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The Real Housewives of New York City Recap: Switching Teams

Season 14 Episode 9 Editor’s Rating2 stars **

Photo: Bravo After watching this episode, I’m more confused than Shawn Mendes in Timothée Chalamet’s dressing room when it comes to determining which team I’m on. Am I Team Brynn or Team Erin? Am I Team Erin or Team Brynn? Back and forth, back and forth, like one of those sprinklers oscillating on suburban lawns.

I’m definitely not Team Erin when she shows up to dinner at the Sun Shine Shack wearing a dress right out of an old Laura Ashley catalog. How many grandmothers’ couches had to die for that dress? When they all sit down, Ubah once again brings up Brynn flirting with Erin’s husband, Abe, at their anniversary party, which was all speeches and no food. Brynn then apologizes for saying that the party was boring, and I am decidedly anti-Brynn because, yes, that party was boring and someone needs to tell Erin so she never throws one again.

Brynn says she only said the party was boring to hurt Erin because she accused her of “something disgusting,” which is flirting with a married man. Girl, we saw you flirt with that husband! Brynn’s whole schtick is that she flirts with everyone, and, you know what, I’m cool with that. I’m firmly in the stance that flirting is always good. Flirt often and liberally. Flirt shamelessly and with abandon. Flirt with men, women, and those who identify as neither. A little bit of flirting is never a bad thing. Now if Brynn is actually trying to fuck Erin’s husband, that’s another matter, but she clearly was not. Brynn is waiting for an apology from Erin that is not deserved and will never come. Brynn is denying two true things here: that the party was boring and that she flirted with Abe.

Sai cuts the argument short by ordering food because that is apparently her only joke. The conversation then turns to Jenna and how she has difficulty opening up to the other women. I am fascinated by Jenna Lyons, not only because she’s so chic and effortlessly cool, but because I’ve never seen a Real Housewife be so incredibly authentic. Also, I love a Housewives storyline about not sharing enough. Usually, we get stuck with people like Noella Bergener on RHOC, who in her first scene is like, “Wanna hear about my vagina stack and my porce?”

She even admits to being guarded because she’s been fucked over so many times, but I don’t think that Jenna has been that withholding from the women. She’s talked about being outed by the Post, her mother’s death, and her insecurities around her skin condition and appearance. I mean, what else do you want? For Jenna to put a QR code for her period-tracking app in the group chat?

That is when Jenna gets very vulnerable, talking about how her mother had extreme Asperger syndrome and no one could speak in her house. I am haunted by this story, the idea of her and her (hot) brother coming home from school to a silent house with static-y wall-to-wall carpet and just sitting silently in their rooms while the wrong notes from juvenile piano lessons seep through the floorboards. No wonder Jenna is like she is, but also what a miracle Jenna has gotten past that to become who she is.

Then, she turns the spotlight on Jessel. In my mind, Jessel said, “Well, I’ve been waiting for you to ask,” and then she pulled down a movie screen from a palm tree, set up a projector, and played an 18-hour Bollywood epic about her family leaving Kenya to come to London and sleeping on the streets of Paris and how that ended with her packing boxes as a fashion intern. No one was amused.

On the ride home, I was definitely not Team Erin because we find out that she not only doesn’t know what a WAP is but doesn’t want one either and thinks it’s gross. God, how is Erin just a walking pair of granny panties? Sure, go ahead, don’t have a WAP, but I feel bad for her poor husband and his sad, dry closet bangs.

The next morning, after Jessel and Ubah talk some shit about Brynn while lying in bed, all of the women eat breakfast and once again talk about their dysfunctional mothers. (For the record, the only thing I like more than flirting is dysfunctional mother talk.) This time, it’s Sai’s chance to talk about her alcoholic mother and how she always had to take care of her. Then she had a heart attack all alone on a park bench. Since her mother loved her eyebrows, Sai went to the hospital and did her eyebrows one last time, saying, “You’re not going out like this.” No, I’m not crying. You’re crying! (I am also crying.)

After breakfast, we learn two facts about Brynn that are so obvious I’m surprised they didn’t hit us in the face. The first is that she is a certified yoga instructor, which means that the Housewives universe is now approximately one degree of separation away from Hilaria Baldwin. Secondly, she wants to put her “yoni” in the sun. She better be careful. Josh Brolin burned his taint that way. The scene on the beach then devolves into what seems like a really fun photo shoot with Jenna operating the camera as everyone else poses. I would have thoroughly loved this scene, but the entire time, I was haunted by the ghost of Kelly Killoren Bensimon saying, “Johan face. Johan face,” while taking pictures on Scary Island.

Then it is off to lunch, where the women sit on a different beach with a different set of picnic tables, this one painted a lovely shade of turquoise. Sai asks Brynn about how her dating life is going, and after a brief discussion about dating three guys a day, she talks about getting her eggs frozen. She says when she went to get the procedure done, they told her that it’s more viable to free embryos rather than eggs and asked if she had anyone in mind and Brynn said she started going through her phone looking for candidates.

Now, I have many problems with Erin, but the biggest is that she can’t take a joke or tell when anyone else is joking. She thinks Brynn is lying about it and tells Ubah, at the other end of the table, that it’s a weird thing for Brynn to lie about. The way Erin hears it is that the fertility clinic told Brynn to go look through her phone to find a sperm donor. Yeah, that’s not what she said. Brynn was doing a bit. Brynn has clearly told this story many times before, and this is where she gets all the laughs, joking about which dude in her Rolodex was going to be the father of her baby.

Then Erin tells Brynn at the table that she’s lying about this. Okay, sure. Brynn may have embellished the details and is playing up her search for laughs, but Erin doesn’t get that. Nothing but exactly the truth from Erin, apparently, who I don’t think has ever told a good story in her life. (I feel like most of Erin’s stories start, “The other day I was getting a blowout and …”)

Erin then tells Brynn that she’s being too sensitive about it. What?!?!?! Erin, who got mad because someone was flirting with her husband jokingly, is calling Brynn too sensitive? That is the picnic table calling ugly jewelry turquoise.

When they all return to the house, Brynn and Erin don’t know if they love or hate each other, but I know I went from Team Brynn to Team Erin back to Team Brynn again. Even when Erin made a legitimately funny joke about looking like George Washington, I still can’t like her. Brynn decides to skip that night’s dinner to stay home and rest. Sai, the nominal host, is understanding but tells Brynn that this is the only time out she gets. This is a great Housewives rule on any trip, and I like Sai for instituting it. We know whose team she is on. It’s Team Drama, and I think that’s the team we’re all rooting for.

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