After watching this week’s episode of “The Real Housewives of New Jersey,” there is one, and only one, person for whom I have praise: Al Manzo.
While the others were acting like kids (especially the two Joes) or lazy louts (we’re talking about you, Rich), Al was chopping wood, shaking his head in disgust at the crazy antics and generally acting like a grown-up. You could almost hear what he was thinking to himself: I’d rather be home running The Brownstone.
Why doesn’t this man have his own reality show?
The answer, of course, is that Al Manzo represents true reality, and reality shows are looking for heightened, over the top craziness.And so, you get the two Joes — Gorga and Giudice — trying to surf while intoxicated, Joe Gorga acting on a dare (during a game of “Truth or Dare”) to go up to another RV in only his underwear and ask if the strangers had any fruit they could give him and Joe Gorga exposing himself to everyone who’s sharing the RV with him, prompting sister Teresa to say, “I do not want to look at my brother’s private parts.”
Teresa, meanwhile, was among those who attempted to surf in a wetsuit. She did fairly well — until she hurt her ankle. A few minutes later, though, she says, “I hurt my foot and then it went away, maybe ’cause of the coldness of the water.”
Cut to a bit later: Teresa is in agony and icing the ankle isn’t helping much. Even later, she’s still in such pain when they’re sitting outside eating that Joe Gorga has to prod Juicy to carry Teresa in to bed. “Take care of my sister, you son of a bitch,” he says.
But then, seemingly the next morning, she’s trying to jam her ACE-bandaged foot into a high-heeled boot, which reminds us anew: You can’t buy intelligence.
By this point, the Jersey gang are moving on to Casini Ranch Family Campground, which requires them to cross San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge, which disappointed Juicy. “They lied. They said it was gold,” he says, later opining that “there’s nothing great about it.” Between the bridge and the campground, when they hit a spot where they had no cell service, everyone (except Al Manzo) acts like they’ve just driven into a nuclear mushroom cloud. “Oh, my God. We got no service. We’re gonna die,” Teresa shrieks. Gazing at the sketchy-looking people by the side of the road, her husband says, “This is like ‘Deliverance.’”
The store at the campground is not as well stocked as others they have visited. “Where’s your produce department,” Rich asks. “We don’t have a produce department,” the clerk says.
They do, however, have mood rings. And so, Juicy buys one for Tre. And Rich comes home with…a wiffle ball.
They’re supposedly down to their last piece of pasta, but somehow, the gang pulls together an amazing-looking feast. If only the conversation were as good. The Manzo boys decide to break the news to mom and dad and everyone else that Albie’s girlfriend Lindsey is moving in with them. Their sister Lauren, at that point, is somewhere else (inside an RV?), so they tell her by walkie-talkie. Figurative fireworks ensue. Lauren locks herself inside an RV and boyfriend Vito has to try to calm her down.
Morning comes. The two Joes are exercising outdoors, using a picnic bench and a tree limb as their gym equipment. Rich has to clean out the toilet line, so naturally, he gets someone else to do it. Wife Kathy says, “Rich always seems to find someone to do the dirty work. Vito and Greg are his bitches.” She seems amused. Not sure how many “housewives” out there would feel the same way about having a slug of a husband.
Then, it’s time for a canoe trip up the Russian River. Hijinx anew. Melissa and Joe Gorga wind up in the river, whose bottom, they’ve been warned, has biting critters called river ticks. Melissa keeps shrieking, until Juicy goes and picks her up. “I’ve never been so happy to touch Joe Giudice in my life,” she says.
Caroline and Al have wisely broken away from the group, in an attempt to have a “peaceful canoe ride.”
Time for another outdoor dinner. Teresa asks Jacqueline to help her get the dessert, but everyone knows what that really means. The two estranged friends are gonna have a heart-to-heart.
“Jacqueline broke my heart in a million pieces, and I just don’t know how to glue them together,” Teresa tells the camera, sounding like she’d memorized part of a Hallmark card.
Brother Joe’s take: “I love my sister, but it’s hard to be Teresa’s friend, ’cause when she’s wrong, she doesn’t want to hear she’s wrong.”
Ain’t that the truth.
Al’s wife’s take: “As sure as I know my name’s Caroline Manzo’s, Jacqueline’s going to get hurt.”
Inside the RV, Teresa tries to tell Jacqueline, again, how hurt she was by the “ambush” at Jacqueline’s house. J. tries to point out, again, that she was hurt, too, but Teresa is clearly not listening. “I’m not going to jail,” she tells Jacqueline, alluding to the tabloid story that drove a wedge between them. If she were going to jail, she says, Jacqueline would be the first to know. Teresa just does not get the larger point: She did not let Jacqueline know what was really going on in her life (from the bankruptcy to the possibility that Joe faces up to 10 years in prison if convicted on charges that he fraudulently obtained a driver’s license.)
Teresa and Jacqueline ended up hugging. But that was almost a year ago and we now know that that reconciliation didn’t stick. Jacqueline did not show up at last season’s reunion show, because she said she could not bear to see Teresa.
Coming attractions for next week’s episode include the buzzed-about scene in which Juicy excuses himself from an outdoor meal, saying he’s gotta call “work.” Teresa gets up from the table to see whom he’s talking to, and Juicy can be heard saying, “Hold on. Here she comes, my bitch wife.” According to the Huffington Post, Joe forgot he was miked, and the audio picked up a lot more than the “bitch wife” comment — it allegedly got what sounded like a cheating husband.
Bravo plans to air that scene in next week’s episode, and though my vote will not count for much here, I urge the network to do the decent thing and not air that scene. If it’s really as bad as Huffington Post made it sound, this could be the kind of thing that ends a marriage. Beyond that, Teresa and Joe’s kids could see it, or their friends could see it, and that would be awful. Play it in its entirety for Teresa, yes. But in private. America does not need to eavesdrop, too.
But that, in my opinion, would be the ethical thing to do. And ethics don’t pay off the way ratings do. So, I would count on seeing this next week.