Where to Stream: The Real Housewives of New York City

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Of all the great things about television, the greatest is that it’s on every single day. TV history is being made, day in and day out, in ways big and small. In an effort to better appreciate this history, we’re taking a look back, every day, at one particular TV milestone.

IMPORTANT DATE IN TV HISTORY: June 16, 2011

PROGRAM ORIGINALLY AIRED ON THIS DATE: The Real Housewives of New York City, “Debt Becomes Her” (Season 4, Episode 11) [Stream on Hulu]

WHY IT’S IMPORTANT: We’ve been well-conditioned by the Bravo machine to expect certain things during a Real Housewives season, and chief among them has been that the vacations are where it all goes down. On the New York City version of the series, there have been unforgettable meltdowns in the Virgin Islands, Turks and Caicos, and the Berkshires. The season-four trip to Morocco is somewhat underrated, if only because the conflicts weren’t fresh (Jill and Ramona still fighting about whatever the hell they always fight about; LuAnn and Alex and their never-ending tragedy of manners), though the one new conflict between Alex and Kelly is truly undervalued in the Housewives canon, if only for Kelly repeatedly calling Alex “weird” and calling out her hives. But we’re not here to talk about the Morocco trip! Not even the time a camel dumped LuAnn out onto the Sahara! We’re here to talk about the Aftermath Episode.

Not every Housewives vacation gets a good Aftermath Episode, where the ladies regroup and rehash and generally tally up the scoreboard for who did what to whom on the trip. Certainly no vacation got the Aftermath Episode that the Morocco trip got, thanks to Countess LuAnn, Alex McCord, and some Herman Munster shoes.

Before we get to the footwear burn heard ’round the Upper East Side, though, we should recognize how awkward it is to watch this episode now, six years hence. And not just having to remember that this was the season of Cindy Barshop and her Quogue vajazzling empire. There is a Ramona/Mario scene in this that was definitely uncomfortable at the time (a psychic in Morocco told Ramona that her husband was seeing another woman, and the viewers at home instinctively knew it was true, though it took a couple more seasons before that story went public), but is even more uncomfortable now that we know for sure that Mario had women on the side. Watching Ramona scatter rose petals, compliment Mario’s pysique, and deliver what certainly appears to be a frenetic and uncomfortable shoulder massage is all just so awful, especially in hindsight.

But the main event here was the sit-down between LuAnn and Alex, who had mixed it up in Morocco, when Alex went overboard trying to defend Ramona from LuAnn’s barbed lectures about propriety. (Aw, remember when Ramona was the one being attacked by others?) Alex, as always, makes the mistake of thinking she can shame the other women into apologizing to her. But the true power of a woman like the former Countess LuAnn DeLesseps (now D’Agostino … for the moment) is that she is so far beyond shame the word holds no meaning for her. So while Alex works herself up into some neck hives over LuAnn acting “haughty,” LuAnn gets even haughtier. How else to describe the following sentence: “You’re the one that came to me and tried to bully me in my own … in my own salon where I was having a wonderful henna tattoo, and you came in and aggressed me in front of my guests.” [Emphasis on the most insane word choices mine]

But the moment that makes this an all-time is the following exchange:

LuAnn: “You came after me, in your Herman Munster shoes.” Alex: “Um they’re Louis Vuitton shoes…” LuAnn: “Well. Even Louis Vuitton makes mistakes.”

Pack it in! Put this show in a vault at the Paley Center before the seas rise and take with them this evidence of the goddamn sickest burn in Housewives history. See, the secret to reality TV success is that you have to want it more. That LuAnn was able to throw Louis Vuitton under the bus at a moment’s notice in order to stomp Alex into the ground shows that LuAnn wants it more. She always did.

Where to stream The Real Housewives of New York City