It is the particular ability of Real Housewives to turn the doing of something good (or straightforward) into a giant diabolical mess of bickering, tantrums, and meltdowns. The Real Housewives Of Atlanta headed to Houston to do some charity work after the devastation of Hurricane Harvey but brought a new kind of devastation all of their own making. Thanks, but no thanks!
I don’t want to imply nothing of merit happened on this trip, but competing charity events in hurricane-destroyed towns, complete with all the accompanying Housewives histrionics, may be a new low. Possibly? Maybe I should try to be more positive and instead believe the ladies were so overcome with emotion from their good works and seeing people who lost everything that in turn they lost their heads? Naaaahhh.
I will say, all the new interview looks were great. Cynthia Bailey was like a disco ball lit from within. Although I didn’t think Porsha William‘s repurposed Kim Zolciak wig was her best, the dress was fantastic. Sheree Whitfield‘s pale pink dress was also super flattering.
It all started out rather sweetly, a tale of sisterhood and putting aside differences for the greater good. During NeNe Leakes‘ Elephants Crush The Circus energy rave (is NeNe intentionally trying for the stupidest and nonsensical events this season?) Porsha mentioned that her family charity Hosea Feed The Hungry & Homeless was doing a drive to gather supplies and food for Houston, then heading down there to distribute them. Porsha invited all the women, but was met with dead silence, because as Kandi Burruss explains, nobody likes Porsha. And if nobody likes Porsha that means they also can’t like helping people in dire straights.
Kandi made sure to mention that she personally had donated $20,000 to families in need, because Kandi is a person who really values and understands those feelings of hunger. Girl will run over your foot for some fried chicken!
Cynthia found herself in a tough spot. See, SHE was going to Houston to do her own fundraising/uplifting event on the very same weekend and had also planned to invite the women. Therefore she felt obligated to attend Porsha’s event – if Porsha was willing to come to hers in exchange. And Porsha was! I felt this little quake of glee, ‘Look – Real Housewives behaving like REAL HUMANS. Something is amiss with the world, but for now I will take it!’ And you know for a while, NOTHING was amiss.
I don’t know what everyone else’s excuses were for not attending. I guess NeNe is too self-important to fit her ego in a food drive, and Kim, likewise, only likes herself and her Instagram feed. Kenya Moore is a wife and that is a full-time job even though they don’t live together. Sheree still has a back injury from her car accident and is under Dr. Tyrone‘s orders to sit on her backside. But seriously – why is no one demanding a doctor’s note?
Porsha and Cynthia went to Houston with their sisters in tow. Luckily, Cynthia managed to abandon her Scarecrow from The Wiz look before traveling to Houston, cause, girl, those glasses were previously worn by my seventh grade science teacher who also still had a mustache left over from 1975.
Then Shamea Morton met up with them. For a brief moment there was no drama. Even though Porsha and Shamea are kinda still not speaking. Porsha was initially weirded out by Shamea inviting herself. Shamea decided to show-up in Houston as a way of glossing over all their issues and pretending they never happened. A Housewife in Houston is still a Housewife with a vendetta and a demand for an apology, after all!
Porsha is hurt because Shamea intentionally embarrassed her during the bridal party by questioning Porsha’s health issues in front of the Kandi Koated Klique, but Shamea actually seems like she’s in Houston for the right reasons. And what better way to show you’re a friend than to attend the charity event of the friend you’re having a tiff with? Later they talk through it like normal friends and make amends, and it was really cute.
First, the ladies did a food drive hosted by Porsha’s family foundation. Porsha explains that for her grandfather feeding the hungry and homeless was an important, except that didn’t always extend to his granddaughter. Porsha shared an anecdote of the time when she and her mother were so hungry and poor, they were digging in the creases of the car seats to ferret out coins for the dollar menu. Yet they didn’t hit up Hosea!? Porsha is the most curious legacy of her grandfather and I am dying to know more about her backstory, instead of her backside, which is what she usually displays.
Anyway, then Porsha headed off to do radio promotion for the bigger event the following day, while Cynthia got dressed for her charity gala and drive. Porsha, Shamea, and Lauren were exhausted and barely had time to change or straighten their wigs, but they still made it for Cynthia’s event and were super engaged. Porsha was feeling all inspired by the sisterhood and togetherness, and really excited that her relationship with Cynthia was growing. Likewise, Cynthia was impressed with this different side of Porsha, and then record scratch: KENYA CAME WALTZING THROUGH THE DOOR.
Literally as soon as Kenya showed up, Cynthia showed Porsha her back. Kenya had scrounged up this opportunity to volunteer with Habitat For Humanity. Her brother and his family live in Houston, and although it sounds like they weren’t directly affected by the hurricane, it was still important for Kenya to help, and she included her sister-in-law and nieces. All extremely nice. Except Porsha had planned a huge charity food and goods drive and gathered enough donations for several hundred and was counting on Cynthia to also be there.
In the spirit of this burgeoning sisterhood, Porsha even suggested Shamea skip the food drive to help Kenya’s project – and Porsha sent a donation. Of course that’s because Porsha was expecting Cynthia to come help her and all.
But all good deeds are not repaid, as we know.
That morning, as they’re literally walking out the door, Cynthia informs Porsha that instead she’s going to volunteer with Kenya. Kenya, who showed up last-minute and is already being a twaty-B by bossing everyone around about how whatever SHE is doing is more important than what they are. She even shades Cynthia and Porsha for just hosting events instead of getting their hands dirty. UGH.
As always, Krayonce needs to check herself before she wrecks herself, but Krayonce has no brakes – wedding ring or not!
Then Kenya is straight-up obnoxious at the site; ordering everyone around, barking commands, snapping, acting like she’s running Habitat and is too important for even a water break (later she will have her fill #Foreshadowing), demanding everyone do more because SHE is the arbiter of what constitutes a good deed.
When Shamea calls to find out which house they’re working in, Kenya brusquely tells her she has no time for small talk and hangs up (Kenya had time to apply false eyelashes to wear with her googles though!). When Shamea arrives, Kenya orders her to “trash duty.” No one missed the hidden message there! Shamea was EXTREMELY nice about it, though. I might’ve trash dutied all over Krayonce’s face.
Seriously – Kenya acted like SHE personally was getting a family back in their home with her one afternoon of work!
Porsha’s event is so successful they run out of food and need local restaurants to bring more hot meals. They were expecting 400 – 500 people, but over 2,000 came. I suppose that doesn’t count since she wasn’t ripping insulation off the walls?
Afterwards, the ladies hit up a BBQ restaurant, but Kenya was too busy vacuuming her hotel room and lecturing her dog children, because wives always create domestic bliss even if their husbands are no where in sight, ergo she was very late to dinner! Because wives also routinely blow off their friends since their invisible husbands come first.
The only thing ‘baby vegan’ Porsha can eat is corn on the cob and a side salad, and it must’ve put her in a saucy mood because she and Lauren confronted Cynthia about how quickly she denounced them once Kenya arrived; instantly breaking her previous commitment to Porsha. Cynthia played dumb by pretending she had already helped Porsha during the Hosea food drive, and then tried to argue that it was “all about charity, not the ladies personally.” Cynthia complains that Porsha should be grateful she came to any of her stuff, considering that it’s Porsha who no one likes or wants to support. SIGH.
I adore Cynthia sometimes, but she is a spineless Jell-O model of a person and needs to get her saran wrap off Kenya. Furthermore Cynthia had just been complaining that since Kenya got married she blows everyone off with piss-poor excuses – like bailing on dinner with Cynthia and Kandi for basically no reason.
Shamea is also offended that Kenya was so brusque and rude to her at Habitat. Cynthia, to take the heat off herself, encourages Shamea to share her feelings with Kenya. Boy was that some WRONG advice. Kenya must’ve been hangry, and that will teach you to roll into a restaurant late, because when she FINALLY arrived the kitchen was closed and no one even had a leftover bone for her to gnaw on. So she gnawed on Shamea instead.
Shamea fell right into a trap of taking Cynthia’s advice and mentioned how “rude” and “dismissive” Kenya was of her efforts to help. If Shamea wanted to see rude and dismissive, though, Kenya decided to show her! She interrupted Shamea to demand more water (she’s thirsty!) and continued cutting her off to snark her feelings weren’t valid since it was about charity. When Porsha jumped in to help Shamea make her point, Kenya brushed her off too. Except even Cynthia agreed that just maybe “people thought you were rude.” So what does this mature married woman do? She stormed away form the table and hid in the bathroom, screaming at a producer.
As she stomped away, Kenya grumbled about ‘f–king stupid bitches,’ who she doesn’t need because she is a wife, and her husband doesn’t want himself her embarrassed. Kenya believes that being a wife is now the single most important defining factor of her life. Maybe because she has waited so long to get married, but she puts so much stock into what is essentially a word. And they don’t even live together!
I assume Marc wants Kenya to leave RHOA, but it also sounds like he (or she) also wants Kenya to leave her personal identity behind and become a different person overnight. Kenya thinks she makes him sound like this dream man, but instead he sounds like an egotistical ass.
Kenya rants that Shamea is trying to diminish all the good she did, by focusing on herself, and Kenya will not have that! The focus must stay on how much Kenya helped! She insists the women undermine her on purpose. Back at the table everyone is shocked.
Porsha decides to check on her, and Kenya practically slams the door in her face because “this isn’t a moment.” The moment is instead Kenya storming out of the restaurant! In the parking lot, Cynthia tries to speak with her but Kenya rolls the window up in her face and refuses. She’s got Marc to do, and nothing else.
Shamea is married, but she doesn’t go around screaming that she is a WIFE and therefore gets to act out however much she pleases, cause her husband says no one is allowed to be rude to her.
If we thought Krayonce was crazy, Mrs. Daly is next level. And I thought this was supposed to be about helping people, not ourselves?
Back in Atlanta, our Love During Lockup installment includes Sheree telling Tyrone that she believes the only reason NeNe has an elephant with her is over him. Tyrone, in exchange, warns that NeNe should step carefully – he knows things. Word on the street things! Have prison time; will gossip!
Allegedly NeNe once tried to “pursue” Tyrone, even inviting him to the Celebrity Apprentice set and following him to an out of town location – NeNe may or may not have been separated from Gregg during this time! But what’s a little thing like investigating the truth matter to Sheree and Tyrone? Luckily for Sheree (and NeNe), NeNe is not the Tyrone’s type. NeNe is not enough of a push-over. And he only has eyes for Sheree’s chateau booty.
Finally, Kandi is still having issues with Riley and Block, but Kandi and Block talked and decided they needed to communicate better to set the example for Riley that she is allowed to have a relationship with her father. It was very grown-up, but poor Riley – Block is still a jerk.
P.S. Seeing Houston was so humbling and it actually made me – a person whose heart has turned black from years of Housewives of exposure – cry. So any good the ladies did there, however small and misguided, was still ultimately a good deed.
TELL US – IS KENYA OUT OF CONTROL, OR WAS SHAMEA TRYING TO BE SHADY? SHOULD CYNTHIA HAVE SUPPORTED PORSHA’S EVENT? DO YOU THINK NENE TRIED TO CALL TYRONE?
[Photo Credits: Bravo]
