There is a strange connection between the Real Slot Machines of Desperation Canyon and Las Vegas. It’s like Sin City is their rollicking id, where they often go (and where some make their money) and where all sorts of crazy action happens. It’s not hookers and blow and gambling and strippers and magic shows like it is for everyone else, but there is some sort of sorcery at work when the ladies take the trip. They are all transformed into something else — fighting wildebeests scratching their hooves at the desert floor looking to unearth each other’s secrets. What is certain is that what happens in Vegas never stays in Vegas.
The ostensible reason for the trip to Vegas was so that Brandi could teach everyone how to be a stripper to empower them. This makes, um, total sense, I guess? I don’t know. If you want to learn how to pole dance, just learn how to pole dance. Do we really need the excuse that it is somehow going to solve all the problems in your life? I don’t think so. It’s probably not. But it is a fun reason to get drunk with all of your girlfriends.
Of course some of the ladies were better at it than others. St. Camille of Grammer, patron saint of cable television dance shows, didn’t know how to pole dance, but she knows how to move that lean, lithe body of hers. She hovered around that pole shaking like a wraith or an angel. Definitely an angel. We could see her halo, halo, halo-oooo, as Beyoncé would sing. Lisa Vanderpump said she didn’t want to pole dance, but, supporting her friend Brandi, she gamely climbed up there and turned it into a comedy routine. Isn’t that just a metaphor for Lisa Vanderpump’s life? Isn’t that just how she lives from day to day, taking the unpleasants and turning them into little laughs? I guess it’s easy when you sleep on a bed of diamonds at night. Yolanda Bananas Foster was deftly adroit, as a woman who mostly cages herself in her home adhering to a staunch workout routine would be. Kyle Richards, as always, made it all about her. She can’t dance or work the pole, but she laughed and cackled and yelled and put on a good performance just like her mother taught her in those stuffy audition rooms back when she was still in pig tails. OH! Kyle would have looked so good on that pole in pig tails. The worst, of course, was Fetch (aka Marisa Zanuck), who is never going to happen. She whined and complained about doing it because, yes, that is what makes good TV. God, Fetch is never going to happen. Are we really going to be burdened with her face, which looks like the inside of one of Yolanda’s lemons, for the rest of the season?
The one good thing that Fetch did last night was try to clean a red wine stain out of her dioley skirt using white wine, because it’s a trick she saw Barbra Streisand do at a party once. Really? She crazy! Does she think that Barbra’s talons have touched a single piece of laundry since she moved out of Brooklyn all those years ago? No! The worst part is, they didn’t even show us if it worked or not, because if it did I was totally going to steal it and tell people that I saw Barbra Streisand do it at a party once and then I would seem so cool and smart and awesome. Now I’m just going to pick on Fetch for doing it.
I guess we need to mention Adrienne, the Queen of the Maloofs (a race of mole people that live under the mountain). She has just been grasping for relevancy the past few weeks while she’s licked her wounds, and she didn’t want to interact with anyone because they all found out that she (allegedly, possibly, according to the Internet, which is never right about anything except when it is right about some things) gave birth to her children using a surrogate. Either that or she is DB Cooper. Her big secret is one of those two things. Adrienne needed something to do, and decided on designing a handbag line to go along with her ever-so-successful shoe line (which you can purchase at 65% off on the Internet). She had some people at the California Accessory Council and Teen Runaway Shelter mock up a logo for her. All the bags are going to have her name on them, but the logo is going to be all the letters of her name jumbled up like they have floated to the top of a bowl of alphabet soup and just congealed there. When you look at the purse you think it’s made by LERENNIOFOAMAD. That’s not very good branding.
And if that weren’t enough, then she had to take her husband, Paulo the Chimp, to get laser hair removal on his back. That is a really mean thing to do to a chimp. Do you know what a hairless chimp looks like? Macaulay Culkin, that’s what. No one wants that. But know who I do want? Jjennifferr Holliddayy, the technician who was brandishing the laser that would singe off all of Paulo’s estimable back hair. First of all there are far too many consonants in her name. Wheel of Fortune never wants her to be famous because she would cost them too much money if she was the answer to a puzzle. Also, I believe that she was a Bulgarian pop singer that, after too much inexpensive plastic surgery in Georgia (the country, not the home of Lenethia Leakes) she was deported to America to live a life of shame. At least she got her aesthetician’s degree and is now serving the world by ridding chimps of their fur. That is very noble of her.
Now I guess it’s time we get to last night’s main event. I guess it’s appropriate that all the biggest fights in the boxing world happen in Vegas because, well, this was a humdinger. You knew it was going to be bad when Yolanda Bananas Foster, an agorophobic who claims to not like drunk women, was drinking tequila and Fetch, who had already poured red and white wine all over her skirt at Barbra Streisand’s insistence, was essentially absent from dinner. Oh, and Brandi had on this hot silver dress that was just short enough to be sexy but not so short that we could see her halo, halo, halo-ooooo and it was just sparkly and totally wonderful. I have a theory that whenever Brandi looks the best is when she gets in the worst fights. Watch for it to happen.
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OK, here is how it went down: everyone was talking about Kim Richards, and how they know that her nose is a new nose from some guy they know she knows knows noses. Then, suddenly, St. Camille turned the discussion to Adrienne which, well, that was a stupid move. As my friends would say, “Why you gotta bring up old shit?” How do we accurately describe this fight? Camille was angry, I don’t know about what initially. But she wanted to talk about Adrienne. So she did. Then Brandi, for the millionth time, detailed that she was uncomfortable when Adrienne approached her and said she was going after Lisa at the reunion and was trying to recruit her. Apparently Camille was somehow involved in this too, and Brandi told everyone that Camille knew about the sabotage plot. Camille got all pissed off that Brandi was telling everyone, especially Lisa, that she know about the plot and didn’t do anything. She got up from the table and said, “I can handle this, but I won’t stand for it!” What a statement. That’s amazing. She was basically saying, “I could take you down if you want to, but this is too tawdry for me to sit and listen to.”
Instead of talking about what happened and who said what, we should talk about the winners and losers, maybe? Who was right and who was wrong? I think that’s easier. OK, so Brandi, I think, came out a loser. Yes, I am #TeamBrandi all the way, and I think that Adrienne is the worst kind of rich person for using her money and lawyers to intimidate Brandi by “suing her.”
Oh wait, what’s this? I just got hand delivered a message. “Dear Mr. Moylan. It has just come to my attention that you are besmirching the name of my client, HRH Adrienne, the Queen of the Maloofs (a race of mole people that live under the mountain), in a public sphere. If you do not cease and desist not only your discussion of her, her family, her friends, her associates, and anyone that might ever come in contact with her in this world or any other in your public position, then there will be a lawsuit. Also, you should probably just shut down this here recap right now, because it will be admissable in a court of law and a judge will hate it. Sincerely, Dirk Jacobini, Attorney at Law.”
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Screw that. I’m going to talk as much trash about Adrienne as I want. She’s wrong to pursue this nonsense with Brandi when Brandi was speaking the truth. But what makes Brandi a loser is she went on the “Adrienne only owns 2% of the Palms” kick. Yeah. So what, Brandi? Not to be a jerk, but you own 100% of Jack Squat Industries. Adrienne’s stake in a billion-dollar business is still $10 million. How much did you get for your book deal?
The other loser was Camille Grammer, who then went after Lisa with her, “You don’t own SUR,” line which, I think we can all agree is patently false. Lisa only owns 51% of that Sexy Unique Restaurant, but come on, that’s basically owning it. Camille was trying to make a point. I get it, but she failed. I think that Kyle and Camille were right to say that Adrienne wasn’t there and she couldn’t defend herself and that’s why they were sticking up for her. That’s cool, I get that, but Kyle is not helping her reputation as a shit stirrer. She’s always trying to be the peace keeper and make sure everyone is getting along, but as soon as the gloves come on, she’s there in the corner fighting an argument.
I would like to say Yolanda Bananas Foster was a loser, for shushing our St. Camille (which is something you should never do), but she had a point. This was the third time this fight had gone round and round, and the third dinner that it had ruined, and we’re all just getting a little bit sick of it, aren’t we? Don’t we want there to be some kind of resolution or movement? Oh, and Yolanda got to go home early in a private jet while everyone else had to sit around and stew in their own juices (Housewife juices smell like white wine and broken endorsement deals). See ya later, suckers! However, I think that Yolanda loses existentially, because she has no idea what show she is on. This is a battle royale where women get drink and yell at dinner. That’s sort of like planning a trip to the beach and then complaining that there is too much sand. If you don’t want the sand, get off the damn beach.
Lisa Vanderpump was also a winner here, because this whole fight started about her but somehow migrated around the table and encompassed everyone but her. The one kernel of truth that Camille placed out there — the thing that started this whole row — was that Adrienne started going after Lisa because of two things: 1. Adrienne was mad that Lisa’s daughter Pandora had her Vegas bachelorette party at a hotel other than the Palms and 2. Adrienne was mad that Lisa called her shoe “The Maloof Hoof.” OK, those are the two dumbest reasons ever. The first one, I have said before, will go down in history as the dumbest gripe on any Housewives show ever. Who cares where Pandora went? It was her decision, not her mother’s. People don’t blame my mother for my public urination arrest, so no one should blame Pandy’s mom for her bachelorette party.
The second reason was the real problem. No one in this universe (and by that I mean the Real Housewives universe, which is strange and separate from our own) has a sense of humor. Well, most of them don’t. Brandi does and Lisa sure does and when they say something like that, it is a joke. Adrienne can not take a joke. That is what this whole season is essentially about: one grown woman who can’t take another woman’s clever pun about her shoe. The reason they aren’t selling has nothing to do with what Lisa called them on the show. They’re not selling because they’re bland and ugly and overpriced (even 65% off is too much). In fact, calling them the “Maloof Hoof” was the best bit of branding anyone did for Adrienne. She should pay Lisa for that.
The fight petered out and just ended for some reason. I’m not sure why. Maybe Yolanda squashed it with her lemon-scented lips. The real take-away from the end of the episode was that we saw Kyle and Lisa face off, telling their sides of the story. This was the real fight. This was the real angle that the show is taking, these two Titans trying to steal the world from each other. That is what this season wants us to take away from it. If their relationship ruptures, well, it will be an awful horrible split. A rift that will engulf Jill and Bethenny, Kim and Nene, Tamra and Vicki and all the rest. Like an explosion.
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Finally, we have to talk about Kim. Oh yes, my favorite Kim Richards got a new nose installed last night. I’m not going to get into all that drama with her addiction and taking pain pills, because that was just a red herring. She told us she was going to try to not take any pain pills (well, at least anything stronger than an Advil), and I have to believe her. I’m not a family member who has been screwed over repeatedly by her lying and drug abuse so it’s easy for me, but, there it is. I’m trusting her. As for her call with Kyle, it was extremely fraught.
Kim called Kyle while she was in Las Vegas and said, “I’m thinking of getting a nose job today.” What? OK, Kim. You do not need your sister’s permission, but you also didn’t need to call her up on the day you were doing it and ask for it. Here’s the thing. Kim thought that she needed Kyle’s permission — that’s why she called and asked, and didn’t just call and tell her. I think Kyle has made Kim think that Kim needs her permission for everything, and now Kim is getting over that. When Kyle talks about how this is the “state of our relationship” it means that Kim is growing up, growing away from Kyle, and becoming her own, unique, strong person.
But Kim needed a nose job like Yolanda needs another lemon tree. She even said it herself, that God made her and she’s perfect but he wouldn’t mind her changing her nose so much because when he made her it was the end of the day and he wasn’t really paying attention and used some spare parts anyway. But Kim needed something. She knew she needed someone who knows why she knows someone that knows noses. She knew that she needed to make herself better inside and out. She needed some physical manifestation of her inner transformation. Get on it, girl. And when the doctor was digging around in there he found that her septum was deviated, which probably means that she could now get her health insurance to cover the cost. You go Kim.
But the sad part came when she was lying in the hospital, coming out of the aenesthesia. The show’s producers love these moments, because the women always say ridiculous things and can’t help but tell the truth. Kim said some remarkable things. She lied there in her hospital gown and mumbled that she wished her sister were there. She mumbled that she wished that one of her four children were there. But there was no one. She was all alone, fighting through the fog on her own. So many people have come and gone, the husbands, the lovers, the family, that rock she painted a face on and named Ken and called her boyfriend. They’ve all gone, sniffed out like the moon falling behind a dark, dank cloud.
Suddenly, in that way only medication can do, she isn’t in the world anymore. She is both awake and asleep and she’s in her trailer on the Disney lot and it’s the last day of a movie shoot. She’s young again, and beautiful. Her hair is teased high and she’s wearing bright makeup because it was the ’80s and that was the style. She looks down at her vanity and sees the crimping iron and then she looks up at the mirror and sees her old nose and all the people standing behind her. The crew mostly, but fans all. And staff. They’re clamoring for her. “Sign this for me please, Kim?” “It was so great working with you!” “What is our next project going to be?” “You better hurry up or you’re going to be late for your first date with this hot new actor, I think his name is Jimmy Depp.” “Oh, Kim this has been the best two months of my life.”
She thanks them all and signs them and waives. She waves and makes her way through the scrum and out the door into the sun which is so bright it’s like an operating lamp blaring down at her eyes. Even when she closes them, she can still see the indistinct brightness shining down into her face, over the clean, expansive lines of the sound studio. “Kim! Kim! Kim!” all the onlookers shout at her. “Kim! Kim!” She turns around and waves at them, but the sun is still in her eyes. She can’t see them anymore, but she can hear the voices, hear them getting fainter and fainter as they recede. “Bye everyone,” she says. “Don’t forget. I love you. Will you love me too? Love me forever and I’ll remember. Don’t forget. Don’t forget. Don’t forget,” she says to all the disembodied dream people. “Don’t forget me,” she says out loud.
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