Reality Matters

Anna David

• Publisher: HarperCollins e-books
• Year: 2010
• ISBN:
  9780061978487
• Topic: Sozialwissenschaften
• Subtopic: Popkultur

Top Chef. America's Next Top Model. Survivor. Dancing with the Stars. American Idol. Big Brother. The Biggest Loser … Everyone has a guilty reality television pleasure. Curated by Party Girl author Anna David, Reality Matters is a collection of hilarious yet revealing essays from novelists, essayists, and journalists—including Toby Young, Neil Strauss, and Stacey Grenrock Woods, among many others—about the reality television shows they love, obsess over, and cringe at; and why they, and America, can't stop watching.

1

POVERTY IN THE TIME OF THE REAL HOUSEWIVES OF NEW YORK CITY

Stacey Grenrock Woods

“IF JILL CAN DROP sixteen thousand dollars on a bag,” beamed Kelly Bensimon, the newest housewife on Bravo’s The Real Housewives of New York City, “then I say, go for it!”

“Go for it” is excellent advice, especially from someone who designs owl jewelry and jogs in traffic. Bensimon was referring to her fellow housewife Jill Zarin’s televised purchase of a garish green handbag. It really was, as the price tag showed, sixteen thousand dollars. Most people, even the obscenely rich, wouldn’t go for such a thing so publicly in late 2008, when season two of the series was shot. But the Real Housewives will go for anything—parties, purchases, press lines, each other’s jugular veins—as long as it means more of that precious commodity: attention.

In late 2008, I was going for things too: enough change for a meal at McDonald’s, a lot of walks (my oxidized green 1991 Saab had long stopped going for it), and down to the mailbox, hoping vainly for a check. Work had been scarce for some time. I’m a writer and my husband, Kenny, owns a recording studio, so of course we are insurance-free. Unable to afford our antidepressants, we went off them, and our bodies seemed to turn wholly edematous within hours. Our new Top Ramen and Quarter Pounder diet was counterproductive to our health goals. Also, his teeth were steadily rotting. Each newly sprouted abscess thwarted our few remaining dreams. We couldn’t afford to take drugs, and even the plants curled up and died. Jill Zarin’s throwaway sixteen thousand would have made all the difference in the world to us, so it’s tempting, and it would be great fun, to rip the Real Housewives for having so much when so many have so little, but we all know things don’t work that way. Besides, I’d rather rip them for being stupid and awful. I feel it’s more appropriate.

The housewives brought this on themselves. Not content to be privately rich and terrible, they belong to that rare and now overrepresented class of people who have always thought, “You know what? I should have a TV show. They should make a TV show about me.” Fans of the series could easily imagine Jill Zarin saying something like this in her Long Island brogue. I like to daydream about how each cast member made the decision to audition for a reality show; how they all thought it over and decided, “Yes, the best thing for me and my loved ones is to have our lives derided by as many people and through as much media as the current technology will allow.” It will be, they surely told themselves, good exposure. I want to be on television, they surely said. I’ll come off well. Besides, it’s all in good fun.

No it isn’t.

For several years I was a correspondent on The Daily Show, both with and without Jon Stewart. I reported on ridiculous people doing moronic things (or was it moronic people doing ridiculous things?) for exposure all over America. I loved this job because I got to be on television, and because I got to make stupid people look stupid on television. Of course, no one producing entertainment of this kind would ever admit to mocking anyone. “Celebrating” is the euphemism of choice. I can’t tell you how many times I sat in meetings and listened to development executives beam about their new projects: “We’re not mocking these people,” they’d say, “it’s not mean-spirited at all.” (It’s at this point that another executive or two would echo the sentiment with an “Oh, no!”) “That’s not what we’re about,” they’d insist. “We want to celebrate these people!” I’ll bet people at Bravo say this sort of thing an awful lot. I imagine that Bravo executives celebrate the fuck out of “these people.” I’ll bet they’re “all about” it. But these people shouldn’t be celebrated. They should be mocked—roundly mocked—with the meanest spirits we can muster—because capital “r” Reality is getting far too close to real reality for my comfort.

Of course the Real Housewives aren’t really housewives. (Students of Reality should by now have a natural suspicion of any show with the word “real” in the title.) At the time of this writing, only three of the six are technically wives, but like nuns who have taken a vow to God, the Real Housewives are wedded to the media, forsaking all others. Season two (one of the rare superior sequels in art) saw our girls feathering not their nests, but their brands. And by their brands we shall know them:

There is a countess on the show. It’s okay if you forget—the countess will consistently remind you by dropping hints like “I’m a countess” and by referring to herself as “the countess.” Those interested in how former “catalog model” LuAnn de Lesseps became a countess can read the whole fairy tale in her gracefully ghostwritten etiquette guide/memoir. (Or I can save you the trouble: she married some count. He was rarely seen on the show because, as it turned out, his Ethiopian mistress demanded much of his time. Fortunately, the countess will retain her title after the divorce.)

Natural foods chef Bethenny Frankel (two n’s, two e’s) has spent season two promoting her Skinnygirl (one word) brand: Skinnygirl cocktail mixes, Skinnygirl wheat-, egg-, and dairy-free baked goods, and a peppily ghostwritten book about how you can be a Skinnygirl yourself. Skinnygirl, Skinnygirl, Skinny girl. Let’s all say it! Although formerly branded the show’s underdog (because she was, until recently, unmarried, goofy, brash, doesn’t like to be touched, and has a bite radius of such might and scope that it could come only from a lifetime of grinding through even the stealthiest of nightguards), Bethenny Frankel seems to be reaping the most rewards from her decision to go for a reality show, her second. She is certainly faring better than she did on The Apprentice: Martha Stewart. We’re all very proud of our Bethenny. All of us, that is, but Kelly Bensimon.

Kelly Bensimon, former model, current horsewoman, is the newest housewife. Tan and torrential, she has no time for anyone she doesn’t consider “amazing” (she means “famous”). Her remoteness and unrepentant snobbery keep her at odds with Bethenny and have managed to offend even the countess. A woman of many whims and at least as much alimony, Kelly is a tremendous figure on the Manhattan/Hamptons/Owl Jewelry scene. And she works, too: she goes to parties and “writes for articles.” I’m not sure what that means, but in any case, Kelly is fiercely protective of the Bensimon brand.

Simon van Kempen and Alex McCord have always reminded me of the Veneerings, Charles Dickens’s nouveau riche climbers whose furniture “smelt a little too much of the workshop and was a trifle sticky.” Their one-night stand born of an Internet chat room has blossomed into a beautiful life in Brooklyn with their two small but vigorous boys, Johan and Francois, who impress everyone with their command of Latin and their genius for running around at parties, screaming and stabbing things with steak knives. The show takes every opportunity to insinuate that Simon, often called the seventh housewife, is gay. I don’t think he’s gay. Nor do I think he’s straight. I think he’s just Australian, and a con man. The van Kempens don’t fool me. Simon has implied on camera that he owns the Manhattan hotel he only manages, and everything about them tells of colossal debt and vague horseshit. When their sons are old enough to comprehend their parents’ publicity, I’m confident the boys will, as they say, “go Menendez.” Naturally, the van Kempens are writing a parenting memoir. (No word yet on who’s ghost-writing.)

Ramona Singer is the one with the “crazy eyes.” Her husband, Mario, sells religious jewelry, and must sell an awful lot of it from the looks of their Hamptons house. Despite her protests otherwise, Ramona doesn’t do anything, leaving her plenty of time to offend people at parties. “You’re, like, blind, right?” she asked New York Governor David Paterson, who is blind. She went on to tell him that she’s, like, blind, too, without her contacts. Convinced of her irrepressible youthfulness, Ramona is “developing” a line of anti-aging skin care products that she hopes to sell one day on QVC. She also has a line of jeweled T’s—but these days who doesn’t?

Which brings us to Jill Zarin, the Fabric Queen. Jill, in the space of one episode, bought that $16,000 bag, turned down her husband’s gift of a new Mercedes because it lacked a specific dashboard dock for her iPhone, and spoke at length about the size of her diamonds. But it’s all right, because Jill does charity work—or, I should say, helps organize some charity fund-raisers. (Choosing a tapenade and deciding where the Zarin Fabrics logo will appear on the invitation is work, after all.) On one episode, Jill spoke to the BBC about the world economic crisis. “Economic crisis” would have waved the red flag of mockery right in the face of most people, but not Jill Zarin, who is ravenous for publicity. When asked if she thought it fair to have so much when people in Africa, for example, are starving, Jill said that life isn’t fair—but, funnily enough, she had just raised money for a school in Africa. She even cited the “teach them to fish” idiom so popular with the very rich. To her credit, she was able to repeat the phrase correctly, unlike the time she spoke of “kicking a gift horse in the mouth.”

With so many vivacious personalities competing for screen time, it’s no wonder our housewives occasionally step on one another’s toes. What usually happens is something like this: Bethenny Frankel is chosen to be on the cover of Social Life magazine (the only magazine I’ve heard of where the stylist picks the cover story). Immediately upon hearing the exciting news, the countess asks if the magazine will be doing any retouching. Bethenny is understandably hurt, and asks the countess to lunch to discuss the hurting. When pressed, the countess explains that her comment was not evidence of jealousy, but merely her protective model’s instinct kicking in. Furthermore, the countess can’t understand why Bethenny is being so “attackive” toward her. Later on, Bethenny goes on the attackive herself by calling into question the countess’s authorial credentials (which is a ludicrous notion to anyone who’s ever seen the countess hashing it out with her ghostwriter!). To soothe her image, the countess, in a black dress and a pair of knee-high suede boots, takes a town car to the Madison Square Boys & Girls Club to inspire a group of underprivileged, underfunded, underloved, and misunderstood black girls. After a proper introduction, she begins her talk with “My husband’s family—get this, ’cause it’s fun—built the Suez Canal.” After what surely felt like hours, the countess asks the girls what they want to be when they grow up. One girl says she wants to be a model. On top of being underprivileged, underfunded, underloved, and misunderstood, I’m sorry to say this girl looked to be grossly overfed (although, judging by the quality of food most easily afforded by the poor in America, she could have just been bloated like I was).

“Stand up,” ordered the countess. “How old are you?”

“Ten.”

“Oh,” said the countess, “you have plenty of time to grow.” The girl stood very still. “You have a beautiful face,” said the countess, before taking a sip of the bijou coffee drink she had brought along. The girl remained heartbreakingly still. We all did.

“And you know what?” No, Countess. What?

“Losing weight is easy!”

There it was and there it stays, on national television, for all to see, rerun after blessed rerun.

“I think they got a kick out of seeing me in my high heels on the basketball court,” the countess later said. “And they really appreciated me taking time out of my day.”

It occurs to me now that I haven’t mentioned, for all those who want to buy it, the name of the countess’s book. It’s called Class with the Countess and comes to us courtesy of Gotham Books. (Thank you, Gotham Books.)

Another major attackive that runs through most of season two started at the meeting for an arthritis charity fund-raiser that Jill Zarin was helping organize. Well, really it started long before that. It really started each time Bethenny was, she felt, systematically ignored by the towering Bensimon at various stops along the Manhattan party circuit. The countess asked Kelly to come along to meet the other housewives and get involved with the Creaky Joints event. She showed up classically late and was introduced to the group, which included Jill’s teenage daughter, Allyson.

“Cute!” said Kelly Bensimon, upon hearing that Allyson is herself afflicted with arthritis. The other women seemed a little taken aback, but proceeded with business. They were told that, as honorary co-chairs, each woman’s name would appear on the invitation. At this, Kelly perked up. (You’ll recall that Kelly is very protective of the Bensimon brand.) She flat-out refused to have her name associated with the charity. Kelly Bensimon, according to Kelly Bensimon, doesn’t lend her name to just anything. Why? Well, for one thing, she’s super-busy. “Like, I have, literally, fifteen more minutes,” she told them, “and then I gotta go.” That’s how busy she is. Everyone there looked rightfully wounded, and Bethenny made a light crack about Kelly thinking herself Madonna. I felt the remark was justified; I think we all did. Kelly, for unknowable reasons, took issue with the comparison.

That is what prompted the legendary “I’m up here, you’re down here” exchange, during which Kelly used hand gestures to demonstrate how much higher she is than Bethenny on the social ladder. It happened at a cocktail date called by Kelly to discuss the hurting—a cocktail date to which Kelly was half an hour late.

Throughout the season, numerous attackives are flung about: Jill calls Simon a drunk in the press, Ramona calls the count “old,” and everyone calls Simon gay. Eventually, Kelly, who we indeed see lending her name to just about anything throughout the season, recants and helps out with the Creaky Joints auction, and despite a gigantic screaming match over what Jill felt was an abundance of Bethenny’s Skinnygirl signage, the climactic event goes well and Ramona offers everyone “kudooz.” The van Kempens, with the help of the show’s sponsor, General Electric, redo their apartment, and there is also a tennis side plot, manufactured and uncompelling, between Jill and Mario, but I don’t care about any of that. I care about the real stuff: “the weight,” “I’m up here,” “retouching,” “Madonna,” “drunk,” “gay.”

Here in the spring of 2009, work has begun to trickle down our way. We can currently afford weekly groceries, and our bodies, finally free of pharmaceutical impediments, have regained their rightful sizes. Stunningly, one of the plants has even come back to life. We live for Tuesday nights and always say the same thing after The Real Housewives is over: “I wish this show were ten hours long.”

What troubles me, though, is as much as they are mocked, the housewives are also being celebrated. Quick visits to the Bravo message boards during the second season revealed an outpouring of ungrammatical love and support, even for the ones I consider the vilest. It’s working: they are crossing over. As the self-appointed gatekeeper of truth, I plead with anyone who’s still reading to not let it happen. Do not feel for them, do not buy their muffins or their skin cream, do not buy their books (publishers, I’m talking to you). Don’t let “these people” use their freak-fame to step over to legitimacy. Legitimacy belongs to us: the real, the poor, and the decent. We must come together, finally, and laugh at the laughable, the terrible. Yes, at them, not with them, at them, at them, at them, at them! And although Bethenny Frankel’s book is at number twenty-three on Amazon and mine is, when I last checked, substantially higher, I have a little attackive of my own: Reality Star. No one’s getting across.

2

FAKETASTIC

Melissa de la Cruz

MTV’S THE HILLS GETS A LOT OF GRIEF for its relationship to reality. Mainly that it has none. The situations are scripted! The drama is forced! What Teen Vogue intern also graces its cover? C’mon! That’s not reality, that’s…orchestrated! Manipulated! Fake! Fake! Fake! And yet, for all the rotten tomatoes hurled at it, the documented lives of young women in Los Angeles is one of the highest-rated shows on the network and has made tabloid sensations out of its stars.

So what’s going on here? I, for one, am addicted to The Hills. I love the fairy-tale-in-LA premise, with its shiny Range Rovers and club openings in place of carriages and royal balls—and the toothsome and uncomplicated prettiness of its former main attraction. Lauren Conrad is...