The party costumes the cast dreams up will inspire gay Halloweens for years to come.
Photo: Bravo
You can tell a lot about a person by the costume they choose to wear to a fancy-dress birthday party that has no right to be as fancy or as dressed as it is. When Whitner (who is still not Whitney because Whitney is in London and he didn’t even call me to hang out) has a party where everyone has to dress up as a literary figure — either an author or a character — our bestie Molly decides to dress up like Gandalf in a giant gray sack with a giant gray hat and a giant gray beard. It hides not only her face but her entire body. She looks like your dryer’s lint tray after washing a full load of sweatpants. Molly is a gorgeous girl, but of course she went for a nerdy costume that is authentic to her personality. It’s like Lindsay Lohan in Mean Girls in her scary but ugly costume.
Meanwhile, Venita, who helped Whitner set up for the party, comes dressed as Medusa in a green sequined dress with a small cobra tiara. Sorry, that is not giving Gorgon. Venita is not turning anyone to stone. Also, wasn’t the bottom half of Medusa (at least the Clash of the Titans version) a reptile? Venita looks more like Cleopatra with an ASP hat than Medusa. Then Salley shows up with her extra E and a costume that makes her look like a gunslinging wench from Westworld, but she’s Kissin’ Kate Barlow from Holes. Shep, who is the same as me, does not know Holes because we were 24 when this kid flick came out. Salley also doesn’t realize that this is a literary-themed party or remembers too late and yells, “It was a book first.” This leads to a hilarious exchange where Salley asks if Shep knows “holes,” and, of course, he does, but he also couldn’t find a clit with two hands and a flashlight.
Molly sums up her differences with the girls perfectly: “Some girls dress up like Salley and Venita. Some girls are Gandalf.” Yes, and we want to hang out with Gandalf every time. That is why Molly is great TV, because she knows who she is and is true to herself. Salley thinks she’s great TV because she’s messy. But messy gets old, and authenticity gets gold. Never forget. That said, I love the brewing hatred between Molly and Salley because #TeamMolly4Lyfe. Even if she’s a hoarder living among the skeletons of her flattened cats, Molly is so much cooler than Salley. Molly is pissed that Salley talked shit about her behavior at Madison’s baby shower to Madison and also that she seems to be calling dibs on every dude in Charleston. Salley is mad at Molly because Molly’s name has the correct number of vowels and also for talking shit about her to everyone in the group but “blowing up her phone” like they’re besties. But it really goes deeper. This is the hatred of a band nerd toward a cheerleader, and vice versa, and these two are just never going to get along.
It seems like Salley is having a hard time keeping her friend Venita, too. The day after the big singles party, Venita goes to lie by the pool with Salley and asks Salley if she is interested in Craig. Salley gives this wishy-washy answer that’s like, “I think he’s hot and like flirting with him.” She’s trying to act like she’s not pressed, but if she’s not pressed, why was she riding Charley’s jock about talking to Craig at the party? Salley is either being a jerk to Charley by pretending she’s more into Craig than she is, or she’s being a jerk to Venita by downplaying how much she likes Craig because she knows Venita has (legit) issues with him. Either way, Salley is a jerk, Molly is right, we love her and her tiny tuba and giant gray beard, and that is all we have to say on that.
Salley also seems to be losing out on Craig, who visits Charley at the art gallery where she works. It seems to be a lot of what I like to call “resort art.” You know those places near the beach that sell watercolors of lighthouses or the crappy galleries in Paris that show schmaltzy photos of the Eiffel Tower? Meanwhile, Craig is looking for, and I quote, “a really big picture of a tiger or a penguin or a polar bear.” Does he want to live in a second-grade classroom? He makes some headway with Charley, but in the episode, she says she is “best friends” with her mom. Ehhhhhhhh. Sorry. Red flag. It’s great to be close with one’s mother, but if her mother tried that hard to be her friend, she wouldn’t know how to set or maintain proper boundaries. Another red flag: She dressed as Daisy Buchanan from The Great Gatsby because she wanted to look pretty and totally asked ChatGPT for costume ideas, just like Craig. Doesn’t she realize that Daisy, while beautiful, is the literal villain of the story?
Austen is making it look like he would rather be single too. He tells Craig that he’s having some FOMO, which, if you’re unaware, is an acronym that means “Fewer Omelets Made Over.” Austen is saying that if his girlfriend is like an egg dish, he doesn’t want to redo her because he already has it good enough at home, so he doesn’t need to find something better. No, wait. That’s not it. Are we sure that is what FOMO means? Anyway, Craig says he’s having a good time making out with people, and Austen is jealous. He also confides to Madison that when his girlfriend, Audrey, is away, he doesn’t miss her much. Madison says that when you think of your partner, you should think that you can’t even breathe if they’re not around. Are we sure about that? There is nothing I love more than when my husband goes away for a week. Sure, I miss him, but isn’t it just wonderful to make a mess, turn the thermostat to wherever you want it, and take up the entire bed? There is a balance. But she is correct that at this stage of Austen’s relationship, he should be way more into her than he is.
In between the two parties, we get some real-estate interludes. We get a tour of Shep’s new beach house, which has four bedrooms and four bathrooms and costs $3.5 million. Then we get a tour of Madison’s new house, which has six bedrooms, seven bathrooms, and a pool and costs $3.9 million (even though the old house was cuter on the outside). The lesson I’m taking away from this? I need to get me some of that reality TV money. Hello, Andrew Cohen. Do you need me to come in and save RHONY? Would you like me to be one of the Ladies of London? I’m ready to stop being bitchy on this side of the camera and be bitchy on the other side of it. Put me in, coach, and get me one of these giant-ass houses.
The star of Shep’s scenes, however, is Rodrigo, who is Shep’s interior designer. Shep takes him up to his parents’ house so he could go through their garage and use any art, rugs, furniture, or other knickknacks they had stored there. Usually, an interior designer makes their money by buying furniture for a client, getting a 15 percent discount from the wholesaler, and then charging the customer full price. If Shep is using all this free shit, how is Rodrigo making his money? Is he getting paid by the hour? Is being on the show and having this story line payment enough? Is he considering his Bravo paycheck part of what Shep should pay him? Regardless, Shep’s parents have some great taste, and I can’t wait to see what Charleston’s sexiest gay dude does to Shep’s house. I also loved his line, “Shep’s parents are probably thinking at this point in his life that he’s going to have a wife and kids and this big house. Instead, he brings his gay interior designer to rifle through his parents’ belongings that they don’t want anymore.”
Rod also shows up in a “Pretend I’m Don Quixote” T-shirt. Much like you know Molly had that Gandalf costume hanging in her closet from some previous nerdy occasion, you know that Rodrigo had that shirt from some stupid gay theme party he went to a year ago. It was probably called, like, Papi Parade, and you had to dress up like the sexiest Spaniard you could think of, and our man Rodrigo saw that he could repeat the joke.
At his party, Whitner looks cute as Ernest Hemingway, but considering he chose this theme, I thought he would have a much better costume. He’s beaten both by Austen, whose silly Hermione Granger is the perfect kind of low-stakes drag more straight guys should invest in, and Craig, whose Rufio is the perfect kind of high-stakes drag that most gay guys invest in for the first night of Halloween weekend (a.k.a. Halloweekend). Craig commits to the look and is handsome as ever with a pompadour, a bit of eye makeup, and some shmutz all over well-defined arms. There are two problems here. First, no one knows that he is Rufio from Hook. Secondly, that is a movie, not a book, and nope, Rufio was not in the original Peter Pan. Anyway, I can’t wait until October 30 of this year so that I can wear the same outfit and post, “I hate gay Halloween, what do you mean you’re dressed as Craig Conover as Rufio from a mediocre episode of Southern Charm?”
The winner of the costume contest, of course, is Madison, who comes as Shep Rose, complete with a copy of his book made into a purse. It’s perfect. It’s like when Shep named his dog Craig; it is both an honor and an insult at the same time. Madison beat him at his own game, and I love that she will never take her foot off his neck but looks like she’s honoring him at the same time.
It’s not Shep and Madison who fight at the party but Austen and Craig, and it is a fight over absolutely nothing. It’s a fight over less than nothing. It’s a fight over some shots, I guess? Austen is being snarky about Craig hanging out in his hot tub with Salley, which is his right. Craig says that Austen is jealous because he’s single and Austen isn’t. Then Craig, as usual, takes it to this whole different level about Austen living a lie when really all he needs to do is break up with the girlfriend he’s just not really that into. I don’t know how this turned into a fight or why I’m agreeing with Craig. Still, I guess we’ll get to see the aftermath next week, when Madison LeCroy, dressed as Shep Rose, will say, “So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.” Everyone around the table, including Charley, will look at her like a large language model just came shooting out of her brain.
