I was having a conversation with this guy while I was watching Real Housewives of Salt Lake City and he said he’d never seen it before.
That’s fine. There are a ton of things that I’ve never seen before because there’s just so much content out there. We find the things that speak to us.
He said he’d been at the circus when some NY Housewives were there and I jokingly said I want to be friends with one of them so I can become a big TV star.
He goes, “I would need more substance than they project on TV.”
My roommate loves anime. I do not. He watches a lot of anime. I do not. Does it speak to me as a genre? No, not really. Am I dismissive of it when someone else likes it? No, because that’s what they like. Can I find some entertainment value in it? Yeah, I can. There are a couple of his favorites that he’s had me watch and, while I wouldn’t sit down and choose to watch them alone, I enjoy them and I’m interested to see what happens next in the story.
My minor point here is, don’t yuck someone’s yum. If someone is telling you they like something, maybe you should err on the side of “Oh that’s not for me” as opposed to “That’s not worthy of my attention.”
And to piggyback: what are you watching exactly that’s so much better than the Real Housewives? Let me just give you a quick rundown of some of the current happenings across the franchises.
Orange County is Republican Trash, but let’s talk about it.
Those of us who live in liberal bubbles really can’t understand how the pandemic unfolded in Conservative areas, but there it is on Bravo. One of them is married to a Fox News reporter, says it’s just a flu, and refuses to wear a real mask while two of the cast members are laid up in the house with COVID and a husband is in the hospital. There’s a functioning alcoholic getting sober while coming to terms with her sexuality after 20 years of marriage and 7 kids; she’s now realizing she’s a lesbian. There’s a battered wife trying to decide whether to put her ex in jail because of what he did or let it go so their kids won’t miss their father. The new wife grew up in a religious cult where she was was beaten half to death and afraid she would be thrown under a bridge. You’re watching Meredith Grey die for the third time on ABC.
Salt Lake City is giving us a front seat to the usual dysfunction of rich ladies forced to interact with each other, but also a peek behind the Mormon curtain.
Quickly: name any other show on television giving you a crash course in Mormonism. The Church of Latter Day Saints is the fourth-largest Christian denomination in the country and I’ll bet the average person can’t tell you anything about it other than polygamy (no longer accurate) and Utah (it’s pretty much still a Mormon state). This cast has Mormons with lineage back to the founding of the church, a Jewish woman who converted to Mormonism, a Mormon woman converting to Islam, a Mormon woman who was kicked out of the church, and a Black Pentecostal prosperity preacher (a grifter for White Jesus). You’re watching an alcoholic Kaley Cuoco on HBO solve a murder mystery.
New York City is the only show on television where women over 50 (and Ramona is over 60) have the space to live full, sexual lives and not apologize for it.
Temptation Island has nothing on a night out with these women at Beautique. How do you even prevent hangovers after 30? I don’t know, but I’m trying to learn their ways. And they’re navigating real life as older women. What do you do as the poor (stay at home) ex-wife of a rich family when your husband runs off with your friend and you have to keep up a house and your kid in boarding school? How do you restart your life at 60 when you discover your husband in your home with another woman? And she’s gone from the show, but I have to remind everyone that the federal government did nothing for Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria for months — Bethenny Frankel was the only one down there helping the residents and handing out supplies. What are you watching that’s so much more compelling? A redhead with wideset eyes playing chess for 8 hours?
Potomac, aka The Sisterhood of the Travelling Vanessa Williamses, is fascinating television, with a full roster of heroes, villains, and every shade in between.
A stay-at-home mom using her newfound notoriety to launch a business after saving her husband from the brink of bankruptcy. High school sweethearts remarrying after infidelity and financial ruin. First generation Nigerian-Americans reaching the pinnacle of educational achievement and setting examples for their children and the community. A new mom wrestling with (and avoiding the seriousness of) her sugar daddy’s repeated sexual harassments of men. A former First Lady of the Church rekindling a relationship with the pastor who cheated on her, is still cheating on her, and who her children do not like. And two women with volatile personalities coming to blows over rumors of infidelity, paternity, and betrayal. You’re watching a show that packed more than that into a season? I would love to see it. If it’s not Veneno, it’s not better than Potomac, I promise you.
And Atlanta.
Listen. You can say what you want about Nene or the lack of Nene, but The Real Housewives of Atlanta will always be compelling television. Beautiful, successful, engaging, intelligent, BLACK women on my screen will always be compelling television. Also, other than the Love & Hip-Hop franchises, where else are Black women so open and casual about their bisexual experiences? Have we seen Black women go through the fertility struggle and surrogacy process? Have we seen Black women (from the South no less!) treading the thin line between respecting your toxic mother and respecting your husband? Have we been able to ignore the Black people who acted like selfish assholes during the pandemic, throwing (potentially) superspreader events because white people were the ones who went viral for it? When we see Black women dealing with an emotionally abusive husband and navigating that relationship for the sake of her child, doesn’t Tyler Perry always write in a man to save her? And Porsha Luther King Williams. Nobody else on television got arrested multiple times this summer putting their body on the line for Breonna Taylor and protesting against police brutality. The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel is not better than this just because Amy Sherman Palladino packs 20 pages worth of dialogue into 5 pages worth of script.
The Real Housewives isn’t a documentary. It isn’t reality TV the way The Real World was reality TV 30 years ago. It’s “reality” TV. It’s a heightened reality. It’s a stylized presentation of real life. It’s real life that has been manipulated for entertainment value. Would you normally throw a glass of wine at someone? Probably not — you’d walk away. Would you have the same argument with someone you don’t like for weeks? Probably not — you’d stop hanging out with them. It’s a manufactured experience engineered to capture authentic reactions to slightly manipulated real life situations because it makes for better TV. But Ashley’s husband gropes men. Ramona’s husband cheated on her. Shannon’s kids do have COVID. Braunwyn is a lesbian. Karen is starting a business. Whitney got kicked out of the church. Mary is married to her grandfather. And Porsha did get arrested.
What are you watching that’s so much better?
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