Although the war between Meredith Marks and Angie Katsanevas continues, there’s a lot more to the Oct. 10 episode of “The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City” than that. Including a lot of “Mormon”-related happenings: Lisa Barlow talks about going to the temple, and Heather Gay makes it clear she has a lot of anger toward the church.
Going on a mission
Lisa and her 18-year-old son, Jack, go to get pedicures. The conversation quickly turns to Jack’s upcoming mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints — and nonmember viewers are going to get some interesting impressions of the church from Lisa.
• In a confessional, Lisa says, “A lot of people here pay their kids to go on mission. Or blackmail them. Or say, like, ‘Go or you’re going to embarrass the family.’ Like, there’re social pressures in Utah. But Jack has been raised non-orthodox.”
• Lisa says all of her friends were “shocked” to hear Jack is going on a mission. And she’s not happy with Heather, who was less than enthusiastic. “It’s not like he’s doing anything bad,” Lisa says. “I mean, he chose to serve a mission instead of, like, math or, like, teenage pregnancies.”
• Jack is currently reading the Book of Mormon. His impression: “It’s very action-packed. … They could turn it into a movie and it’d, like, do good.”
• Lisa, who’s been a member for more than 20 years, has not read the Book of Mormon. “But based on the things I’m hearing about this book, I kind of want to read it. I’m shocked that Jack is reading it before me. I am an avid reader.”
(Charles Sykes | Bravo) Lisa and John Barlow on the "Real Housewives of Salt Lake City" Season 3 reunion.
• And then there’s a confusing exchange about Lisa and her husband, John, accompanying Jack when he goes through the temple. She leaves the impression that she will decide if she goes. John will “definitely” accompany Jack, and she has to think about that “next-level commitment. … You’re going to have to wear [temple] garments. And I respect the garments [but], I don’t do that.”
In a confessional, Lisa says, “you have to be worthy” to go to the temple. “I might not feel worthy because I drink too much Diet Coke. Someone might not feel worthy because they drink too much alcohol” or “because they’re hitting it with their neighbor.”
(Diet Coke won’t keep you out. Alcohol and adultery will. So might a refusal to wear temple garments. Lisa never mentions that she must have interviews with her bishop and stake president to get a temple recommend. Or, possibly, that was edited out.)
Lisa tells Jack she doesn’t feel “like I’m doing anything wrong … but I could do more right.” She says that she worries on a daily basis that she hasn’t been a good enough mother, although “clearly I’m a great mom, if you made this decision.”
Heather really resents the LDS Church
Heather and Whitney go skiing at Woodward Park City — well, Whitney snowboards — and chat afterward. Heather is unhappy that she was the last to learn that Jack Barlow is going on a mission, and expresses some really negative feelings about her own mission. She’s more unhappy when Whitney says, “I don’t really care. Like, honestly, good for him.”
In a confessional, Heather says that is “absurd! How can the church be this horrible, traumatic thing that’s ruined your life” and prompted Whitney to resign her membership “but also be good for him to go out there and convert more people to live it?”
(Randy Shropshire | Bravo) Heather Gay on "The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City."
To Whitney’s face, Heather says, “you don’t feel conflicted about it when he’s actually going to, like, go door-to-door telling people to join the Mormon church?” Whitney sort of shrugs, and Heather says that she doesn’t think they should “be acting all supportive and excited about a guy that’s going to go out there and sell a church that we know can be very destructive.”
Heather served a mission to southern France, and she remains “conflicted” about it. “Of course, I had good experiences ... but I also had to convince people ... to join the Mormon church. And I feel shame about that” because she “ruined a lot of people’s lives.”
And she didn’t stop there. “I feel like we’re not being honest about church history — that it’s homophobic, that it dis-acknowledges any sort of transgender — it just says it doesn’t exist.” In a confessional, Heather says her feelings reflect what Whitney has said to her in the past.
Back to the present, the two share their belief that the church is “sexist,” and Heather calls it “misogynistic, bigoted, and it has a horrible, problematic racist history.”
Angie confronts Meredith
At the end of last week’s episode, Monica and Whitney told Angie that Meredith is spreading rumors that Angie’s husband, Shawn, is cheating on her with other men. Armed with that information, Angie marches to the other side of the room as this week’s episode begins, pulls Meredith aside and accuses her of spreading false rumors.
Meredith says she has no idea what Angie is talking about. Well, she admits she’s heard “there are rumors” about Angie and Shawn, but she insists, “I haven’t been spreading them.” Angie replies, “you have said it to multiple women in the group.”
(That’s not verifiably true. Viewers have seen Meredith tell Lisa she has dirt on Angie. Whitney said Meredith told her the same thing, although that was not in an episode. Only Monica says that Meredith told her the rumor about Shawn, and viewers have only her word for that.)
(Presley Ann | Bravo) Monica Garcia, Angie Katsanevas and Heather Gay in the Sept. 19 episode of "The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City."
Angie tells Meredith, “you’ve gone after every marriage in the group when, meanwhile, you’re the only one that’s out spreading their legs outside of their marriage.” (She offers no details or proof that Meredith cheated on her husband.) Meredith says, “We’re done”; she gets up and walks away; and she says she won’t speak to Angie again until Angie speaks to her “with respect.”
Meredith goes and sits down with Lisa. Angie follows her and continues to harangue her. When Lisa asks what’s happening, Angie says, “did you like it when she [expletive] spread rumors about you giving [oral sex] for Jazz tickets?” (That’s incorrect. The disproved rumor wrongly accused Lisa of trading sex for business opportunities with a man who give her Jazz tickets.)
Meredith gets up to leave again. Angie impedes her exit, and once again hurls the “spreading you legs” accusation. Meredith says, “deal with your marriage. Leave mine alone. … I didn’t spread anything, Angie.” (At the very least, we know Meredith spread the rumor that there are rumors about Angie and her husband.)
Lisa says in a confessional she “just cannot believe” Meredith is “doing the same thing again.” Meredith tells Lisa “there’s something wrong” with Angie. “She has a weird thing with me. I don’t know what it is. And it’s not my problem, and I’m not interested.”
In a confessional, Lisa says she needs “to take a moment and think about how we move forward together as friends. … I can’t believe that Meredith is playing victim right now,” because “the real victim in this situation is Angie. And me. It’s my party.” Which has been largely ruined by Monica, Whitney, Angie and Meredith.
Are there really rumors?
Lisa, Whitney and Angie all say they’ve never heard the rumors about Shawn. In a confessional, Monica says that “all of these women have heard about this, have talked about this, or have spread this. So fake [expletive]. That’s some Utah [expletive].”
Heather also says that this is a Utah thing: “You haven’t heard that in Salt Lake? People always say that about male hairdressers.” In a confessional, she adds, “This is Utah. I’ve been to family reunions — if a guy wears a cardigan, they think he’s gay. And as soon as [Angie] married a guy that had tapered pants and custom-made suits, the rumors started flying.”
(Fred Hayes | Bravo) Shawn Trujillo, Elektra Katsanevas and Angie Katsanevas on "The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City."
Husband in tears
The morning after Lisa’s party, Angie tells her husband, Shawn, about what happened.
“I was a little shocked as some things that Meredith was saying,” Angie says. “She started alluding to the fact that she could destroy our family and that you actually like men. Or, you know, you are hooking up with men on the side.” Shawn say, “What a[n expletive] idiot.”
“You’re a hairdresser, so you’re automatically gay,” Angie says, Shawn replies, “Bottom line is — is gay, straight, whatever, it’s the adultery part of it that’s bad. … It’s crazy. It’s nuts. It’s a smear campaign. And to what end is this woman willing to go to? What did we do?”
Angie says Meredith is “a miserable bitch. Don’t let her get to you.” But Shawn tears up and starts to cry as he contemplates this getting back to their 12-year-old daughter, Elektra. “It kills me to think,” he says, “that she would ever think that I would do something like this. I’ve been working my ass off to be her hero.” Angie reassures him that he is.
And Shawn wants nothing more to do with Meredith: “You know, somebody comes for my family, my character — they’re not welcome here anymore. She’s not welcome in this home. I don’t want to be around her at all.”
Lisa and Whitney back Angie
Lisa and Whitney visit Angie’s home to express their support after the fight with Meredith. In a confessional, Lisa says she’s “definitely worried about Angie. I know what it feels like. I went through this. I mean, I wish someone had checked in on me last year. Instead, I had to go to bed eating a burrito.”
Angie tells them about what happened when she told Shawn about what happened, and “he cried, because now there’s a little person involved. You know, to see him like that just crushed me.”
She recounts the rest of their conversation, and Lisa tells her, “I was just in your shoes, and no one believes this [expletive].” She adds, “I’m in a weird position, because I’m trying to build a friendship back with Meredith. But, like, in my head, I’m, like, ‘No, no, no, no, no.’ How do I stay silent when she’s [doing] the exact same thing to you that she did to me.”
(Presley Ann | Bravo) Angie Katsanevas, Monica Garcia and Whitney Rose in the Sept. 19 episode of "The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City."
Whitney’s advice is “do not feed into Meredith. … She is not worth it.”
Lisa questions Monica’s motives in all of this, but Whitney defends Monica: “It is important to remember that she had the courage to tell you [about the rumor because] she was being a good friend to you.”
Lisa’s eyes flash annoyance when Angie says she’s starting to see “a different side of Heather.” Heather invited Angie to her home a week earlier and apologized for not having her back when she battled with Meredith in Palm Springs.
“I was honored, actually, that she invited me into her home, because I’ve known her since I was 15,” Angie says, “and I don’t like the tension.”
Lisa is visibly and audibly upset by this. “You’re lucky she gave that to you,” she tells Angie. “She’s never done that with me. … I am literally getting triggered by this because I’m, like — where was this friendship last year?”
In a confessional, Lisa continues that thought: “It is so upsetting to me, because where are my accolades for putting up with people talking about my family, my business, me behind my back? It’s, like, Angie, you had a bad weekend in Palm Springs. I had to endure it for three [expletive] years.”
Whitney and Angie both look uncomfortable as Lisa asserts that she endured what Angie did “times 10.” Lisa says that her son, Henry, called her “hysterically crying” when his fifth-grade classmate told him there are naked pictures of her online (which is not true).
It does seem that Lisa has forgotten that she’s there to support Angie. “Lisa’s reaction is very shocking to me,” Whitney says. “I had no idea that she was harboring so many feelings from last year. But, like, Lisa, read the room. The timing is not right. Like, we came over here to make Angie feel better.”
Later in the episode, Whitney tells Heather how upset Lisa was when she learned that Angie had gotten a big apology from Heather: “I think she was, like, jealous. Like she was hurt.”
In a confessional, Heather says she’s “really confused” by Lisa. “I don’t know what she wants from me. If she wants to, like, have a compassionate friendship, you’d think she would tell me about Jack’s mission and include me and all of that. But she didn’t. But she’s upset that I would extend myself to Angie.”
BRAVOCON -- “BravoCon 2022 from the Javits Center in New York City on Friday, October 14, 2022” -- Pictured: (l-r) Meredith Marks, Brooks Marks -- (Photo by: Evan Angelastro/Bravo)
Meredith outs her son
Remember in Season 2 when Meredith came unglued when Jen Shah suggested that her son, Brooks, is gay? Even though umpteen people (including yours truly) had written that Brooks was openly gay? (I thought he was. It was my mistake. He was … not openly gay.)
But, yeah, Brooks is gay. Openly, now. He doesn’t announce it in the latest episode, but he speaks casually about his sexuality with his mother. Actually, she outs him.
As Brooks, 23, is driving himself and his mother to go snowshoeing (while, weirdly, wearing ski goggles), Meredith asks him, “so what’s going on on the dating front?” Brooks tells her there’s “nothing serious” because he “just got out of, like, a serious relationship.”
And Meredith opines that it was “a great first relationship. He was fun.” (This is, officially, the first time anyone on the show has confirmed that Brooks is gay.)
In a confessional, Meredith says, “Brooks has become, you know, more secure in his own being. It’s wild to see him feeling comfortable and open.” When she tells him she likes it when his father, Seth, brings her coffee in the morning, Brooks says, “I don’t need my boyfriend to do that.”
Meredith encourages Brooks to bring a date to an upcoming event, and he calls her the “most supportive mom I know.”
Meredith’s near-death experience
When Meredith and her friend left Lisa’s party, their driver “lost control of the car” in a “terrible, terrible snowstorm.”
“On one side of the road was the cliff. and the other side was a snowbank,” she says, “and it appeared that we were going to go over the cliff. And he somehow gained enough control to steer us into the snowbank.”
Meredith says it was “terrifying,” adding, “I thought I was dying.” And she was further distressed because she “thought my last interactions of significance were what just happened at Lisa’s party, that was just ugly and mean. And I decided I really want to spend my time with the people that I care about the most, because we never know when it’s ending.”
She starts to cry — although whether there are actual tears is tough to see on the screen — and tells the producer she doesn’t want to talk about it anymore.
(Charles Sykes | Bravo) Mary Cosby on an episode of "What What Happens Live with Andy Cohen."
Mary is entitled, rude and mean
Examples:
• To Mary, the battle between Meredith and Angie is really all about Mary: “I can’t believe I wasted another outfit on this event,” she says in a confessional. “Like, where’s the food? Like, what are we eating?”
• Mary asks Lisa where the food is, and then asks if she can have it “to go.”
• Lisa asks one of the caterers to make Mary a flatbread pizza. Monica says, sarcastically, “a fresh pizza is what we need right now.” Mary, who completely misses the sarcasm, rudely says, “you can order your own.”
• With great impatience, Mary says, “where’s my box? How long is it going to take this guy?”
• Then she says to the catering staffer, “you couldn’t have put it in the box yourself for customer service?” When he replies that he didn’t want to touch it with his hands, Mary says, “no, you’re lazy.”
(You can learn a lot about people by the way they treat service staff.)
Single mother of four
Angie is trying to wake up her four daughters — who range in age from 5 to 17 — and get them ready for school. As any parent, single or not, can tell you, it’s not easy.
Monica says her childhood was “very different” from her kids’ childhoods. “Growing up, we moved around so much because my mom [Linda] was always looking for something bigger and better. A lot of times that was at my expense.” And, she admits, “there’s some resentment there for that. I’ve always been searching for stability, because I never had that. The only thing that I can count on with my mom is that there’s nothing to count on with my mom.”
(Fred Hayes/Bravo) Monica Garcia has joined the cast of "The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City."
Monica and Linda take Nana, Monica’s grandmother, to the Central Davis Senior Activity Center, where Monica plays cards with Nana and her friends. Monica tells Linda, “you can find a man here” — and then Linda tells her about a recent date she went on. The man invited her to spend the weekend with him, and then “ghosted her.”
“You must have done something,” Monica says. “What did you do?” And Linda replies, “I told him that even though I’m not Mormon anymore, I’m still celibate. I don’t believe in sex before marriage.”
Monica says in a confessional that she finds it “confusing” that her mother “is still following the doctrine, but has left the church.” Linda asks if Monica still considers herself “Mormon.” Monica says, “I struggle with it.”
Linda asks if Monica wants to raise her daughters in the church, “because I believe wholeheartedly that those girls need Jesus … scriptures [and] prayer.”
Monica cuts her off “because when you left the church, you came to me and you apologized for raising me in the church.” Linda denies that happened, and Monica insists it did.
“We went to church every Sunday,” Linda says; Monica interjects, “and your daughter still got knocked up at 19. You are literally saying, ‘If you don’t go to church every Sunday, I’m raising my kids wrong.’ I do more with my kids than you ever did with me. And that is a fact.”
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