Tinsley Mortimer

Guys, this Cartegena trip is not going well. The Real Housewives Of New York continue their journey to the center of Bethenny Frankel’s emotional meltdown this week as she continues to unravel. Dorinda Medley offers support in the best way she knows how: by letting Bethenny cry, then getting drunk and picking a fight with Luann de Lesseps at dinner. While their argument picks up steam on one end of the table, Carole Radziwill faces off with Bethenny on the other. Basically, it’s a boom operator’s nightmare, what with microphones only able to pick up on one Housewife clusterf**k at a time!

Before we get to the big fight, we pick up right where we left off: Bethenny in the kitchen with Dorinda, crying and shoving her head into the freezer. WTF?!? After rejecting Luann’s comfort, Bethenny unloads her worries on Dorinda. She’s in a custody battle with her ex, she’s moving to a new apartment, her life is too scheduled, and she’s at war with her (former) best friend. Basically, Bethenny’s life can be summed up as #ThisIsACrisis.

Bethenny Frankel called last night’s episode “The Crying Game” before it aired, which left me to wonder how this trip would differ from any other? I mean, tears, drinks, and stabbing oneself in the hand are just par for the course when The Real Housewives of New York hit the shores of any foreign country, right? As it turns out, this Colombia trip did involve a lot of crying, but it also involved ONE AMAZING WIG courtesy of Luann de Lesseps. So all was not lost!

The South American destination of Cartegena didn’t know what was coming until it saw the Ramonacoaster rolling up in a friggin wheelchair, but the ladies didn’t waste any time making their presence known. After packing montages, the group somehow makes it past airport security to officially leave the country. This is, we assume, an auspicious start.

What do you get when you mix jailbird cabaret with speed dating with mothballs? The Real Housewives of New York, of course, which is still hitting it out of the park every week this season. I don’t know whether it was Luann de Lesseps singing in her classic Tony Bennet baritone in front of a penthouse piano, Sonja Morgan touting her cabarlesque (no spellcheck can help us here, folks) skills to actual, legitimate Broadway heavyweights, or Ramona Singer attempting to robotically flirt with/stalk men in scarves. But there was a Hangover meets Laurel & Hardy vibe to this week’s episode, which is a welcome gift after last week’s dry spell on Bravo.

Okay, let’s do this. We start with Ben Rimalower and Billy Stritch walking Luann through her talking-while-singing-while-snapping version of “Money Can’t Buy You Class.” Luann is taking her upcoming cabaret show #CountessAndFriends very seriously – so seriously, in fact, that she’s bringing Sonja in on the act. Because when you think, “I need this act to be classed up a little bit” you naturally think of the woman who lounges in her own filthy bed surrounded by plastic tarps as she sniffs yesterday’s underwear. Enter: Lady Morgan.