There comes a time in every Real Housewife’s career when she must decide how to make her mark, lest she be dropped by Andy Cohen. She has to decide: Will she be a DeShawn Snow, Quinn Fry or Cindy Barshop? Or will she rise to the occasion like a Tamra, a Vanderpump, a Ramona?
For Kathryn Edwards on Tuesday night’s Real Housewives of Beverly Hills, she faced this crossroads and chose the path that made her look like an asshole, but probably ensured her job security.
To sum it up: Kathryn was on one.
Erika invited the ladies to her Pasadena palace for an elegant dinner party to meet her husband Tom. For some reason, the only husbands present were Tom and Ken, which meant Kathryn’s hunk of a husband Donnie wasn’t there to give his wife some much-needed perspective on her behavior.
For Kathryn’s sake, I hope she was drunk. She began the evening by harping at Lisa Rinna about her weight, which Lisa laughed off, but sort of not really. Kathryn proceeded to be—as Lisa Vanderpump described—“cheeky” but mostly behaved like a loud hooligan.
Erika Girardi does not like to be treated like this IN HER OWN HOME, thank you very much. I get the irritation here, but disrespecting a Real Housewife IN HER OWN HOME seems to be a graver sin than most. Perhaps I would better understand if I owned a mansion.
Much of the contention stems from an incident from a previous episode. To recap: Kathryn and Erika had a bonding lunch where Erika detailed her distrust of women (which is a very suspect point of view, but I digress), and talked about how much they’re going to enjoy being best friends. The conversation shifted to Lisa Vanderpump and Erika revealed that she thinks Lisa is a bit manipulative which: yes.
Kathryn turned around gave the Reader’s Digest version of the conversation to Lisa herself, including the analogy of Lisa “spinning a web” of manipulation. The problem is that Erika didn’t say those exact words (at least on camera); she said something similar (“I don’t think she wants to leave any fingerprints, that’s what I think”), but the dramatization did mischaracterize her tone somewhat.
Erika, of course, was not pleased. Kathryn played dumb and acted like she didn’t realize their conversation was in confidence (for now, until the footage airs)—the conversation where they discussed trust and building a friendship. Lisa is now justifiably miffed and Erika is annoyed with Kathryn for injuring her relationship with Lisa.
WHEW. Meanwhile, throughout all of this, Lisa Rinna is serving as the perfect Greek chorus, complete with totally apt sound effects.
Kathryn telling Lisa about the conversation was dumb and not remotely innocent. Doesn’t she know that you have to wait until the season is over before you get to hear what all the women said about you behind your back?
Anyway, during last night’s episode, from the dinner party we transition to a house painting party. Kyle and Mauricio take all their friends to Watts to paint a house for Habitat for Humanity. Lisa says that it feels good to do something tangible for charity instead of “just donating money,” but I really hope they also donated money because, please, do you really need eight people to paint a house?
Kathryn is very proud of being aggressive and loud which can certainly be good qualities, but she seems a bit too proud. There’s a thin line between “telling it like it is” and looking like an asshole—especially when editing is involved.
The Flawless Empress of Chill Erika described Kathryn’s behavior as “tired LA bullshit,” which I know earned a “YAAASSS HONEY, READ” from her gang of gay groomers/friends and also from me.
The two end up hugging it out, meaning they still definitely hate each other. I predict another clash in their future.
Unrelated but completely related: Whoever does Erika’s extensions is a magician.
Welcome to the club, Kathryn. You put in a strong performance, but only time will tell if you showed your ass enough to keep us discerning Real Housewives viewers happy.
Contact the author at kara.brown@jezebel.com .
Screenshot via Bravo.