The penultimate episode of the season had plenty of the usual nonsense, which we’ll breeze through quickly, because it’s all building up to the start of the annual Posche fashion show — a sequence that continues in next week’s finale.
And so, let’s just briefly recap the other stuff, most of which seemed like manufactured-for-TV drama and comedy:
1. At home in Montville, Teresa is trying to teach her girls Italian, although Milania thinks they’re learning Spanish. Mama even has a little blackboard up, but she quickly loses control of the class. Gia tells her mom, “If you were a high school teacher, this would never work. You gotta pay attention. You gotta teach.”
Before moving on to the next bit of nonsense, we’ll note that Teresa tells the camera, “I love the Posche fashion show. We always have a good time.” At this point, Bravo edits in flashbacks to the infamous 2009 fashion show (where the hair-extension-pulling episode took place) and the 2010 event (where Teresa screamed at cousin Kathy Wakile for saying she left her baby “unattended” during the row at baby Gorga’s christening party”).
2. Caroline, Albert and Lauren Manzo go to brunch at Albie and Christopher’s apartment in Hoboken, and Caroline immediately starts in with digs aimed at Albie’s girlfriend Lindsey.
3. Kathy and Rich Wakile go to a business meeting at Bindi USA about her dessert brand, and Rich immediately starts in with insults and sexual innuendo. Some if it I can’t repeat here and the rest I won’t, because I don’t think that Rich deserves the space. I’d just like pose two questions to Rich here: Do you really want your children and their friends to see such disrespectful behavior? And, what the heck do you do for a living? Don’t you ever have something else to do? The only comment worth repeating is from Kathy: “I’m going to be in business with a big company…I’ll get my nose job yet.” (And so she subsequently did.)
4. Melissa and Joe Gorga have a meeting with music industry people at the Russian Tea Room. Best Joe comment about his wife: “So, look, you have a true artist in front of you.”
5. Jacqueline and Caroline go to Posche in Wayne, where Mrs. Manzo pronounces,”I’m not trying on. Caroline does not try on.” I immediately think of a comment Teresa had made on “Watch What Happens Live” about how Caroline talks about herself in the third person.” I was surprised Teresa even knew that term. But she’s right. And it’s weird. Posche owner Kim D. has invited the girls — all of them — to her annual fashion show, and Caroline says to the camera,”Here’s my issue. We’re going to a fashion show that historically had not ended well.” It could be the understatement of, well, the episode.
6. Caroline and Lauren go to the space they have rented, for Lauren to open her new store, Cafface. It’s in Franklin Lakes, where Chateau (which moved across town) used to be. After they discuss changes they need to make, Lauren says,
“OK. Let’s call the constructing man.”
7. Jacqueline has a video chat with daughter Ashlee, who’s now living in California. Ashlee looks great, and Jac later says that “She’s got a great job doing some PR work.” But Ashlee tells her mom that she accidentally left the ovengas on in her apartment for three days.” (Ashlee’s neighbors must love her, eh?) Jac tries to hide her horror over that, as well as the two new tattoos Ashlee is sporting: a skull on her hand, and the words “Veni, Vidi,Vici” down the back of her neck. Jacqueline does not know that it means, “I came, I saw, I conquered.” (It’s a little premature for Ashlee to be making that Caesarian proclamation, but hey, there are worse sayings she could have chosen.
8. Kim D. takes Teresa to a hair salon called Allure to get her hair done for the Posche fashion show. There, a man identified as Angelo, PR manager, gets them settled in, then returns to tell Teresa, “I must say, it’s actually a small world we live in. A long time ago, she actually worked for me…at a gentleman’s club in Elizabeth.” Kim D. asks what Melissa did there. Says Angelo, “She danced for me, for about a year.” At this point, Teresa looks truly upset and says, “I don’t want to talk about my family, and I’d appreciate it if you didn’t talk about my family.” Angelo goes away, but returns to offer his “heartfelt apologies” — and even more details. Kim D., who knows that if there’s no dirt, there’s no air time, suggests that “maybe that’s when she went from porn again to born again.”
Teresa leaves the room, but Kim D. keeps it up, asking Angelo for more details, such as whether Melissa was a good dancer. “Our customers were very unhappy to see her go,” he says, claiming that she was a dancer there seven or eight years ago.
The housewives’ hatred of Teresa seems to stem from what happens next, at the fashion show. But I have to say, Teresa looked truly shocked and upset by Angelo’s presence and allegations at the so salon. I don’t think she’s that good an actress. It looked like an ambush, though the other women have suggested that Teresa set up her sister-in-law. Maybe they have information we don’t have yet.
So, finally we get to the Posche fashion show, held at Son Cubano in West New York. Everyone’s seated in the same booth, and Angelo appears to say hi, remember me to Melissa, who seems to not quite register what’s going on. When she does, she calls husband Joe to come to her rescue–which he apparently does, as we see in previews of next week’s episode, which show Joe and Kim D. having a row in front of the restaurant, and Joe screaming, “you can’t even talk, you’re so drunk and high.”
I can’t help but wonder how Joe got there so fast. Was he home in Montville, or in a proverbial phone booth around the corner, waiting to change into his Superman suit?
The bigger question is how Posche, a vest-pocket boutique in a strip mall, manages to wind up at the center of such huge blow-ups, year after year.
We’ll talk about that more next week. Until then…Ciao.