Does anyone else forget all about where we left off when there is a break in episodes on a show? I certainly do! I’m assuming it’s a survival technique so that I can sustain watching copious amounts of horrible reality TV and keep coming back for more, but regardless of the brain science behind it, that’s exactly what happened when I went to watch tonight’s episode of Shahs of Sunset. I forgot all about the 80s costume party/unofficial day of reckoning for Shervin Roohparvar and his playboy ways. Not that it matters because in tonight’s episode, the Shahs have already moved on to skewer someone else and the lucky winner is pregnant-and-don’t-you-forget-it Asa Soltan Rahmati.
But first, let’s take a moment to call BS on Shervin. He heads to the cigar shop to do what playboys do: smoke cigars and deny sleeping with alleged crazy women. Shervin meets some homeless guy to discuss it all, oh wait! I’m sorry, that’s Mike Shouhed dressed as a homeless guy. Shervin maintains his story that he did not have sexual relations with that woman – he simply picked her up, drank and had some apps with her, then went home. Also, he uses the age old excuse that she isn’t his type. Well, not only not his type but also, not good enough for him: Shervin sinks as low as you can go on the scumbag meter by comparing Tara to a car, asking Mike why he would roll out in an ’84 Honda Civic when he could drive a Ferrari. Ugggggghhhhh. This conversation can’t get any more gross. Mike is amused (and also wearing eyeliner?) but Shervin’s “I’m too hot to be hooking up with her” theories don’t fly. It takes a cheater to know a cheater and if there is one thing Mike is, it’s a cheater! As Mike tries to explain to Shervin why lying to cover it up won’t work in the long run, we get treated to Mike’s Greatest Hits of Denying Cheating on His Wife, Volume 2. It’s not pretty and Mike knows that Shervin will hold the same fate by either the end of the season or the next one.
Someone was desperate enough to give Golnesa “GG” Gharachedaghi a part in an off OFF Broadway play. Who that someone is, no one knows but I would love to ask them what the eff they were thinking. Because GG is no actress (lying about multiple aspects of your friends’ lives on TV doesn’t count) she meets with an acting coach, who could never get paid enough to deal with this. The second he asks her to do a read through, GG remembers that she has had a hearing issue since birth and therefore, can’t read? What does that have to do with her reading a script you ask? Yeah, no one knows and she doesn’t really bother to explain. Instead, she launches into this story of how she has learned to read lips all her life and that’s how she gets by. They press on and we are treated to GG’s attempt at acting out the part of a professor named Robin. GG says she is looking for a good old fashioned rush that doesn’t include drugs, alcohol or sex. Oh, it’s going to be a rush all right – people will be rushing out the door to get their money back when they see her performance.
Reza Farahan and husband Adam Neely head to the fertility clinic to get the results of the sperm analysis they recently did in an effort to see if egg donors and surrogacy is for them. The doctor tells Reza his sperm is A+ and while Adam’s are decent, they are shaped weird. Adam claims that his walking around in jeans and hot weather the day before his test is to blame but the doctor simply says they can retest again. The doctor quickly moves on to the next step, saying they can start picking out egg donors online now but Reza is starting to sweat. He gives the excuse that they are in a small condo and aren’t baby-ready until they find a house, which could be never 6 months, 8 months, a year from now! He later explains in his talking head how he is feeling like that guy who is dating a girl who wants a ring and a proposal but he’s just not ready. So, exactly like Reza with Adam a few seasons ago.
Asa is working on the footage of her video from Israel and is planning a big viewing party, trying to pass it off as an art showing. She goes on and on about how she can’t wait to share her spiritual experience with everyone else but she knows her friends didn’t have the same experience she did because *spiritual shade alert* they haven’t been able to elevate to her level of spiritual awareness. At this point, I am truly desperate to know what Asa’s heightened level of spiritual awareness involves. Does she think that dancing on a foreign street with some spiritual leaders who agreed to humor her for a few hours on video is the next level of spiritual awareness? She then gets off her high horse to climb on another, filming the intro to her video by saying that she’s seven and a half months pregnant (OMG, WE KNOW) and that it’s time for world peace. Oh, well then if Asa says so, I guess everyone should get right on it! Asa may have spiritual awareness but she is majorly lacking self-awareness for how stupid she sounds.
Speaking of stupid – back to Mike, who is moving forward with his idiotic idea of starting a baby shoe line. He is meeting with a photographer to shoot some ads that will go online and shares his vision that he wants it to be just like a Benetton ad. So I guess he wants it to be outdated and idealistic but with babies. Mike does his best to entertain the babies who wait a whole two seconds before losing their sh**, as most babies do. Even though the babies are acting up, it’s all reminding him that the clock is ticking and he will likely be an old man before having a child of his own.
Because GG is GG and we have to roll with a new health issue this season, she takes her mom to get a hearing test with an audiologist. She tells the doctor that she is “practically deaf”. The hearing test results are that with lower pitches, GG is only operating at 28% and the only solution is a hearing aid. GG say she had one for a bit when she was 13 but vanity caused her to ditch it. Now that technology has progressed and the hearing aids are much less obvious, GG is game for one since it’s all part of her process in becoming a “healthier person”.
It’s the night of Asa’s video art thing and she’s wandering around, pushing the narrative that she is a political artist and not just some reality TV cast member. Paris Jackson shows up in support but she looks bored and like she has somewhere, anywhere, better to be. As her guests arrive and Asa greets them, she complains about anything and everything that has to do with being pregnant – she’s hot, uncomfortable, she wanted to look cute in heels but her feet hurt, she is feeling physically weaker during pregnancy. You name it, Asa is complaining about it. Bravo seizes the opportunity to couple her complaints with a talking head of her saying what a trooper she is and this is why I live for Bravo – they are only going to let her get away with so much.
Over at Mercedes “MJ” Javid and fiancé Tommy Feight’s Condo of Broken Dreams and Water Pipes, they are desperately trying to find a way to keep MJ’s boobs corralled into her jumpsuit. Seriously, where does MJ find these outfits and why can’t she just buy something that doesn’t have a neckline that starts at her belly button?! Reza comes over to pick them up and while MJ is in the bathroom, he grills Tommy about their plans to stop living in squalor. Tommy acts like he doesn’t understand what Reza means and MJ is still using the excuse that her dad is sick and therefore, she can’t focus on getting running water set up.
When she emerges from the sink-less bathroom, she wants Reza to know she heard him talking about her but assumes it was about her plans to have a baby and not how disgusting her thinks her current lifestyle is. She starts telling him some convoluted (and incorrect) explanation of what she did at the doctor and seems to think that freezing your eggs is the same thing as IVF. Reza jumps in and explains to her that they are not the same thing and Tommy points out that if Reza knows more about the process than she does, maybe it’s time to slow it down until she learns what she would actually be doing with her body. Somewhere in this conversation, Reza lets it slip that back when MJ was in the process of freezing her eggs, Asa went and did the very same thing, with the same doctor, at the SAME time. Oh maaaaan, MJ is pissed now that she realizes that not only was Asa pumping her for egg freezing information when she was knew exactly what she was doing but to add insult to injury, she was doing it at the same time with the same doctor!
Originally, as annoying as Asa was about her whole “miracle” pregnancy, I really just thought MJ was being petty about Asa being pregnant first. I know they don’t like each other but I felt it was overboard for MJ to be so fixated on how Asa conceived and why she did it now. Ok, I still think that part is overboard BUT……with this new element of information, I can really see why MJ is so upset. Not only did Asa pump MJ for personal information on a very sensitive process, but she did it while completely omitting the fact that she was going through the very same process, down to the same doctor. Why wouldn’t she mention that part at all? As much as Asa wants to say she doesn’t trust MJ, it seems more than a bit shady. It’s sort of like Asa stole MJ’s whole fertility plan and now has the pregnancy to show for it while MJ is at square one. That’s not totally Asa’s fault since she’s at a different place with her life and relationship but Asa just looks so phony handling it all this way. She should have been more open with what she was doing instead of always presenting the perfect picture – if you’re going to press someone for details of such a personal process, it’s not cool to leave out your own experience and your intentions behind asking.
Being armed with this new information of emotional betrayal, MJ stews on the way to the party and is rightfully fuming when she gets there. Reza admits that as much as he respects his friendship with Asa, he understands MJ’s side of things when Asa always makes her life out to be perfect. For whatever reason, Mike, GG and Shervin brought Asa baby gifts (can we add this to the montage of Asa claiming no one has been supporting her pregnancy?) and that’s the catalyst for MJ to go off the deep end. She starts spite-opening the gifts before Asa can get to them, then wanders off to avoid seeing Asa fawning over what she got.
As Asa finally plays her video in the background, MJ decides she’s done supporting the idea that Asa is some kind of artist. For the last six years, they have all supported her in all of her silly endeavors, like being a pop star (I actually forgot all about that!), having art installations, being a “visual artist” and MJ is just tired of faking it. She is right – just because Asa slaps together a video and rents some space to show it, it doesn’t make her an artist.
At this point, MJ has her claws fully out and is ready to use them. When Tommy calls MJ over to talk to Asa, the group quickly assembles and GG, despite her lack of hearing, plays translator between Asa and MJ. She explains to Asa how hurt MJ feels that Asa wasn’t honest with her about the egg freezing thing. Asa tries to defend herself and says they weren’t close at the time of this happening and she didn’t ask all the questions MJ claims she did. Mike has seen this before in Asa and he knows that she is gas lighting everyone. Asa truly believes that if she says something didn’t happen with enough conviction, everyone else will believe it too and most of the time, she gets away with it. But MJ done attempting to have an honest relationship with Asa and takes a literal step back.
Tommy tries to lighten the mood by demanding hugs and kisses but MJ wants none of it and snaps at him in front of everyone, then storms off.
Maybe Asa should start by asking for peace in her own friendships before she asks it of the world.
TELL US – IS ANYONE IN THIS GROUP MATURE ENOUGH TO BE A PARENT YET?
Photo Credit: Bravo TV
