‘Joan & Melissa’ return to action

“Joan & Melissa: Joan Knows Best?”

10 p.m. today, WEtv.

NEW YORK — Joan Rivers, who for more than a half-century has turned her life inside out for comedy, is starting her fourth season doing just that for the reality show she shares with her daughter, Melissa.

“Joan & Melissa: Joan Knows Best?” (10 tonight on WEtv) finds Joan making a sex tape. Attending a lacrosse game where Melissa picks a fight with her teenage son’s coach. Consoling Melissa after her boyfriend is caught in a compromising position.

She also mourns the death of her beloved dog, Max, then stages a splendiferous funeral that includes a chorus, an avant-garde poet and a male ballerina in a tutu.

“The vet said Max could have been anywhere from 11 to 14 years old,” says Joan solemnly, then eases into a wisecrack: “You can usually check a dog’s teeth, but Max lived for a while in California, so they were capped.”

She and Melissa have invited a reporter to hear about their show’s new season, which tracks this mother-daughter duo in their professional pursuits (including production of their weekly E! series, “Fashion Police,” and her online talk show, “In Bed With Joan”) as well as shining a glaring light into their personal lives.

“It’s no-holds-barred,” says Joan proudly.

Item: On one episode, Rivers, at 80 years old, goes to heroic lengths to undo her history as a fashionista and a frequent flier to her plastic surgeon’s office. She wants to look more age-appropriate to land an acting role as a senior on a proposed TV drama series, and prepares herself, stripped of any vanity, with what she calls — no, not a makeover — but instead “a make-UNDER.”

For this recent interview, though, she is every bit the Joan the world knows and loves: nipped, tucked and coiffed to a T.

You ask who is she wearing? A shocking pink Armani jacket, Chanel slacks, Manolos, a necklace from her own Joan Rivers collection “and a Hermes knockoff that I got in China. Come as close as you want, mister,” she boasts as she holds up the baby-soft handbag, “you’re not gonna tell the difference!”

“Joan & Melissa” came about when Joan, who lives on the Upper East Side, began routinely crashing with her daughter, an Angeleno, to tape the L.A.-based “Fashion Police.”