This week on our favorite show, Holy Shit Is This Season Still Going?, the season was, in fact, still going. Thank our dark lord Allison Dubois that next week is the finale because I don’t think I can keep going around in circles like this for many more episodes. If there were going to be three more episodes then I was about to be the one having an episode.
I would be just like Kathy Hilton having an episode in Aspen, which we continued to tease out for another week even though there were hardly any new revelations about what exactly went down in Kyle’s $9 million duplex. The episode kicks off with Dorit FaceTiming Kyle who we know is on the set of Halloween Ends because we see the most terrifying thing ever to populate an episode of RHOBH: Kyle Denise Richards with bangs. (Her middle name is actually Egan, but could you imagine?) Dorit tells Kyle that Rinna left Crystal’s party early and it had something to do with Kathy but she’s not sure. Then Kyle said that most of what Kathy had to say that night was about her and she didn’t want to say it out loud because she didn’t want to hurt Kathy more.
I totally understand why Kyle doesn’t want to cause another rift with her sister when they just finally started talking about a year ago. But you know what you do when you want your relationship with your sister to heal? I have no clue, since I get along with all of my siblings, but even I know what you don’t do, and that is drag them on a reality television program, the same program that already ruined the life, sobriety, and reputation of your other sister. So, yeah, great plan, Kyle.
Both Kyle and Kathy miss Erika’s Pretty Mess Hair party where all of the women brought their hair stylists so they could pick out the free hair they’ll actually use and then they summarily ignored them all while they sat in the corner eating free cupcakes and bitching about which one has the worst hair dryer. (It is definitely Rinna.) But that doesn’t mean the Kathy drama wasn’t discussed. Here’s what I don’t get about Lisa Rinna. She’s at the party saying that she can’t go into what was said when Kathy had her meltdown. Why? Cause Kyle asked her not to? Because there was a cease and desist? Because she was diddling with Harry Hamlin on ChatRoulette while Kathy was stomping on her glasses.
But then, as she’s telling the ladies that she can’t talk about all of these things, she’s in her confessional spilling the tea like she’s at Sutton’s for an all-you-can-eat Popeyes buffet with sweet tea. Rinna is at the party, in her rented Tom Ford denim, and she tells Dorit that Kathy tried to silence her, sending her texts asking her to stay silent about what they talked about. But this is Lisa Rinna we’re talking about. There is not a Munchausen’s syndrome, a Kim Richards close to death, or a lesbian affair with a former castmate that she didn’t hear about off camera and then drag onto the show.
She says what she’s mad about is that Kathy is lying. We see Kathy talking about how she didn’t throw things or yell on an Instagram live when all of the women on the show (even Kathy’s allies) admit that at the club she lost her gosh darn mind because the DJ wouldn’t play Michael Jackson’s “Billie Jean.†(I’m not going to wade into the debate about whether or not an old family friend of MJ’s should be requesting his songs in the year of our discontent 2022, but I will say the reason the DJ didn’t play it is probably because they hate getting requests not because of anything having to do with the King of Pop.)
This is when we start to see Lisa saying, “I can’t go any further,†to the gang and then saying that Kathy said that everyone on the cast is dumb and she doesn’t want to be around them and it’s her show and she’s going to ruin Kyle. Dorit is a useless idiot. Crystal and Sutton deserve to be fired. I mean…and? Which one of these women hasn’t gotten wasted and slurred the same things. The only difference is that Lisa has some kind of ax to grind with Kathy and has decided that she is going to make this an issue one soap opera scene at a time.
It’s at this same party when Sheree tells everyone that at the Kemo Sabe hat party, Kathy was already pissed off. Rinna then connects all of the dots and decides it was her asking for Kendal Jenner’s tequila that set her off. Duh! That’s why she did it, especially because we now know that Kathy is jealous of the Kardashians because she probably thinks that Paris started it all and deserves some credit. Anyway, of course Lisa set her off. And this is what annoys me about her. The queen of “own it†won’t own that she set Kathy up. She won’t own that she’s kinda happy this is happening to Kathy. Instead, she’s like, “I’m sending her prayers and blessings because she needs them.†Oh Rinna, you need to retire this like you retire one of your old wigs.
What is so frustrating about all of this is that we don’t have any footage to see and I think that’s why Lisa thinks she can get away with it. She can overplay her hand. I don’t doubt, for a second, that Kathy was ranting about Kyle and how she “stole my goddamn real estate agency.†This for sure happened. What not everyone believes is all the other shit she talked. Even when Kyle relates it to Dorit she says, “Yeah she said some shit about everyone else, but it was mostly at me.†Even Crystal, when pressed, believes Kathy and thinks Rinna is making it up. Why shouldn’t we think the same thing?
Before we get back to Kathy and Kyle and Rinna and an event that we will never get to see because our God is a vengeful God, let’s take a little detour with Erika Jayne. I’m glad she’s finally doing what Kyle said she was doing when she was getting wasted, making a fool of herself, and harassing harmless teenagers at their mother’s birthday parties: She’s being vulnerable and opening up. We see her on the computer with her therapist (once again Lisa Kudrow is a visionary) about how hard her relationship with Tom really was and how she is grieving for the loss of a life she thought she had. I know there will be many people who aren’t sympathetic, and I’m not saying you should be, but it was probably the most honest we’ve seen Erika be all season and the most honest therapy session we’ve ever seen on one of these shows.
Erika also goes over to Sutton’s for Popeyes on china. Listen, you can always invite me over for Popeyes (especially cause there is only one in the U.K. and the line — sorry, queue — is always more than an hour long) but don’t you dare put it on China. Don’t try to fancy it up. Give me that grease soggy cardboard box, a napkin for when I’m eating, and two Wet Wipes for when I am done. That’s all a Brian needs in this world. Erika and Sutton start a shaky détente and Sutton tells Erika she needs to not blow up at people anymore, which she acknowledges and explains she was doing it because she didn’t feel heard. Again, you might not agree with her, but at least we’re finally getting her rationale.
Sutton also asks that Erika have some compassion in her voice when talking about the victims. Erika says that she would like some compassion too. Sutton points out that is what she is doing and I think she has gotten compassion from the rest of the group. I think where this might get lost is that many of us imagine these women are talking to us when they ask things like that. I think some will see Erika asking the public for compassion, like she deserves as much as the victims that Tom defrauded. I think what she is asking for is compassion from her coworkers. I think she was reacting to not getting as much support from some of the cast as she was expecting in the immediate aftermath of the allegations coming to light. I hope now she can see that she’s finally gotten it and she can start treating everyone on the cast with the same compassion.
Okay, so now to the Kathy and Kyle attrition scene, which was as fascinating to me as the moon landing, the queen’s funeral, and a random replay of Devil Wears Prada  you catch 20 minutes in but watch all of even though there are commercials and no one in the movie is being nearly mean enough to Andi’s stupid chef boyfriend. Kathy shows up, playing the daffy aunt picking the flowers out of Kyle’s planters and asking for forgiveness. She’s also wearing the same shirt that says “Peace†that she wore the night of the meltdown. I think this is one of the things about Kathy that drives Rinna and the rest of the girls insane. They set these rules about how they have to be dolled up and never wear the same thing twice and have “glam†every time the camera turns on. Kathy is not bothering with any of that pretense and is just as beloved as any of them.
What fascinates me about these two is that this was a real conversation. This was not a fight about the show. This was decades of love and resentment, support and betrayal, affection and hatred playing out in real time on our television. Kathy is in full crisis PR mode and knows that she needs to apologize to Kyle, but even as Kyle is saying, “How could you say those things about me?†Kathy is saying, “Kyle … Kyle,†talking down to her and trying to control the conversation. This has all happened before and it will happen again.
The two have issues — substantial and petty. Kathy hates that she can’t get Kyle on the phone. Kyle hates that Kathy calls and just rants at her and doesn’t ask how she is. Kathy wants more time just the two of them. Kyle says that she is too busy with her own family. I don’t know that they’re ever going to agree, but these two have generations of disappointment with each other and that’s not even factoring Kim into the equation and how Kyle might have exacerbated her problems with a little thing called Rich Women Doing Things. What’s left is Kyle crying on Kathy’s shoulder while she smooths her hair and says how proud she is of her. But then what is the truth? What she’s saying now or whatever she said in Aspen? (Which we still don’t entirely know what it is!)
Then Lisa Rinna shows up, conveniently, just like Kim Richards conveniently had Brandi Glanville in the car with her last season, to talk to Kathy. Just as Kyle suspected, Rinna was not there to make up, she was there to goad Kathy again. She talked her into admitting that what she said was “cruel.†She made Kathy sit there while Lisa said she needed help. She accused her of trying to shut her up. Kathy eventually breaks down in tears, says she has a friend dying of cancer, and that she doesn’t behave the way Lisa is describing. Okay, this is where they’re both wrong because Kathy behaves that way. Everyone attests to it. She can apologize for it and ask forgiveness, but she first needs to acknowledge the deep dark anger that burns inside of all the Sisters Richards.
Lisa doesn’t like that either and says, “I’m sorry Kathy, but you’re not going to get away with it from me. You can have your tears, but you did what you did, and you’re not just going to gaslight [Ed note: Ugh.] and manipulate me right now. Let’s talk about some of the things you said and some of the names you called people and we’ll go there if you want to.†Alright, is this the allegation that Kathy said some racist and homophobic things we heard about in the press? If it is then Lisa needs to actually say it rather than allege it. Also, that is the only thing that makes Rinna’s moralistic stance on all of this make sense. I can only square Rinna talking about Kathy’s “black heart†and her “hatred†if it is something like that. If it’s just a drunken rant about her coworkers and sister, who cares. But if she was dropping N-bombs and F-slurs we all need to know that.
That is when Kathy shuts the conversation down and it ends in just the way Kyle feared, with the two of them more at odds than ever. And you can practically see the blood coming through Kathy’s teeth from biting her tongue in there. We now know she has a temper, but she kept it under control while Lisa goaded her with slings, arrows, barbs, and verbal cattle prods. Kathy responded in the only way she knows how, by walking out to her car playing the doddering aunt while the ghost of Big Kathy, fat like a junkyard crow, stared down from the leaves of the trees in Kyle’s front yard, and she didn’t like anything she saw that day.