The theme of Thursday night’s episode of the Real Housewives of New York City seemed to be “Woe Is Me” by Jill Zarin. Not since Vicki Gunvalson of the OC Housewives have I seen someone play the victim role so effortlessly. The more I think about it, the more I see the similarities between Jill and Vicki. They both make everything about them, and they are always the victims.
We start out this episode with the charity event planned by Countess LuAnn. The point of the oxy-moronic event is to donate coutoure dresses to the homeless (scratching head on this one). Jill’s underdog feels the need to scold Alex, and try to guilt her into apologizing to her new BFF Jill. LuAnn makes an interesting comment saying Alex shouldn’t take sides. Interesting because it seems rather obvious LuAnn has picked a side. And then Jill arrives, and the underdog informs her she has told Alex she “has to fix” things with her or else!
Jill makes a point to not talk to Alex, after all, she did vow last week to forget but never forgive! Jill’s husband, Bobby, attempting to talk to Alex was sort of sweet, but unfortunately he didn’t know the whole story. It’s however understandable for a husband to want to smooth thiings over for his wife. As I was watching this episode, it dawned on me that the issue with Jill wasn’t so much Alex’s delivery but the actual message. It finally dawned on her now that Bethenny’s DONE with her, so she decided to kill the messenger – Alex. Yes Alex was wrong in her delivery, but Jill’s continued reaction is over the top.
And then Ramona decides to scold Alex for the “bad timing” of delivering her message. This coming from the woman who decided Jill’s Kodak event was the right time and place to inform her of the company’s shortcomings. Perhaps Ramona needs to crawl back into her glass house and shut her mouth.
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Next, we see Bethenny and fiance Jason heading out to California to see her dying father. Bethenny calls Ramona, who gives her some sound advice. Not having closure with someone is arguably one of the hardest things. It was nice to see Bethenny get some closure before the passing of her father. Hopefully she will be able to grow from it and become the parent she never had.
We then move on to the Gotham party and in attendance is new housewife Jennifer Gilbert. LuAnn shows up with an interesting looking fella who uses this chance to promote his book on national television, and Jill decides to greet Alex, perhaps trying to make peace. The best part of the scene was Jennifer’s comments that LuAnn’s date has “got bad hair and is gay.” And just like that, I get a pretty good sense of why Bravo cast Jennifer. Looking forward to getting to know you better JenJen.
Ramona’s scene with the wedding dresses was boring. Hopefully the whole vow renewal thing will not be done on every housewife franchise. Perhaps Caroline form New Jersey will be the next.
And now on to the scene in which some of the ladies meet up with LuAnn for a spa/yoga date. Very touching scene as the ladies shared their stuggles with deperession, post-partum depression, anxiety etc. Sometimes it’s just nice to see these ladies being “real.” Loved LuAnn’s comment about “When they don’t love you anymore, they don’t love you anymore.” Great quote.
The scene with Jill and Kelly dining together is interesting. The way Jill talked to Kelly, the little dig at her for using the word “like” too much was interesting. What I got from that scene is that these two have nothing in common, and the chance of any friendship outside the proximity of Bravo cameras is about a zero percent. Next is the scene with Jill, Ramona and Sonja. Sonja reveals her modeling past and Jill once again feels the need to take a little dig asking her how she could model if she’s only 5’6.
Now onto the big event of the night. Jennifer organizes a get together for the ladies and quickly learns the craziness involved in being a Bravo housewife. Ramona reveals that Bethenny’s father had passed and Jill overreacts and over dramatizes the whole thing, and blames Ramona for not telling her about it. Once again Jill is really upset that Bethenny is DONE with her and chose not to tell her about her father, but Jill decides to kill the messaenger aka Ramona (see a trend here with Jill?). Jill’s underdog decides to scold Ramona for not informing her BFF of this earlier. And this is all the more interesting considering Alex did inform Jill of how sick Bethenny’s father was earlier and Jill ofcourse brushed it off saying Bethenny wasn’t that close with her father anyways.
Moving on to the showdown between Alex and Jill. Alex walks in with a vegeance and informs us that Jill had texted her earlier that day, wanting gossip on someone’s passing. Alex shares that Jill hadn’t tried to contact her for weeks. Alex has had enough of Jill and lets her have it, giving us the best quote of the season, “You are in high school, you are a mean girl and you are in high school!” It’s interesting that Jill doesn’t understand where Alex’s disdain for her comes from. From someone who has watched the first and second seasons of the show, you have to understand that while all the housewives picked on Alex and her family the first season, they all toned it down the second season with the exception of Jill. And I think the incident earlier this season, during which Jill felt the need to dig at Alex and bring up her kids climbing up someone’s leg, was simply the straw that broke the camel’s back. Yes, Alex kids are a bit of a handful, but at the same time, she is human and constantly hearing others put down her kids, family, home etc has to be hurtful. With that said, I absolutely understand where Alex’s anger came from.
And I agree with Ramona, perhaps Jill and Bethenny could have made up had LuAnn not interrupted them during the so called Jill ambush.
And you have to love Jill’s comment about not being ready to talk with Bethenny during the “ambush” because she didn’t have her notes. This woman literally keeps notes, like who does that? The main thing I was a bit torn about this episode was Jill’s motives in wanting to to rebuild her friendship with Bethenny. Is it genuine or is she just feeling left out now that Bethenny’s constantly on PEOPLE.com, tv shows and magazines, with news of her engagement, pregnancy, best selling book etc? I say it’s a bit of both, but I’ll let you be the judge of that.
And just when you think this week’s episode was pure awesomeness, next week’s preview looks to be even better.
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