KFC

I personally interpreted it as a dig at Mariah as well. Those two have a well-documented "rivalry," so I was not surprised she chose Britney. I'm curious if anyone actually enjoys Whitney Cummings. While less obnoxious than Chelsea Handler, it was so irritating how she kept interrupting Eileen Davidson with low-hanging one-liners. If you're going to constantly cut someone off, at least be clever about it.

But, hey, there are fewer lines to remember than on daytime. That alone has to be enticing...

Given this week's bartender "theme," I'm surprised Old Man Cohen doesn't just start referring to "the bar" as "the casting couch."

But the original article says that all of the current HWs are coming back, so presumably that would include Lizzie. And wasn't that the rumor (that everyone was asked back) when it was leaked the Tamra wasn't fired?

God yes. Cindy, we already knew ye. And like you said, at least Jill had her moments of hilarity, both intentional and unintentional. Kelly was so humorless and inarticulate. Beyond that, she always had this stench of superiority to me that surpassed even Jill and Luann. I totally thought Bethenny called it when she described Kelly as the type of person who would only bother acknowledging someone if they served a purpose to her. As awkward as Alex was, I always felt bad for her (and thus am so glad she's off the show) when it was patently clear the other women viewed her as beneath them and only deigned to recognize her presence.

Andy was so full of shit during the Gwyneth Paltrow/Amanda Peet episode. Amanda clearly took a backseat to Andy's slobbering over Her Royal Goopness, which reached its peak when he praised her for the brilliance of the "conscious uncoupling" phrase.

I know a lot of people tuned out during the Cindy Barshop season, but in fairness, I think NY suffered from the delays in airing the seasons more than anything else. It's going to be interesting to see how the show fares with Bethenny Frankel's return. And Shannon Beador on OC is one of the few exceptions/examples of a good casting replacement. She's been a real find: Enough crazy/neuroses for reality TV, but she's not overly conscious about what image she projects on camera, so her scenes come across a lot more organic than most. The drama from her presence seems real rather than scripted. She just lets it all hang out, consequences be damned.

I *think* this is the same apartment as that IG pic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=blyd90AQ0CQ It's a quick tour of Luann's place on the UWS.

Yeah, I'm generally loathe to giant statement piece necklaces like the ones Luann wears, but there's something to be said for a woman who knows her body and what suits it. Her clothes are always perfectly tailored for her figure and she manages to pull off those looks without appearing too effortful.

Atlanta- Those stairs terrify the fuck out of me. I don't think I'll ever understand the appeal of floating staircases; the lack of railing seems like an accident just waiting to happen.

I feel like BH is the one series in the RH franchise that can get away with having a cast full of actresses/former actresses. It's sort of befitting for the city. msblossom- I'd love it if BH had more "friends of" to serve as the crazy supporting characters. I'm totally okay if there's minimal drama among the main wives, and then have people like Alison DuBois come on for the crazy cameos. But I'm okay without Faye. Her acting was atrocious (I think she was acting... it felt rather for-the-cameras in hindsight), and in my mind she'll never live down stumbling over that "no matter how many Chanel handbags you borrow" line. Lady, you tipped your hand to us! The producers must have hated her, because if ever there were a scene in need of a reshoot, it was that one when Faye flubbed that line.

Yeah, Lisa's "you're losing your audience" remarks and the mothering about Brandi's drinking were reminiscent of Nene trying to shush Porsha on the RHOA reunion last season. In both cases, I think Lisa/Nene both wanted to make sure the crazy people didn't start blabbing in their irrational, word-vomit-y states.

This is pretty low on the gossip meter, but I remember being a kid and my dad's boss having us all over for dinner. The house was in a swanky neighborhood, and I asked the boss if anyone famous lived there. The boss said some of Nicole Brown Simpson's family (aka Denise) lived down the street and that he had seen Geraldo Rivera, whose car was often there overnight. Of course at the time, I didn't really register what that meant, but he certainly got a guffaw out of my parents.

The whole scene felt very Godfather/"kiss the ring" to me. Lots of dramatic gestures standing in for something else.

This I agree with. Of course they all do. It's why I think they're all kinda terrible in their own ways. But I was replying to your response prior where you said Lisa's jokes are self-deprecating and that you couldn't remember her jokes ever being at anyone else's expense or used to hurt someone... Like I said, Lisa does it all the time! I agree, she's not the only one guilty of it, but she's one of the biggest offenders. And she and Brandi are birds of a feather in their hitting below the belt. I still think the reunion where Lisa alluded to Kim's son having the mental breakdown was one of the dirtiest things we've ever seen on this show. Every bit as gross as Brandi revealing Adrienne's surrogate, just done in a sneakier way.

Lisa makes jokes at other people's expense all the time. It's been discussed a lot, but two examples off the top of my head: 1. Her poking Kyle about Portia being "the other woman," when Lisa clearly knew Mauricio and the cheating allegations were a sore subject. 2. In the S2 reunion, Taylor even pointed out that Lisa would always get in these little digs at her expense and then say how they weren't friends. She cited Lisa's "Giggy" twitter account as an example of Lisa getting in little digs at the other women while hiding behind the pretense of it being "Giggy" just joking around. Lisa and Brandi were friends for a reason. They both know how to go for the jugular and hit people where it hurts them the most.

But following the Armstrongs' appearance on this show, someone ended up dead. Between that and all the murky abuse allegations, Taylor's storyline was infinitely darker than any antics Brandi has ever pulled, and so I found her even more painful to watch than Ms. Glanville. Early Brandi was entertaining to watch, whereas I could never say the same of Taylor. I still think Taylor was by far the worst HW they've had on this show, including potential HWs Dana Pam, TMC Faye Resnick, and the delightfully crazy Allison Dubois. With all those other women (and Brandi), I have an easier time chalking up their awful behavior to being camera whores, but with Taylor it always seemed to cross the line into "too real" for me. At the time, I actually kind of liked that Lisa was forthcoming about disliking Taylor. All the bizarre stories she had... it was Danielle Staub/Kelly Bensimon/Teresa Giudice levels of "even when the cameras are off" disturbing to me.

But her popularity never seems to take a hit the way the other women do, so she must be doing something right. Frankly, I'm rather amazed at how she's managed to maintain good graces among viewers while pretty much every other HW has been raked over the coals for their various missteps. It's interesting to me because I find Lisa by the far the most calculated and disingenuous of all the HWs yet she seems to be the only one who manages to go unscathed season after season.

I also seem to recall the flap over her tagline, and how her defense was "the producers made me say it!" Which might very well have been true, but that's never the smartest line of defense when you appear on a reality show. Especially not if you're a newcomer trying to solidify your position on the show. Plus it was sort of damning already when the other cast members came to the show's defense (naturally) and said something about how no one is forced to say anything they don't want to for the taglines. Her "problem" (aka what got her fired) was basically the exact opposite of Carlton, who I think was probably all too accommodating with the producers, whereas Joyce probably should have been more agreeable and kept quiet.

In S2, "There's The Rub," when Emily and Lorelai are talking to the front desk clerk: BOBBY: You ladies are booked solid, I see. EMILY: Well, we intend to leave here completely different people. LORELAI: Yes, I'm going to be Ted Nugent. Lauren Graham's delivery in that scene was the perfect blend of deadpan and chirpy sarcasm.

It's all relative, but for the area where Pump is situated (in the epicenter of West Hollywood's boystown), drinks are definitely on the high end. Pump's prices are probably more reflective of a slightly upscale bar in Los Angeles (although in general LA is definitely cheaper than Manhattan), but not so much of the prices in their direct neighborhood. For example, the bar next door to Pump serves $7 tumbler-sized cocktails, and pretty much all the bars on the street serve drinks for under $10 that are twice as large as the watered down drinks you'd get at Lisa's.

Scoobie and vrocotamy- That's about right. Lisa basically set up shop right in the epicenter of the gay bars/clubs on Santa Monica Boulevard, and although Pump might be marketed as a gay[er] bar, it's really not at all. It's a pretentious tourist trap with a ridiculously priced cocktail menu. Your average cocktail at Pump is 2-3 times as expensive as most of the places nearby, be they gay or straight. I think its lack of success is probably because it represents a gentrification of the area, and there's very little about it I would classify as gay. It's an interesting contrast to The Abbey, as zoeysmom pointed out. That place also attracts a very mixed, largely straight/LA wannabe scenester crowd, but the establishment is still undoubtedly a gay bar. Your typical Weho gayboy would probably get a few odd looks if he strolled into Pump for a drink in a tanktop and jeans, whereas a place like The Abbey has a mix of suited/cocktail dress-wearing straight people juxtaposed with go-go boys and scantily dressed gay men.

Let's also not forget Vicki's "ch*nky ch*nky Chinaman" comment and all the racist remarks she, Lauri and Jeana made about latinos in the early seasons.

Only if Helen's grandmother is the one pointing the gun!

Earlier this year, The Wire had a pretty comprehensive breakdown/ranking of the HWs across all the various franchises. Of course, there's been a lot of new HWs since then and while you may or may not agree with their rankings, I enjoyed seeing their analysis and how they categorized the different women. http://www.thewire.com/entertainment/2014/03/definitive-ranking-every-real-housewife/358890/ One of the things I've always found fascinating on the HWs shows is the unspoken-but-increasingly-obvious blend of real and fake, especially in terms of certain "character" archetypes you see repeated across the different cities: there's a HW who thinks she's the queen bee/den mother/ringleader (Vicki Gunvalson, Caroline Manzo, Jill Zarin), a loudmouth troublemaker who proclaims she's just "keeping it real" (Tamra Barney, Brandi Glanville), a beautiful-but-austere pearl-clutcher (Luann DeLesseps, Yolanda Foster), utter lunacy (Kenya Moore, Kelly Bensimon, Danielle Staub). Etc etc. YMMV, but it's fun to draw parallels. Then, of course, the sheer number of griftery low-lifes... The season-to-season edit is also an interesting parallel. Especially now that these series are all well-established, a lot of the new HWs will get a generally neutral-to-positive observer/Greek chorus edit their first season, but then all bets are off in their second season.