
Deena couldn't have agreed more.
"It's amazing 'cause Romeo and Cameron [her second child] are only three weeks apart," she says. "So seeing them interact was like the cutest frickin' thing I've ever seen. They were like trying to give each other kisses. I'm like, 'Oh my god. I can't.'"
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