R266 Does that mean no more Andy-hosted reunions in gaudy hotels with over the top furniture and gowns from the Frederick’s of Hollywood Superboobs Couture collection?
I have come to adore RuPaul’s podcast, and last week he inteviewed Kristin Chenoweth. He asked her what TV she likes and she confessed—claiming embarrassment—that she watches all the Housewives (including Dallas!), Flipping Out, Vanderpump Rules, etc. RuPaul said, “oh, all the Bravo shows. You know what my problem is with those shows...?”
I don’t remember what his problem is. It wasn’t something serious. But his tone changed when she brought Bravo up and I liked to think, as I have said in the Drag Race thread, that he intentionally distances himself from the Cohen-Cooper cult.
I used to like Bravo and thought my black women friends were overreacting to how the Atlanta women were represented, with the wig pulling and screaming, bullhorns, undermining the importance of the Undergroun Railroad, etc. Then suddenly one night I realized how seriously mutilated many of the (mostly now former) BH cast members were. Then on WWHL I realized how Cohen has basically tripled down on this (to me) offensive expectation of conformity among gay men—the opposite of RuPaul. Cohen and Bravo capitalize on “gay” with a parade of cookie-cutter young men who take off their shirts and are gawked at by creepy old Andy, and who serve as either sidekick props to rich old ladies or who are encouraged (you and I) to revere these rich old ladies from our living rooms while obsessing over doing crunches and getting drunk. RuPaul on the other hand acknowledges that vain gay culture with his “pit crew” human props, but the focus of the show is actually on standing out by being the most different, the most creative, most talented, most surprising. Most of the Drag Race casts are not conventionally attractive and that is the only place I can think of that presents gay guys who don’t look like they walked off the CW Starling assembly line. Cohen, and even if the Bravo network has limited his power the network has kept his model, in gay terms is about being “hot,” being intoxicated and either being rich or worshipping people who are. It makes me sick.
Brandi on Big Brother, apart from a Housewives cast, stands out much more as the sort of people Cohen/Bravo have cast. She was once gorgeous but is in the process of Michael Jackson-level self-mutilation. She seems to be drunk or at least drinking all the time on Big Brother (as she did on RHOBH) and plays it up like it’s funny and cool, as her Bravo pimp daddy does with alcohol, weed and cocaine. It’s really sad to me to watch. I saw an ep of Big Brother in which she has to crawl through a dark room and she slurred “OF COURSE I had a glass of wine first to calm my nerves” with a giggle. A glass of wine, fine, but Bravo actually celebrates alcoholism and takes everything way too far—I honestly thought the show might show Kim Richards OD and play it up in dramatic promotions and then build Kyle up as a strong survivor, etc.
I’ve had my fill of what this network offers. I am not coming from a place of “social justice.” I just feel personally insulted by the way the network coopted gay identities and essentially was a major force in eradicating the parts of gay culture that I’ve always identified with—creativity, individualism, being proud of being different—and mainstreamed “gay” as an entirely superficial, uninteresting, paint-by-numbers identity based on consumerism, narcissism, and old men and women denying their ages through terrifying surgeries, drugs and alcohol, and fucking trophy guys.
