The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills
“Mind your P’s and BBQ’s”
June 3, 2020
After a little preview of the episode’s big confrontation, and a promise from Kyle that, “OH WE’LL GET TO THAT IN A MINUTE!” we begin the episode with an event the Los Angeles Mission is holding to honor Garcelle for her work with their organization. Garcelle explains that having grown up in Haiti, she knows from poverty, and now that she’s successful, she wants to give back.
As for the event itself, she’s not doing this passive-aggressive Teddi crap: yes, she wants the other women to be there and she’s not ashamed to say so.
Garcelle picks Rinna up for the gala and on the ride there, they discuss what Garcelle missed in Santa Barbara. After discussing Denise’s weirdness for no more than a hot second — Garcelle is Team Denise on this issue about talking about sex near the children — they turn on Kyle again, and how Kyle told Dorit that she and Erika are not actually as good of friends as they think they are. Now, I agree it’s a weird thing to say to someone, but while Erica and Dorit’s friendship has nothing to do with Kyle, it has even less to do with either Rinna or Garcelle, so …
They arrive at the gala, as do the rest of the cast but Dorit, who has a fever, and after establishing that yes, they are at a fancy Hollywood event — Nick Cannon is the MC, y’all! and he hopefully won’t say anything anti-Semitic! — the women sit down to a woefully underseasoned dinner. Finally, Ali Larter presents Garcelle with her award and she takes the stage.
In an interview, Garcelle opens up about how her older son, Oliver, had struggles with drugs and homelessness. She and Oliver’s father did everything they could to help him, but eventually, there was no more they could offer, and there were times when she couldn’t see him. In those times, Garcelle would volunteer at The Mission, which made her feel like she was feeding her son. Oliver is better now, thank goodness, and starting his own family. It’s an honest, heartbreaking confession.
We do not see her say any of this on stage, however, and instead the part of the speech we do see is where she says that she hopes her sons are proud of her. She then points out the table of her “new best friends … some of them not so much,” she says while pointedly looking at Kyle, before adding, “We’ll figure that out.”
The other women:
Teddi wonders if Kyle and Garcelle had some beef, and Kyle’s like, “NONE THAT I KNOW ABOUT!” And that’s when Erika and Sutton return from the bathroom having missed the entire thing.
The ladies retire outside where they chat for a few until Denise is like, “Alright, I don’t have time for this bullshit, I’ve got a real job to do in the morning, byeeeee.” Kyle, for one, isn’t buying the whole “I am on a soap opera and have 30 pages of dialogue” excuse, and thinks Denise is just trying to avoid a confrontation. But to be fair — and God knows I’m not a Denise Richards apologist — soap opera work is long and super hard.
After Denise leaves, Garcelle asks about the Santa Barbara trip and they all tell her that it was a fun sleepover until Denise made it weird by shutting down a conversation they were trying to have with her over the whole “talking about sex in front of her kids” thing. The women pout that it seems Denise is trying to make them all look like bad mothers.
But in an interview, Rinna shares my theory that it’s all because Denise has some regrets about talking so freely about sex in the previous season and is now trying to make herself look like The Good Mother. Word.
Garcelle changes the subject, telling the women that she doesn’t feel like she’s really making a deep connection with them, that they aren’t “fully present” with her, Kyle in particular.
Rinna, Godbless her:
Kyle protests that she thought they had a good conversation a few weeks ago about Garcelle’s big move and the new house and her kids, and honestly, does Garcelle know that much more about Kyle than all that? But Garcelle sticks to her guns: she just feels like Kyle is more interested in what Kyle has to say than what Garcelle has to say.
And then in an interview, Garcelle adds that she thinks that when Kyle is interested in you, she is a very good friend … but be sure to ask Teddi, not Dorit.
So then we sit in on dinner with Denise and her weirdo meathead husband where Denise tells him for the first time about her trip to Santa Barbara (and we are all expected to believe that this is the first time he’s heard this, that she waited to tell him this whole story until the cameras became available, because the producers think we are idiots).
And before we get to their conversation, I have to comment on Denise’s completely insane dinner order — which I never do with these shows, that’s how insane it is. She orders: “mashed potatoes and the salad but just the cucumbers and shaved parmesan no dressing or peppers or anything.”
Mashed potatoes and a plate of cucumbers with shaved parmesan. That’s her meal.
So Denise tells him about how she complained to the women about Sami overhearing their threesome talk and how they think she’s trying to make them look bad by telling them not to talk that way around her kids. “WHY NOT SHUT THE FUCK UP, HOW ABOUT THAT,” is this very calm, very rational man’s response.
Denise notes that being Charlie Sheen and Denise Richards’ kids already comes with enough baggage — true that! — and she doesn’t need her friends adding to that baggage by telling her to calm down because her kids have heard far worse things about their father or her. (I mean, OK, but they probably have? And that is not to say that her kids shouldn’t be treated like kids by her friends, just that Saint Denise act is a thin one.)
Denise then complains to her husband that having Rinna call her a hypocrite is what hurt the most. They’ve known each other for years, so why is she bringing up Denise’s past and work in movies like Wild Things now?
Denise then informs her husband that they’ve been invited to a barbecue at Kyle’s house, but he jokes that he’s “completely booked.” When she tells him that she has to go or it will bite her in the ass later, he promises to bite her on the ass later and THIS IS EXACTLY WHAT EVERYONE IS TALKING ABOUT: IT IS FINE FOR YOUR HUSBAND TO DO SOME SEXY FLIRTING WITH YOU, ESPECIALLY WHEN THE KIDS AREN’T AROUND. HOMEVER, YOUR KIDS ARE DEFINITELY GOING TO SEE THIS AND YOU WILL HAVE NO ONE TO BLAME BUT YOURSELVES WHEN THEY ARE “UNCOMFORTABLE.”
Kyle’s barbecue — or “barbecue” because who are we kidding, she has this whole thing catered every year and we’re just lucky she’s not showing up in an evening gown this time. Kyle has set up a bouncy house for the kids and set up a cool Arabian Night’s tent situation out in the yard, and most people arrive with their kids in tow because that was how this was billed: as a family-friendly backyard barbecue.
But let’s just pause here and also acknowledge that this is also clearly a test on Kyle’s part. Denise swore just a week before that she wasn’t going to bring her daughters around the other women anymore, and Kyle was challenging her. And Denise, she accepts the challenge.
On their way to Kyle’s, Aaron and Denise — sans daughters — discuss how very much they do not want to go to this barbecue, and where they should go for dinner afterward, because while they may show up, they sure as hell aren’t going to stay. In fact, the driver gives them his number in the event they want to leave early, and they’re like, “YES PLEASE.”
Meanwhile, everyone is having a good time at the barbecue: the kids are playing, the women are comparing outfits, and Teddi is talking about turning her placenta into a pill, which Garcelle scoffs at.
She’s not wrong.
Denise and Aaron arrive, bearing gifts, even: a “grounding bag” filled with mashed potatoes and cucumbers crushed crystals to combat EMF and 5G. Aaron assures Kyle that she needs to sleep with it: it will cure anything and everything. If she has a headache, she needs to “put it on [her] liver” and it will work.
Kyle asks where the kids are, and Denise explains that two are on sleepovers and Eloise is on a playdate, and Kyle’s like, “But I got a bounce house and everything!” Denise, she don’t care.
Everyone grabs food and then makes their way to the long table in the yard where they are forced to sit on pillows. Poor Teddi, who is 39 months pregnant, laughs that she has come to the realization that they are going to proceed this season as if she is not pregnant. And I am not a Teddi fan, but she’s not wrong.
As they take their seats (on the ground), Garcelle asks Denise where her kids are, and Denise quietly — but not quite quietly enough — replies, “do you think I’d bring them around everyone?” Garcelle laughs that she shouldn’t after what happened last time. Kyle, who is directly across the table from them is like, “The hell? I thought they had other engagements?” But Denise is all, “I’m pretty sure I made my feelings clear in Santa Barbara about this.”
At this point, everyone is in on the conversation and Teddi tells Denise and her doofus husband that it’s insulting they are no longer willing to have their kids in the ladies’ presence, and Dorit points out that everyone else is fine with it — they all brought their kids to Kyle’s.
Denise tries to backtrack a bit, claiming that her teens had other plans, and anyway, it’s also her date night with Dingus. Garcelle comes to her defense that it’s up to Denise to decide what she’s comfortable with for her children, which is not unfair! But when keeping the kids away from the other women is mean to be insulting — which it clearly was — it is, in fact, insulting.
Teddi continues talking about how Denise is trying to make the rest of them look bad at which point Denise’s Quack Husband declares that this entire conversation “ridiculous.” Mr. Mansplainer then patronizingly tells the women that they invited them to their house to break bread and the ONE THING they asked was to pay attention to the fact that their sweet innocent teenagers were sitting nearby and could hear everything that was being said. WAS IT TOO MUCH TO ASK FOR THEM TO NOT SOIL THEIR DAUGHTERS’ VIRGIN EARHOLES?
Rinna decides she’s going to get to the bottom of this and cuts to the after-party conversation Denise had with her daughter Sami: how’d that all go down? Did Sami come to Denise with questions? What was said? But Rinna replies it was a private conversation and she will not be discussing it with them.
Narrator: It wasn’t a private conversation. In fact, Denise invited the crew to film it.
And in that conversation, Denise prods Sami as to what she overheard. When Sami laughs that she and her friends heard talk of threesomes, Denise pretends to be mortified. But Sami waves it off: whatever, they thought it was hilarious. BECAUSE IT WAS. And also, too, leaving aside the fact that she’s the daughter of Charlie Tiger Blood Sheen, she’s growing up in the heart of Los Angeles, does her mother REALLY believe she doesn’t know what a threesome is?
Rinna’s sensing something is fishy here, and is becoming a full-on Sami Truther.
Back at the party, some non-cast member is assuring Denise and Mr. Aggro that teenagers absolutely know what threesomes are, but Not-Dr. Asshole is all, “I MEAN, MAYBE, BUT WHAT IF THEY DIDN’T, GOT CURIOUS AND WENT A’GOOGLING?” When Kyle kinda shrugs, Beefcake is all, “ALRIGHT, SO WE’RE DONE WITH THIS CONVERSATION, RIGHT? LET’S TALK ABOUT SOMETHING ELSE. GREAT. IT’S DECIDED.”
Except since no one elected him President of the Conversation, the women are all taken aback by his presumptuousness, and Erika and Rinna leave the table out of disgust.
Kyle, still attempting to be diplomatic, explains that women and men handle conflicts differently and is backed up by Teddi and Dorit that Denise’s refusal to bring her kids around them feels “passive aggressive” and like she is “mom shaming” them.
“DEFINE ‘PASSIVE AGGRESSIVE,'” Denise’s Talking Steroid begins demanding, barking over Kyle, “DEFINE ‘PASSIVE AGGRESSIVE!'” And when Kyle tries to explain, Man-Ape starts yelling at all the other women, demanding to know how all of this is making them feel right now, “NOT GREAT, RIGHT?”
At one point, Kyle and Denise are discussing the Santa Barbara trip when Dorit’s child comes over to her mother. At that same moment, Denise is huffing that she had gone to get a “fucking facial,” causing Teddi and Dorit to burst out laughing at the hypocrisy on display BECAUSE IT’S REALLY FUCKING HYPOCRITICAL.
And that’s when Mr. 5G Crystal Bag starts yammering about how this whole conversation is stupid and how when one person wins, other people want to know how they won and that they should all keep that in mind.
He then demands that everyone put their hands in the center of the table and do a “Hoo-ra.”
And he then adds that he’s just “giving them a hint and a clue.” When Teddi, God bless her, sarcastically replies “thank you,” BECAUSE HONESTLY, DUDE, THE GALL, Denise orders her to “stop it,” and calls her a “shit fuckin’ stirrer.”
Denise tries to claim that Teddi had been in agreement with her when they got facials together but that she changed her tune once they arrived in Santa Barbara and ANYWAY WHAT DOES HER IMDB PAGE HAVE TO DO WITH AN INAPPROPRIATE CONVERSATION BEING HELD IN FRONT OF HER DAUGHTERS. With that, Denise declares that she and her rabid St. Bernard are done and leaving.
They stand up and begin marching out, with Denise’s halfwitted husband yelling dumb insults about how they’re all off his Christmas card list while Denise tries and fails to shush him. “We are on camera,” she reminds him, “don’t say a fucking word.”
Dorit and Kyle chase after them, insisting that it’s stupid for them to leave this way and Ding-a-Ling keeps trying to engage, while Denise again reminds him to shut the fuck up, they are being taped. Goofus here, tells Denise through gritted teeth to not tell him what to say before maybe threatening to crush her hand that he’s holding?
Kyle keeps insisting that she doesn’t want them to leave this way, only to receive a sullen, “Shit happens” from Mr. Personality, and with that, they march off of her driveway and into their getaway car off of the show.
The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills airs on Bravo.