New cast, same petty arguments!
Season 14 of The Real Housewives of New York City premiered on Sunday night, with a whole new group of Housewives stepping into the long-running franchise after Bravo decided to scrap its previous stars and start over. It's a bold move — the first of its kind in the history of the Real Housewives universe — and time will tell whether it'll pay off in the long run for viewers.
Sunday's debut undoubtably featured a fresh energy to the show, with updated music and graphics giving it a sparkly new shine alongside a friend group of bold, independent personalities hired to represent the diversity of the Big Apple. But as the episode progressed, the format of the series felt all-too-familiar, with conflict settling around minor misunderstandings and party etiquette slights.
Look no further than eight minutes in. After meeting our Housewives — brand marketing consultant Brynn Whitfield, interior designer and consultant Jenna Lyons, fashion publicist Jessel Taank (Bravo's first South Asian Housewife), creator/influencer and Brooklyn native Sai De Silva, model and hot sauce entrepreneur Ubah Hussan, and realtor/interior designer Erin Lichy — we learned that Erin was feeling "a little salty" towards Sai and Brynn after they ditched a group dinner she planned because they didn't like the place Erin had picked for them to eat.
"The girls and I wanted to get together for dinner. It was a huge group. Nothing was available last minute, so I picked [somewhere]. The restaurant used to be the hottest place in New York. It's easy to get to and it's convenient," Erin explained in confessional, with the name of the eatery in question bleeped out by Bravo's editors. "But Sai and Brynn ditched the group dinner, then they posted on Instagram that they were at Casa Cipriani. And it's hurtful. I think it's just a very obnoxious thing to do."
"I wouldn't care if other people had different plans but it was like, 'We should do something together,' so I made the effort to do something together," Erin continued, recalling what happened to Ubah. "I mean, I would go with anyone to a local bar and be happy, I don't need to go to a chic place all the time, I don't care. [And] we were with our husbands, me and Jessel. I get it. They could've just been like, 'Listen, you guys, go with your husbands, we're going to go to Casa.' No big deal. But they didn't. They were like, 'I'm so tired.' Jessel thought they went home, but they went to dinner. That's what bothered me."
Brynn and Sai, for their part, seemed unapologetic about their decision while discussing it with Jessel.
"I'm sorry that I kinda bailed on dinner. I didn't know how to say I wouldn't be caught dead at [that restaurant]. It's not 2005 and I'm not a D-list model," said Brynn, as Sai and Jessel also shaded the establishment. "Like, Olive Garden to me is chicer. The ones with the carpets? They have good breadsticks. The breadsticks, they slap! I'll go there."
"Is it bad that I don't want to go to [that restaurant]?" asked Sai, of the eatery in question. [It's] good for teenagers, I think."
"[Maybe] if I was drunk enough? Or if I had guests in from out of town, like Florida?" added Brynn. "I can't. I didn't even do it back in the day!"
That conflict soon brought up another one, in which Brynn had apparently heard that Erin was "distancing herself from Sai because Sai rubbed her a little bit wrong" when she criticized Erin for having cheese on her charcuterie board.
As Brynn recalled: "Supposedly Sai goes, 'Oh, you eat cheese?' And Erin's like, 'Is that not cool or chic or something?' And supposedly Sai goes, 'That's weird.' "
"For the record, I did not say, 'Cheese, that's weird,' " Sai clarified in a confessional." I know I didn't because I ate it! I remember eating the cheese more than anybody else!""
Erin and I have similar friends. We have run in the same circle for a few years now. But Erin is always arguing with someone or is mad at someone," added Sai. "So now it's starting to seem like Erin is the common denominator here."
Like any good Housewives disagreement, everything came to a head when the cast gathered at Jenna's house for a girl's night. There — in front of a wide array of strategically placed cheese boards — Erin defended herself, denying she ever said that about Sai and claiming that "[Brynn] was lying."
"None of this is true. I would never say that I distanced myself because I served her a cheese platter. It is the stupidest thing I've ever heard." said Erin, combating Brynn's insistence that she did say it. "That's your embellishment. And I don't like when people say s--- I didn't say."
"That is so obnoxious of Brynn. ... She literally makes s--- up. She now is making b------- up. I was telling her that in passing as a joke. To go back and be like, 'Oh, she said your cheese platter is bad.' Like, what the f---?" Erin said in the episode, adding she was "turned off" by Brynn and had "no interest in her."
Brynn and Erin then separated themselves from the group, and they quickly hashed things out. "I am offended, not by the cheese, I don't give a s--- ... I don't like the wishy-washy thing. I felt like you decide who you were going to align yourself with and then you got weird with me. And you did — you know it," Erin said — a claim Brynn "100%" agreed with.
"In all actuality, I don't think there's any issue with us," Brynn told Erin. "Just don't take it personally."
Erin then agreed to move on from it. "It's hard to stay mad at Brynn," she said. "She's fun, she's sweet, she's bubbly. She makes it light enough that you kind of forget."
As for restaurant-gate, both Brynn and Sai owned up to not wanting to go to Erin's eatery of choice, to which Erin gave them a pass. "I'm realizing it's not about the restaurant, it's not about the reservation, it's about wanting to spend quality time together and not caring about these other things," Brynn noted. "And that, I understand."
Sunday's episode ended with the ladies all sharing a laugh, though a preview of the season showed more disagreements to come. Proof once again that in the Housewives universe, the more things change, the more they stay the same.
The Real Housewives of New York City airs Sundays (9 p.m. ET) on Bravo.
