The villainous Cynthia Melville
Cynthia Melville (Wynonna Judd) is the main villainess from "Wife Swap," episodes 2.19 and 2.20 of Hope & Faith (airdate February 18, 2005). She is a spoiled and rich wife and mother from Manhattan; married to Aaron Melville and the mother of four children--teenage daughter Madison, twin boys Bradley and Brent, and another daughter, Briana.
The two-part episode had the Melvills and Shanowskis participating in the reality series, Wife Swap, which was Faith Fairfield's latest plan to get back into the limelight. After Cynthia and Hope Shanowski swap families, the former's callous demeanor was revealed in full form, as among other things, Cynthia regularly bullied her sister, Kathy, into doing all of the housework and child care. In a twist, Kathy revealed that she, not Cynthia, gave birth to Briana, with Cynthia promising Kathy a car as payment--only to give her a bike due to the fact that she gave birth to a girl. Cynthia's villainous nature was shown in Part 1, as she verbally targeted Faith (Hope's sister) and repeated made passes at Hope's husband, Charley.
Hope was surprised and astonished when Madison asked her to take her to an OB-GYN to obtain a diaphragm after she lost her old one--as Madison was only 16. As revealed in Part 2, Madison only had a diaphragm out of peer pressure, stating that Cynthia would tease her if she found out that Madison was actually a virgin. Meanwhile, Cynthia continued her bullying of Faith and her various attempts to seduce Charley. In her latest video interview, Cynthia claimed that the flirtation was a joke and wanted to be back with her family, but this was only due to being turned down various times by Charley. When the families met in the end of the swap period, the evil Cynthia lashed out at Hope over the impact she had on Kathy (who stood up for herself and decided to pursue a singing career) and Aaron (who felt regretful over being a workaholic and quit his job), and attempted to attack Hope, only for the scuffle to be broken up.
The epilogue showed that Cynthia retained her bullying nature, as she mocked Madison for being a virgin. She was later encountered by Kathy, who decided that she was going country and sang a sample of her latest country song, prompting Cynthia to show her how to properly sing country. In response, Kathy stated to Cynthia that singing "wasn't for her" (a veiled inside joke due to Wynonna being a famed country singer), leaving Cynthia stunned at her sister's remark.
