Last night on Real Housewives of Beverly Hills there was an intervention, the reveal of Ken Todd's secret life, and one incredibly boring trip to Paris which consisted of standing on a balcony in bad cocktail dresses speculating over whether or not Kim Richards was jet-lagged or relapsing.
Things begin at Kyle Richards' house where we are treated to the full scope of her sitting room. I certainly hope she isn't paying Faye Resnick for her design services because tacked onto the white walls are dead turtle shells. In other accents Kyle had American flag pillows strewn around her sectional. #Refund. Anyway, Kim loves this room. She just loves this room. Apparently in her house there is no place to sit down. She should hire Faye. Or you know, buy a couch! Craigslist, baby.
Segue: can you imagine how awesome the BH Craigslist offerings must be?
Anyway, one thing Kim isn't happy about, besides her lack of seating space, is Taylor Armstrong's behavior. After Taylor got drunk and took off with a married man whose private jet she's in love with and ditched her daughter with the nanny and Kyle, Kim is convinced Taylor has a little problem with the old Chardonnay. Something about Taylor slurring 'Keeedeeeee's with youse, Kow. I thought eye left er at ome with the burlr larm?' tipped her off to the problem.
CLICK CONTINUE READING FOR THE REST!
And Kim can relate. This new storyline attempt is lame-o. Kim and Kyle decide to call Taylor and stage a little Taylorvention about her coping skills. It was purely out of the goodness of their own heart, you understand. They call Taylor who was totally like home doing nothing while all dressed up and they came over.
Kim sits Taylor down (after admiring her sitting area – not kidding!) and gives her this spiel about how she might be drinking like 3 or 4 bottles too many to cope with a bad year and she kinda like has been embarrassing herself with her overt display of parental negligence among other things like that meltdown at Yolanda Foster's. Taylor thinks about it for a few seconds, starts to cry, and admits that she's been relying on alcohol to cope. It was actually kind of touching.
'Wait – can I do an intervention in these pants? What if we have to chase her down, like on the show?!'
It was hard to focus on the seriousness of Kim's words to Taylor, because I was distracted by Kyle's designer track pant leggings. Ugh. I mean really what show is she on: Real Housewives of Orange County?
Taylor says she wants to change. Then Kyle who has been sitting there the whole time, bored and itching to play Words With Friends on her iPhone, chimes in with, 'Like can you? Or is rehab going to be your storyline next year?'
With the Taylorvention done, we head on over to Lisa Vanderpump's house where Ken is feeding their swans. Swans it would appear are the new microscopic clutch-sized fluffy dogs. If Lisa starts dressing them in leisure suits and hauling them to the Dancing With The Stars set, I propose a Lisavention.
Who knew there were so many layers to the fantastic Mr. Ken Todd? Who knew indeed. Who knew he has a much older son named Warren who lives in St. Tropez and is only five years younger than Lisa. Warren is married to one of Lisa's former friends, Sue. Furthermore Ken's son looks uncannily like him and they have the same hair. Lisa and Ken are headed to France to visit Ken, The Younger whom they haven't seen since Pandora's wedding. This family dynamic is so very European.
Before they go there they must pay a visit to Mohamed's where Yolanda is hosting his housewarming party. Guess what – Mohamed has swans too! Lisa arrives with her hair up and it's a stunning look. She looks even more Dynasty fabulous than usual!
All the girls trickle in save for Adrienne Maloof who called to cancel last minute. Yolanda was disappointed she skipped an all-white color scheme out of fear for Adrienne's 'markings' but whatever, at least she doesn't have to socialize with Her Tradgesty. Everyone is in a great mood at this party and that's because they've just learned that Bravo is paying to send them on a cast trip to Paris. And even better Taylor and Adrienne were not invited. Weeee!
Taylor claims she needs to stay home with Kennedy in the wake of what happened. What she means: Bravo told me I was too much of a train wreck and they are not going to have this trip ruined with my antics.
I also imagine the French embassy, after viewing several episodes of this show, had serious conditions about allowing this lot into this country. 'We'll take the the hot one, the two Europeans, and the one married to the famous filmmaker. That one with the mumus can come so we can make her a national fashion joke.'
Marisa Zanuck appears and spends her five minutes of screen time telling us her husband bores her for the umpteenth time. Her husband Dean stands there thinking, 'If only we had a prenup I could divorce her without risking the Zanuck fortune…' Marisa needs a make-over, both in the fashion and character department.
Marisa and David Foster have some sort of a pissing contest about who finds marriage more boring. That evening Yolanda threw one Grammy in the trash and let another one freeze to death in the cryogenic fridge, but at the party both she and Dean remained composed. David and Marisa are both so awkward.
I shouldn't be too ruthless because Marisa's family experienced a truly heart-breaking tragedy this episode.
The other noteworthy thing that happened besides everyone pretending they were just coincidentally going to Paris at the same time and would totally fly on the same flight and stay at the same hotel and drop everything last minute to travel together is that Yolanda confronted Taylor about some of the rude things she's been saying behind her back. Of course Yolanda is the type of person who has eyes in the back of her head – or she puts tracking devices in the ol' lemons she hands out.
Yolanda wonders if Taylor has a problem with her and suggests they get together for Starbucks to chat. Is Starbuck's paying Yolanda to endorse them? Her solution to everything is Starbucks. C'mon Yo – at least go local!
Taylor denies any such issues then she tells us she just didn't think the party was the right place to bring it up. Good call. Yolanda reinterprets that as lying and pays a little visit to the witch master herself, Kyle, for the scoop. Kyle pretty much tells her that Taylor's BFF (alleged?) Linda Thompson has planted the seed of Yohatred in Taylor's lips and that is where the problems lie. Can we discuss that mini-caftan Kyle wore to the party. Hellacious.
At the very least it was sort of interesting to see Yolanda cause some simmer-heat drama. I anticipate the moment when Taylor confronts Yo about the so-called inaccuracies in her marriage and Yolanda laughs in her face and plucks her away like lint.
Then Lisa went to St. Tropez and we discovered Ken is also a grandfather to a 21-year-old whom is about the same age as their son Max. Peel the layers of Ken Todd like an onion! And Lisa's former friend-turned-daughter-in-law Sue isn't necessarily a fan of her. Lisa describes it has having some rough patches, but now the family is happy. Ken wishes his son lived closer, but Warren's life is in Europe where he is a successful real estate agent.
Lisa and Ken hop on a helicopter to Paris and go from a lovely vacation into the Ninth Circle of Hell with Kyle standing there talking loudly about something we don't care about. Hey at least she left Faye at home. #ThankYouBravo. I guess the producers can't stand her either.
Before the ladies arrive they mingle in the airport. Kim and Kyle discuss her alcoholism and the difficulties it caused their relationship. Kim admits she used to hide wine in coffee cups and most surprisingly of all she showed up at the airport with both her passport (current!) and her license (also unexpired).
Then Marisa calls to cancel last-minute and for a moment (thanks commercial break cliff-hanger!) I was convinced she was going to whip out a Kimscuse and tell us she lost her passport in a Tijuana circus and hasn't seen it since but she's been looking through all her old memory boxes and scrap books trying to find one … But oh look she found a vibrator and twelve empty pill bottles instead. And there's that D&G pump she lost in 2003!
But no, when the show returned Marisa tells us her father-in-law passed away suddenly and I felt super terrible for all my rude thoughts. Our condolences to Marisa's family. 🙁
They arrive in Paris, Brandi Glanville pops a lot of champagne and then they convene on a balcony for what felt like sixty hours of mingling. It was so awkward, like match.com mingle awkward. Like hey, we don't really like each other at all – or rather we don't really like YOU Kyle, but here we all are pretending to be friends. I know, let's speculate on why Kim's late.
Yes, Kim is late and she's acting a little loopy. And naturally everyone starts whispering about Kim possibly being drunk. Kim says she's just so tired. And she doesn't travel much so maybe she is. I hope!
And then some fireworks went off. Real ones – not RHOBH dramatic ones. And everyone cheered and we were saved from obsessing over how many rhinestones were on Giggy's Liberace suit and if someone was going to push someone off said balcony. But that only happens on Revenge and other real soap operas.
[Photo Credits: BravoTV.com]
TELL US – KIM: DRUNK OR JET-LAGGED? WERE YOU SURPRISED TO LEARN ABOUT THE LAYERS OF KEN? DOES TAYLOR HAVE A DRINKING PROBLEM?
