When Jennifer Schuur Herbert passes a rack of tabloid magazines in her Los Angeles neighborhood, she is often reminded of what can happen in even the most glamorous Hollywood marriages.

“He Cheated With Their Nanny!” trumpets the Nov. 23 cover of Us Weekly, with a glamour shot of Gwen Stefani and the promise of details of how her former husband, Gavin Rossdale, the lead singer for the band Bush, had a three-year fling with Melinda Mann, the babysitter for their three sons.

This cover comes just three months after the magazine printed photos of Ben Affleck and Jennifer Garner, looking dour, with one of Christine Ouzounian, the winsome 28-year-old who had cared for their three children, along with the ominous phrase: “He’s Dating the Nanny!”

At least since Rebecca De Mornay starred in “The Hand That Rocks the Cradle,” the nanny — once a no-nonsense figure in starched petticoats, à la Mary Poppins — has been regarded in the popular imagination as a potential home wrecker.