By Sheer Elegance, GTOG Special Guest Slacker Blogger
So admittedly, I have not yet watched the full episode. I tried. I really did, to watch it in real time on Thursday night. (Ed. Note: It is now Monday). And it was so brutal that I turned off the television set and went to sleep instead, promising myself I’d get to it the next day, and then the next, and then the next. And still, by Monday afternoon I still have only seen the first 20 minutes of the show. So I apologize to the two of you still reading this, and I promise next week to get my housewife mojo back. But in the meantime, I will ask you this: how funny is it that they always shoot the exterior of Sonja’s townhouse to show that its connected to a public parking garage? Kinda mean but kinda funny. Also, the new assertive Alex is cool but a leeeetle strident, and quite possibly drinking to excess. And Sonja has jumped the shark.
More soon. In the meantime, please enjoy this Gawker recap. It will keep you in the know until I can get my stuff together.
Forgive me.
Real Housewives of New York: Run Amok Brides
Brian Moylan — Oh, the various assaults, crimes, and misdemeanors perpetrated by this cast of jokers running roughshod over Gotham City. The Real Housewives of New York were more worked up more than a bunch of whores during a penicillin shortage, and it was all in the name of matrimony.
Hello, everyone, I am Dame Brian Moylan, Executive Director of the Real Housewives Institute, I am here to discuss the mating rituals of our favorite subspecies of reality star, the Real Housewives. I know you were expecting Sir Richard the Lawson-hearted, but he was detained due to a prior engagement (slaying the singing dragons of American Idol) so he may ask me to help out with his study of the Housewives now and again this season.
Now, we have some very important events to discuss, namely a wedding. Well, it wasn’t a wedding really, but the Real Housewives sure were treating it like one. There is nothing a Real Housewife loves more than a wedding. Nothing! They will say yes to that dress, they will be shedding for the wedding, but they don’t know whose wedding is it anyway. Whether it’s their first wedding, a friend’s wedding, or that favorite creation of the Real Housewives, the vow renewal ceremony (which is as much of a wedding as a Tofu Chik Patty is a piece of fried chicken), the Housewives love a wedding. It’s because it combines their two favorite things: the validation of basking in someone else’s adoration and being the center of attention. Naturally they were all very jazzed for this Marriage Equality March where a bunch of homosexuals trotted across the Brooklyn bridge to convince all the mean men in the legislature to let them get married just like everyone else.
We heard about this magical march across the rainbow bridge last week when Alex McCord, the shining Athena of the Gay Civil Rights Movement, was telling everyone to wear their wedding dresses to the event and castigating Jill Zarin for being on the host committee of the march but then planning on ditching it to whoop it up with the breeders in the Hamptons instead.
On the morning of the March, Sonja Tremont Morgan, a beautiful sylph who was once the muse and model for John Singer Sargent back in her salad days of the 1860s, was seated in her Manhattan townhouse surrounded by white dresses. This is how she—one day when the invincibility potion she bought from Lisle von Roman wears off—hopes to die. Kelly Killoren Bensimon and Countess Crackerjacks arrive wearing street clothes and Alex McCord, the second coming of Harvey Milk, arrives in her wedding dress. They’re all going to wear wedding dresses to the march because, well, a Housewife loves a motherfucking wedding. But what to do? Kelly doesn’t have her wedding dress because it’s in a museum. In fact, it is hanging right here in the Real Housewives Institute, next to the chuppah from Jill Zarin’s first marriage and the death shroud of Jo De La Rosa’s recording career.
Countess Crackerjacks didn’t have a wedding dress either. She took a big drag off her Pall Mall and said, “Listen, girls, I don’t know what to tell you. Back in ’73, when I finally decided to ditch the game and get hitched I didn’t have a big fancy shindig like the rest of y’all. No, I eloped. I was wearing a pair of jeans, a ratty Harley Davidson T-shirt Count Crackerjacks stole from some trucker at a rest stop somewhere on the 101 outside of Scottdale, and the most darling giant turquoise necklace you ever did see. So I don’t have a dress, sorry. But I still have that T-shirt. Sometimes, when I’m sad at night and I’ve given Bronson Pinchot the night off from attending to my love needs, I take it out and make it into a little pillow. You can still smell the sweat and fumes on the thing, even now. Even now.”
That’s not even one of Sir Richard’s Countess Crackerjacks stories (I wouldn’t dare attempt such blasphemy as to write one myself), that is pretty much a direct quote from the show, with embellishments. Naturally, Sonja had like 174 wedding dresses just lying around from all her times modeling in them for Jack—which is what all of Sargent’s friends called him—so she just let everyone borrow them. God, Sonja really did think she was getting married, she kept going on and on and on about how it was “her day” just like a bride. There is nothing more obnoxious than this modern sentiment that the bride gets to ignore all social niceties and order everyone around on her wedding day. “It’s my day I get whatever I want. It’s my day you better wear this ugly dress cause I said so. It’s my day so if you don’t put those hot pokers in your eyes I’m going to sit here and pout and cry and you’ll ruin my day!”
Alex, channeling Larry Kramer’s ghost, reminded everyone that the day was about Marriage Equality. Then Sonja informed her that she was named the Grand Marshall of the parade and she would be speaking to kick off the march. That basically meant she was marrying the parade, so it was her day. It was all about Sonja.
All the ladies rolled up to the march and who is there but recalcitrant board member Jill Zarin. Standing next to her was a big burly man in one of those reflective vests that people working on the street at night wear. Across his chest in white letters it said “Damage Control.” He was clearly there with Jill. As Alex McCord was walking through the crowd, she also stumbled up someone else familiar. “Simon?” she asked. “What are you doing here?”
There he was, her dutiful husband Simon, standing there with his arms around two of the gayest homosexuals New York has ever produced and wearing a rainbow sequined bolero jacket of some sort that he bought for $200 one night while cavorting on magic mushrooms at the Ice Palace on Fire Island. “Oh, Alex, I didn’t expect to see you here. I just came here for support. Yes, that’s it,” he said taking his hands off the shoulders of his companions. “I want to show all the gay people that I’m one of—I mean that I give them my full support. These are my friends Dustin and Jayden.”
“Girl, what is wrong with your hair?” Dustin said.
“And why are you wearing a wedding dress?” Jayden asked.
“Ain’t no one wants to marry her tired ass!”
“Okrrrr. We need all the gay marriage help we can get, but sister, that ensemble isn’t helping anyone.”
(SNAPS!)
Alex stomped off to the podium where Sonja was waiting to make her speech and Simon came with her, turning back quickly to give Dustin and Jayden a “sorry, I have to go make nice with my wife” shrug of his shoulders. When they got the podium, Simon was really moved to make a speech, but they said he couldn’t. Why? Because Sonja Morgan was marrying the parade, and she wanted to be the only one to speak so unless Simon got permission from the bride, he wouldn’t be able to speak now and he would forever have to hold his peace.
In Alex and Simon’s defense, I have seen them at countless fundraisers and events for homosexual and HIV-related causes over the years. The only time I’ve ever seen Sonja was at this march when the cameras were on, but still, she wanted to make her big wedding speech in front of everyone and wouldn’t let Simon. They got into a big fight right up there on the podium in front of everyone. Sonja kept saying, “It’s my day, it’s about me, don’t talk to me, I have to speak, now is not the time.” Well, when is the time? If they don’t get her permission to speak now, then the march will be over and they aren’t going to have another special march just so Simon can give his little speech. And what does she care if someone else speaks? Like Alex rightfully said, the day wasn’t about any of them, it was about a cause.
Anyway, it was time for Sonja to speak and she got up to the podium and started discussing love or something like that. As soon as she opened her mouth, moisture started falling form the sky, and umbrella after umbrella opened in the crowd in succession, like a row of Busby Berkley chorus girls spinning and unfurling parasols. But the moisture wasn’t rain, it was tears. It was crying tears of all the dead homosexuals who were never allowed to get married, crying at Sonja Morgan. Selfish bride Sonja Morgan, taunting them wither her wedding dress.
So they all march across the bridge and Gay Marriage was solved! Congrats! They celebrated with a reception for Mr. & Mrs. Gay Equality March at Alex and Simon’s house. Alex gets everyone’s attention and finally lets Simon give the speech he wanted to give all day. “Well,” Simon stammers, “I just wanted to say that when I moved to America I really wanted to marry someone named Alex and I met this really nice man named Alex but since you can’t marry a man and get a green card, I had to marry a woman named Alex. My life has been very different ever since.” Then he started to cry.
After the Marriage Equality March, Ramona bought a table at a party for Mr. Gucci, the king of the handbags. There some back burner plots simmered, simmered, simmered. There’s going to be some big blowout between Ramona and Kelly, and there’s also something strange going on with Ramona and new girl Cindy about some dead man’s cigars. Isn’t that the next Johnny Depp as a pirate movie? Pirates of the Caribbean 17: Dead Man’s Cigars. Actually, Cindy kind of looks like a dead man’s cigar. Did her brother smoke her? Anyway, simmering, simmering.
But last night the main course was the fight between Alex and Sonja. Sonja had an art party for her hunky boyfriend Brian. An art party! What kind of awful human being throws such a thing? Anyway, apparently Artist Brian doesn’t have a gallery. He has some paintings in a coffee shop in Brooklyn and in his girlfriend’s house. Screw Larry Gagosian, he has got it made! Sonja invited Alex to the art party, and a fight broke out.
Now, everyone, if you will please watch the video that accompanies this exhibit, we are going to discuss this argument in depth. Alright, you will clearly see that Sonja approaches Alex and as soon as they finish air kissing, she brings up their tiff at the march. Sonja’s all “It was nothing. Water off a duck’s back.” Well, then why are you bringing it up, Sonja? Then she goes with the insulting, “Simon, is that your husband’s name? Simon?” Ugh, that was just awful. And then she says, “What I didn’t appreciate was him all up in my grill. It was horrible.”
Alex comes back with, “What was horrible was how you made the day about you and not gay people.” Point number one for Alex McCord. Then, she tries to calmly and rationally explain her position to Sonja who then says, “Let me cut you off, because you’re annoying me.” Then, when Alex tries to defend herself, Sonja gives her the, “Let me finish!” and gets all huffy. OK, Sonja, you cut people off but then get pissy when they cut you off? Then, miraculously, she just decides, “This is not the time.” Well, Sonja, if it wasn’t the time, why did you bring it up and start the fight in the first place! Alex was trying to have a calm discussion and your rudeness turned it into a screaming match. Then, when Alex pipes up so that she can be heard, Sonja just keeps talking and talking and talking over her, calling Alex rude and accusing her of not shutting up. It appears that Sonja, herself, was the one breaking all of her own rules. What does that say about her? She hates Alex because she hates herself? She’s a pompous jerk? Who knows, but it wasn’t quite right.
I’m a big Alex McCord fan, but I’m not sure how I like this new aggressive Alex McCord. She’s able to get loud, but her argument wasn’t the best. “Check the website, check the website, check the website,” she kept saying. Oh, Alex, we all know that the internet is only made for two things: porn and lies. “Checking a website” is not the best defense. But she didn’t let Sonja run over her and didn’t do the old Alex thing and just apologize when she knew she did nothing wrong. No, she left that party with her head held high knowing that she had won—something. A shred of dignity, the fight for gay rights, another season wearing studded dresses to basement art parties at rich people’s houses. Something, she won something.
But Sonja had everything to lose. She used to be our favorite, this Sonja. She didn’t let anything get to her. She just wanted a glass of chardonnay, a good laugh, and perhaps a hot guy to slam her into next Tuesday every now and again. She was the fun one who didn’t get involved in the drama. That Sonja used to be so above it all just by laughing it all off. But now she’s one of them, the screeching grub women of New York, down there mud wrestling in the mire with all the other invertebrates, getting herself all dirty and exposing her jelly insides for the world. Yes, Sonja, you lost.
Then it was time for the big reveal at the art party. Ageless old Sonja had posed for yet another portrait, this one by her boyfriend Brian. She recalled all those regal oil paintings of her that hung in the Met and the Tate and all those other museums with shortened names. She was sure this was going to be just like that, a muse for another age. When Brian peeled the the drapery away from the painting, Sonja’s eyes had that glint from long ago, but it went out quickly and with a small hiss, like wet fingers closing around a candle wick. Everyone’s face dropped when they saw the misshaped woman’s figure in a Crayola world. She looked like she was inhabiting a scene from What Dreams May Come, that awful movie where Robin Williams goes to heaven. Just like that movie, no one wanted to see this either. There she was, at the center of a schizophrenic rainbow sitting in a big puddle of white. It’s like she wet herself and washed away all the color, all the goodness, and all that remained was a bleached wasteland. That’s when it started again, the dampness, the tears, coming down not from heaven but Sonja’s eyes. And now there wasn’t an umbrella in sight to save her.
