Editor’s Note: — Once again, Hoboken-based comedienne Eileen Budd kindly provides the latest installment of what has become a popular feature – a recap of the North Jersey-based reality show, “The Real Housewives of New Jersey.” Maybe if we’re lucky, she’ll even recap the upcoming reunion show and possibly the so-called “lost footage” episodes. If you want to her to do that, clap real loud! (She’s like Tinkerbell in that respect.) And away we go…
NORTH JERSEY – So it’s time for the families of “The Real Housewives of New Jersey” to sit down across from each other at a table and attempt to end the warring that has wreaked havoc on their lives. It’s like the capos of the Corleones and Branzinis coming together to lament their losses and put down their weapons – only in this case, the weapons aren’t piano wire and machine guns; they’re hair extensions and texts. Caroline volunteers to get the ball rolling by contacting Danielle for a meeting. “How did Caroline get my number?” Danielle asks her daughters. Probably by calling 911 and asking for The Skank in Wayne. Danielle is willing to go meet with her matriarch to matriarch. “I will get the dignity that I deserve.” Uh, I don’t think dignity is handed to you, Danielle. I think it’s something you already need to possess.
Jacqueline tells her daughter, Ashley, that Caroline is going to ask Danielle to drop the charges against her and that she can’t be texting Danielle threatening messages anymore. Emotionless Ashley sits there like a tree stump with a giant blue robin’s egg on her head. Oh, sorry, it’s actually a blue knit hat. My bad. She does come out with a good line about Danielle though. “She’s like herpes – never goes away.” Kinda like your hats too, Ashley.
Danielle confers with ex-con Danny about her upcoming meeting. “The puppeteer is Caroline,” he states emphatically. Danny must know all about puppeteers from all those meat puppets he must have encountered in prison. Danielle tells Caroline via the camera, “You’re not Carmela. You’re not a Soprano.” Well, that’s true because Carmelo never had the set of ta-tas on her that Caroline does.
So Caroline and Danielle go about getting ready for a summit that rivals a pow-wow of Obama and Ahmadinejad discussing nuclear disarmament. “I’m gonna try to get pretty,” Caroline announces. Hmmm, she may have gotten wind that Danielle may have switched teams. Wonder if she’s trying to work some of her ta-ta powers on Danielle…. And Danielle, of course, calls her energist, who offers to “scan” her over the phone. When her energist works her voodoo magic, she asks Danielle if she felt it. “I always feel it when you start on me,” Danielle answers. Sounds like more foreplay.
Danielle hires not one but two bodyguards to accompany her to the meeting. “I don’t have a reason for stress knowing that there’s guys here with guns.” Puh-leaze, Danielle. What is Caroline going to do – torture you by taking away your eyebrow pencil and leggings?
Meanwhile, the gang has gathered at The Brownstone eagerly awaiting the outcome of the diplomatic negotiations. Jacqueline’s husband, Chris, orders a drink of half wine, half Coke. What is it with these people and their cockamamie drinks? Why don’t you order grappa Jell-o shots while you’re at it? Ashley gets into it with her mother. “I don’t even want to be here right now,” she declares before running off to hide in the ladies’ room. I know why she’s hiding – she forgot her hat! Caroline’s daughter goes to talk to her and even Ashley’s own boyfriend convinces her that she needs to treat her mother better. “You need to know your place,” he says. Her place is actually in a back storeroom at Kohl’s where they keep the other damaged mannequins. But, she does wind up coming to her senses and apologizes to her mother.
And the others bond as well. Albert tells Teresa that her book, Skinny Italian, inspired him to write a book, Fat Italian: How to Eat Yourself into a Coma and Die with a Smile on Your Face. I think he’d die with a smile on his face if Caroline just left him alone.
But the tete-a-tete doesn’t go as Caroline planned. Caroline tries to appeal to Danielle’s sense of herself as a young girl who got into trouble. “You come from that place,” she says, playing on Danielle’s psyche and believing that she will drop the charges against Ashley. But Danielle is having none of it, insisting that Ashley accosted her and needs to be punished. She notes that she herself paid for her crimes. Furthermore, she takes a potshot at Caroline with, “Amazingly, I don’t need you to validate my life.” Then Danielle takes it to the limit: “How’s that going for all your friends that are under indictments right now?”
Okay, so the gloves come off and now it’s a throw down. “You’re a clown,” Caroline counters. “You’re saying this when you have red hair?” Danielle shoots back. Ladies, ladies, stop the insults…against the clowns, that is.
Caroline drives her point home to Danielle just to make things clear. “When I said that you were garbage, you are garbage.” To the camera, Caroline adds, “She is blank. She is vacant. She is soulless.” Soulless garbage is a good insult but my favorite line still comes from that other show about tasteless Jerseyites, Jerseylicious. During a feud, one young Jersey Girl tells another, “You are garbage on a barge floating down the Hudson River.” Now that’s a poetic insult!
Danielle gets up to leave. She fetches her black and white bodyguards Crockett and Tubbs or Turner & Hooch or whatever the hell their names are and vamooses. “She’s the clown…” Danielle keeps talking to no one in particular. I’m sure the bodyguards are counting down the minutes (even if they are getting overtime) before they can get rid of this kook. But no, Danielle has to bring them back to her home and introduces them to her kids. She tells her daughters to say thank you to the nice men for protecting their defenseless mommy. You can see from the expression on the girls’ faces that if they had enough money on them they would have paid the bodyguards to take mommy for a “swim” in some Meadowlands swamp.
And so the season ends with a summary of what the crew has been up to:
-One of Danielle’s daughters is modeling and the other is singing (and both are praying that their father will get custody of them).
-Danielle is writing a memoir (The Devil Wears Leggings?) and has recorded a pop song. Rumor has it that she may even be getting her own dating reality show. (Tentative title: The Skanklorette)
-Ashley wound up paying a $189 fine for assaulting Danielle but the harassment charges were dismissed. (It’s hard to prove that soulless garbage can be harassed.)
-Jacqueline is trying to lose her baby weight and is friends with Kim G.
-Teresa has a best-selling cookbook, Skinny Italian, and, despite declaring bankruptcy, maintains that her multi-million dollar house is not in foreclosure. She is currently working on a second book. (Tentative title: Stoonad Italian)
-Albie graduated from the police academy and hopes to go back to law school. This way he can play characters on both sides on Law & Order.
-Chris is managing The Brownstone and still dreams of opening up a carwash/strip club. By the time he has enough money, Teresa’s daughters should be old enough to work there.
-Lauren is a make-up artist. She hopes to have ta-tas as big as her mother’s some day.
-Albert cut back his hours at The Brownstone and is spending more time with Caroline. He likes her to dress up like Carmela Soprano and they play the Hide the Ham game when he’s not heavily sedated.
Next week is a super long reunion special. Tune in to see the weaves and hats fly.
For prior weeks’ recaps, see the links below.
To read more news and features in Hudson County, New Jersey, from our newspaper group, return to www.hudsonreporter.com.
Need a writer? Contact the author at pretty.funny@hotmail.com