I’m afraid these recaps are just going to become a litany of hilarious, unscripted things said by Sonja Tremont Morgan of the Goodyear Wrangler Muddin’ Tires Morgans. She doesn’t even need to say anything to be hilarious. The first shot of the episode is a picture of Sonja’s door with the Do Not Disturb sign on it. No, it’s not one of those handy plastic clips to put over the doorknob like at most hotels. Those are too fancy for Motel Benton. Instead, it’s a piece of lined notebook paper that she scrawled “Do Not Disturb” on and stuck under the number 21 on her front door.
She put that up in the first episode when Luann made too much noise early in the morning. That means she left it up there, and it’s been chilling for three uninterrupted days while its host also remained uninterrupted. Either that or, even more hilariously, it means Sonja came home from the bar with Billy Richard, the third grand-nephew twice removed of Little Richard, and knew she was going to get laid, so she shoved that piece of paper back up on the door so that no one would come a-knocking when the motel room was a-rocking.
According to Sonja, they went all night, multiple times. “I got my pots clanged,” she says. Luann’s response is, well, typically Lu and the sort of thing that would ignite a three-episode fight on The Real Housewives of New York. Luann says, “I could tell you were all into it, so I thought, ‘I’m gonna let her have that one.’” Excuse me but is Luann the keeper of all the men in the Midwest? Do you need to clear your cock with her to make sure she doesn’t want a crack at it first? Seriously, let Sonja have some small-town strange and be cool with it.
Of course, STAM picks up on this, and she says in her confessional that he didn’t ask to take Luann home, he took her by the hand and asked her to come home. Um, that is not quite how I remember it. ROLL TAPE! Ah, yes, there we see it, Sonja grabbing this man and essentially forcing him to take her home. Obviously, he was into it (consent is sexy, kids!), but, yeah, he was not a-courting Sonja in the way that she is accustomed.
The ladies are trying to figure out how to throw a party on a bare patch of grass downtown that they’re calling a “Crappie hour,” which is funny if you pronounce the name of the lake “crappie” but we already know that it has a different A sound. They’re not going to call it a “CRAW-pee hour.” That doesn’t even make sense. While they’re trying to bring St. Tropez to the Midwest, they get a call from Craig, the director of public works, about the playground they’re supposed to build for the town. Luann says, “He sounded hot.” She can’t stand that Sonja got her bell rung but that her Quasimodo has yet to be located.
As Craig teaches them about the playground, Sonja tries to see if he has a talent so he can join the Follies. As she’s asking, Luann is using some sort of surveying device as a baton to show off her old skills from her beauty pageant days. Sadly, when she throws it up in the air, it lands with a thud in the middle of the field as Aviva Drescher’s leg falls right out of the sky. Sonja finds out that Craig, who is handsome in a way as every director of public words across the country, is also a rodeo clown. Yes, that is going to be a hard talent to get into the Follies, but can’t he put on his outfit and do some rope tricks or something? Our girls need the help.
When Lu and Sonj are driving through town, they see a Lemonade stand that some kids are running for charity. The charity they are promoting is their mom, Christen Drew, the owner of the local café who is dressed up in a green polka-dot dress like she just stumbled out of Schmigadoon. The reason this is a charity is because their mother’s dying wish is to be on television. Can’t you tell? The just-so hair, the perfect makeup, the dress that looks more like a Pinterest slide than actual clothing. Oh, yeah, this woman wants to get famous real bad. It’s as if she’s a short story collection about someone famous coming to town and how this is going to turn her sad, Midwestern life around, she just knows it!
Lu uses her superpowers — a flawless body and preternatural flirting abilities — to get business to the stand and Christen tells the kids that people should only pay what they can afford, don’t make anyone feel bad. Sonja jumps right in to say, “No! Pressure ‘em.” That’s because Sonja has raised money in New York City before. There’s no sliding scale. It’s $25,000 a table, and if you don’t like it, then go sit in Washington Square Park for free and buy some black-market marijuana. It’s a little unclear what they’re raising money for, but we know what the charity is. It is the Association of Moms Who Want to Be Housewives LTD, LLC, INC, LGBTQIA+. Give them $100 million.
Here is where we officially get to the Sonja Morgan litany. When they go to meet Billy Richard, his friend Jared, and (I believe) his son Diesel, Billy pulls up to greet them while driving a white stretch limousine. Sonja Morgan says, “I haven’t seen a white limo like this since I dated Richard Lewis and that was in the ‘80s and he was a big f-ing star.” I mean, not even Dan Levy can write Moira Rose dialogue that’s that good or that real. When she finds out there is no champagne or hors d’oeuvres in the car, she says it needs more accoutrements. “Good dick only goes so far,” Sonja says, citing what should be the new motto for Grindr.
The ladies each pair up with a man and while Sonja has to climb into Billy’s mudding truck, which looks like a regular pickup truck but wearing platform stilettos. Meanwhile, Luann gets to take an elevator up to hers. Yes, it’s so high in the air that there is a fucking lift for this thing. They don’t seem to do a bunch of mudding because Billy quickly gets stuck and Luann and Jared have to come to their rescue.
After Luann pulled them out of the mud, she takes the whole elevator ride down to the mud to greet Sonj and Billy, who offer to greet her with a hug. “That’s all I get?” Luann asks flirtily. She points to her cheek for Billy to give her a peck and then turns her head and kisses him on the lips, which is the second oldest trick in the book after cutting out a hole in the bottom of your popcorn so that your date grabs your knob when going for a handful of kernels. Anyway, this is shady. Can’t Sonja have anything? Does Luann have to claim every single man?
Sonja then lets out a monologue that is so correct, so on point, so hilarious that I have preserved it for the ages here. ““Everyone goes out with my men afterwards,” she says, not even needing to remind us about Harry Dubin or Tom D’Agostino. “Because I’m like the Good Housekeep seal of approval. I am the cock curator. People know once I’m with a man, they’re worth going after. Just wait until I’m done with them. Please.” Since Luann can’t wait for Sonja, she gets her ass pushed in the mud, which I think is letting her off-light in this situation.
After their roll in the mud, the two women then take a shower for Billy and Jared that looks more like a Carl’s Jr. commercial than actual bathing. Billy and Jared are staring at them like they’re a bunch of female office workers ready for a Diet Coke. (OMG, remember commercials? Do we even have those anymore?)
As Billy goes back down south, putting an end to his budding romance with an aging socialite and Grey Gardens aspirant, the ladies go back to their hotel, where they have to flirt with a cardboard cut out of the mayor because they’re not going to get the playground equipment for the park they’re building. They say it was a gift from some well-connected friends of theirs (cough, production, cough), but there is an inventory issue and it won’t get there on time. Ugh, remember COVID? Remember not being able to get things? Remember empty supermarket shelves? Remember when you couldn’t get a Peloton or free weights or sourdough starters? Remember R numbers or Omicron or which vaccine you got? Yeah, I’ve erased it all from my memory too. Quick, Sonja, say something funny again so I can forget, I can forget it all, I can bury it under fart jokes and quickies in a muddin’ truck with a guy named Billy Richard. Bury it in the mud and tamp it down, strangle it with the earth, save us all.
