The ‘Real Housewives’ Franchise Is A Timeless Horror Anthology About The Nightmares of Patriarchy — And I’m Obsessed With It

It’s official: I’ve entered a streaming psychosis, a dissociative content-induced fugue state. When the world gets scary, we must search for ways to practice self-care, no matter the method. Reader, I’ve finally found something that works for me. I’ve gone a lifetime without watching a single episode of Real Housewives, of any city. I have almost zero knowledge about any character within the franchise, as I’ve always turned my nose up at this drama-filled reality series. As it turns out, no one is “above” Real Housewives, and my snobby ass has finally been set straight. Join me, isolated folk, and pick your dissociative poison. I’ve divested fully from the doom unfolding outside my windows, and decided to live inside a new reality: Real Housewives of Beverly Hills.

First and foremost, here’s why I’d recommend streaming this show to absolutely anyone stuck indoors right now: It’s a time capsule. Remember the Before Times, when we could do things like go outside, feel the sun on our skin, and howl at our friends in public? RHOBH is a snapshot of the Before Times, sure, but it’s also a perfect capture of the most trash era in recorded human history. After the aughts, they said it couldn’t be done—they said we could not endure a more ghastly pop culture moment—and then 2011 came in swinging with a metal bat and smashed the 2000s into little compacted garbage bits.

2011, when RHOBH debuted, was serving us miniature dogs as props, chunky bedazzled jewelry, frosted lipstick, sparkling, ruched dresses. Real Housewives of Beverly Hills invented that aesthetic. And now, nearly a decade later, it’s like watching sketch comedy about the golden era of reality TV: the unjustifiably intense orchestral score, the green-screen transitions of diamond-encrusted women twirling around in what’s basically an iMovie glow effect. And the quips! Oh god, the quips.

Considering everything that’s going on in the world, listening to these women bicker about menial inner-circle drama and shit-talk each other’s husbands, or lack of husband (god forbid), is honestly soothing. It’s all my brain can handle right now. One jarring realization I’ve had in isolation is that I have what’s known in the Science Community as Broken Capitalist Brain. Broken Capitalist Brain swindles you into believing that every moment of your life must be accounted for by productivity. Your BCB forces you to examine every moment of free time, including time allocated for consuming entertainment, and ask, is this something Ineedto watch? Is itsmartenough? Is it worthyof my time? But now that the End Times have rendered me incapable of doing anything productive, I’ve been able to clear some space in my brain and allow myself to do something I’ve never fully indulged in: Tuning out. What a concept!

And god, does it feel good. The Housewives’ cautionary platitudes like, “You can be the toast of the town one day, and a nobody the next,” or character intros like, “It may look like I have it all, but I want more,” (Taylor Armstrong), are like music to my ears, a welcome respite from reading about gloom and doom on Twitter.

The show is aspirational, and possibly even prophetic. When we’re first introduced to Lisa Vanderpump, she says of her sprawling house, “you can literally live here and not go anywhere.” Wow, remember fantasizing about not leaving your house? Oh, to be trapped in a mansion that has everything you need in it, like an island in the middle of my closet, or shelves that separate each one of your husband’s shirts. In the pilot episode, Noted Housewife Taylor Armstrong says, “I was almost envious of people, in some respects, of people who were content and living the middle class lifestyle that they had. It would’ve been easier to have such normal aspirations—it’s a lot of pressure.” God, that line just hits differently seconds before a dystopian uprising-slash-class war.

Enduring a global crisis really has really put stuff in perspective for me. For example, we’re all hyper-focused on total societal collapse, but you know what we should be focused on? Dance. “Dance, for me, is freedom,” housewife Camille Grammer says of her brief stint as a dancer. “It’s how I express myself.” After binging the first season of RHOBH in, uhh, a day, I’ve realized that Camille is my favorite character. Camille has a darkness in her. She says things like, “A lot of people think they know me, because I’m married to a celebrity, but they don’t,” totally unprovoked. Her storyline in Season 1 follows her desperately trying feel seen by her friends, business associates, and husband, Kelsey Grammer, who has all but rendered her invisible in both her marriage and image of self. RHOBH is actually a timeless horror anthology about the nightmares of patriarchy.

Above all, this show is fun. If you can’t enjoy a 2011 time capsule of rich white women calling each other fakes and drunks and “fucking liars,” all while enjoying their 17 acres of lands, tennis courts, casinos, and basketball teams that they own—what can you enjoy moments before the uprising? Overachievers, you can go ahead and enjoy your daily online yoga classes and sourdough starters. I’ll be here doing what’s right for me: breaking down my Broken Capitalist Brain by swirling a glass of wine at my houseplant and looking like I’m up to something. This is my moment to tune out, binge reality TV, and begin all my Zoom calls with quips like, “In self-isolation, it’s about who you know—and I know everyone.”

Jill Gutowitz is a haunted pair of overalls / writer living in Los Angeles. Follow her on Twitter: @jillboard.

Stream Season 1 of RHOBH on Hulu