Are The Real Housewives Immortal?
Do you ever think about the fact that none of the Real Housewives have died? I do. A lot.
Maybe this is the first you’re hearing of this fact, but it’s true: none of the Housewives from Bravo’s The Real Housewives saga have passed. I’m talking about the series that are first-run in America. I’m not positive about the survival rate of all the international versions that have spun off in other countries. (First freedom, then The Real Housewives? America just gives and gives!) And yes, I know one of the Ladies of London died. Of course I know that.
How is this possible? This season of The Real Housewives of Orange County marks the 100th season of Real Housewives, which means a few things: 1) I have seen 100 seasons of The Real Housewives 2) There’s a lot of these women, so how have none of them met a tragic end?
It’s certainly not like they’ve played it safe. They’ve survived prison stints, home invasions, addictions, cancers, both real and imagined. The entire cast of The Real Housewives of New York almost drowned before our eyes off the shores of Cartagena. Vicki Gunvalson had to be airlifted from a dune buggy accident to a hospital where her former and now once-again-current best friend Shannon Beador refused to visit her. Speaking of Shannon, she recently hit a house with her car. She’s fine.
What’s going on here? Are the Real Housewives immortal? Maybe that’s why Sonja Morgan was in no rush to produce that toaster oven. She’s got time. Maybe she’s got all of it. If being a Housewife leads to immortality, you could see why Marlo Hampton worked so hard to grab that peach. It makes a lot more sense now, doesn’t it?
When my mom was dying she’d rewatch The Real Housewives and send me texts, typically pertaining to a seasons-ago dust up. They were usually in the vein of “Who does Alexis Bellino think she is anyway?” These messages existed in their own timeline, as I was receiving them long after Alexis had left the show and long before she, of course, inevitably, returned to it.
It’s weird to type “when my mom was dying,” because that’s not how I talked about it or perceived it at the time. That’s something I’m projecting on that time period now, like I’m rewatching an old season, knowing what’s coming. You don’t usually refer to someone as dying while it’s happening even if, when you look at the medical facts, that's what's happening. It can make it difficult for people around you to understand what’s going on in your life for the simple fact, you know, you’re not telling them what’s going on in your life. It’s not unlike the way The Real Housewives of New Jersey’s Teresa Giudice struggled to say she was going to prison after she was convicted of “signing papers,”and preferred to say “going away.” Of course, labeling things doesn’t make them real…right? They’re all just words until you’re the one saying them.
I guess that seems weird or maybe even sad to people that my mom spent some of her last months rewatching RHOC, but, with absolutely all due respect to Tim McGraw’s “Live Like You Were Dying,” it’s actually quite difficult to go skydiving, Rocky Mountain climbing or 2.7 seconds on a bull named Fumanchu when you have ovarian cancer. And not everyone wants to do that anyway. The last year of her life she told me “these doctors need to tell me if I have a month to live or what! I have a lot of videos to watch.”
She was dying and she was watching these women who it seems will never die, as they tempt fate at every turn. Maybe that’s why so many of us watch and rewatch these shows. We’re looking for tips and tricks! Does immortality lie in sky tops, in skincare launches, in not knowing how to pluralize the word “text”? It seems like it!
In fairness to the Housewives, they have known death. We’ve watched them lose their partners, their parents, their friends, and even most tragically, their children. Mary M. Cosby mourned all those people who died in the heatwave that created the best grapes of all time for the Dom Pérignon at her Met Gala-themed luncheon at Valter’s, Salt Lake City’s most famous Italian restaurant. Well, she mentioned them at least. The Housewives have borne witness to death. It’s not easy to be the one who survives. I’m guessing.
And here’s another thing -- spoiler alert -- the Real Housewives are going to die too. I don’t know that from social media or a podcast. I didn’t get an advance screener. You’re gonna hate how I know this: it’s because we’re all going to die. It’s that thing that hangs in the air constantly, to be acknowledged never, like Kristen Taekman in season seven of The Real Housewives of New York.
For now, it seems the Housewives work on Earth is not done. And they will continue to be real life characters in this modern day parable, helping us to live in the discomfort of the internal questions for which will never have answers but seem more pressing than ever.
How can some people come so close to death but never die?
When we label things do we make them true?
Who does Alexis Bellino think she is anyway?