Real Housewives of Vancouver premieres TONIGHT!

The five Real Housewives of Vancouver are sitting next to each other in a Toronto hotel, arranged, coincidentally, from most blond to least so, when one cast member lets this sip: “I think all of us would be lying if we said we didn’t love attention,” she says. “I’m an attention whore.”



Score one for honesty. But in truth, the women in person are more complex than those presented in early episodes of the series. They acknowledge the awkwardness of having personal (and drunken) moments exposed for all to see, and they worry about what their kids will think. Also, they seem to like each other, which is curious given what appears onscreen.

The producers say their goal was to tell the stories of these women and to make the audience come to love them. Judging by the first episodes of the 13-episode season, it will be an uphill battle.

The Vancouver version of Real Housewives sticks to the format of its U.S. predecessors: a group of wealthy women are followed around as they live their wealthy lives and generally carry on without an ounce of concern for the fact that most viewers would, after five minutes, conclude that they are awful people.

Ronnie, who lives in a waterfront mansion — she casually drops in that it is worth $10-million — with her family, is introduced with a voice-over that says: “At this stage in my life, I can afford to say it like it is and look good doing it.”

Christina, the self-confessed attention whore, purrs that “Vancouver is a goldmine and I love to go digging.” Later, she says that her “primary source of income is two divorces” and notes that most of the men she dates work in the mining industry, “which makes gold-digging that much easier.”

It feels like these lines have been scripted specifically in order to drive viewers crazy. The nerve of that woman! But it is one of the odd standards of this type of reality show, which offers little other than the chance to intrude on the lives of someone else, whether that is Snooki or the Kardashians or Paris Hilton — the stars of the series must know that, on some level, they are being gawked at not by an audience that admires them, but by one that judges them, and not kindly.

One assumes that the reality TV participants simply chalk up the criticism to the jealousy of people who are not, themselves, on television. Or they know that criticism and controversy feeds their success, and they are cagey enough to exploit it. (Though perhaps that’s giving the likes of Snooki far too much credit.)

Rounding out the Housewives cast are Reiko, who we meet as she is buying a new Ferrari (her third, this one with matching $10,000 luggage); Jody, a self-made business woman who runs a clothing store (“I love that we can help people with their needs. And their accessories.”); and Mary, a one-time Miss Ohio who married a Vancouverite and later, she informs us, became a “Canadian pop star.” This seems to be stretching the term “star,” but Mary says she had seven Top 40 singles in her day. Further research determines that she is Mary Zilba, who did indeed have some recording success in the mid-1990s. Seven Top 40 singles, though? Maybe on the playlist in the family kitchen.

The baffling thing about the Housewives format is that it carries on with the charade that this is not, in fact, a carefully produced reality show. The premiere episode sees the ladies gathered for a girls’ weekend in Whistler, which is a simple enough way to put them all in close proximity and commence with the cat-fighting. But instead we see Jody calling Mary, apparently an old friend, and inviting her to the weekend away. Mary even gives puzzled looks to the camera as she takes the call and wonders why Mary is calling her out of the blue. Crazy thought: because you’re on a reality show? You know, the cameras all around? Anyway, then Jody calls Reiko, also a friend; and Mary calls Ronnie, her “best friend,” and invites her along; and Jody invites Christina “because she’s a lovely person.” And also because producers cast her as the gold-digging bitch.

But reality is not what draws interest in these shows. They promise rich women doing sheltered-rich-woman things.

Viewers feel better about themselves by comparison. The producers say it is more than that; people follow the arcs of the Housewives as though they were scripted characters. A real-life soap opera, and all that.

Either way, “let us entertain you,” Christina says. “Enjoy it. Laugh at it.”

Score another one for honesty.



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GIFs by sharapwna (could a mod plz send him an invite to join ontd bc he got denied last time ty)