The Men Tell All

A caffeinated, almost sarcastically excited crowd of vacationing middle-aged women and their daughters fills a soundstage just east of Fairfax. As the nondescript but achingly familiar strains of "The Bachelorette Mash" (it was a pop-culture-graveyard-smash!) fill the room, the women clap like Tinkerbell is on her death bed, and all the while they cling to the recorded announcement played right before the cameras started rolling that, if they'll be patient, Dr. Phil will be out to solve all of their problems in juuuuuust a minute or two. It may be a lie, y'all, but isn't it their fault for choosing to believe it?

The lights come up, instead revealing the face of "All I Want For" Chris "Mas Is To Stop Losing My" Harrison, wearing a peculiarly shiny silver polo shirt and the same pair of ill-fitting khakis I wore to temple the night before my Bar Mitzvah. You know that age? That age where nothing fits right? Chris is that age tonight. He speaks directly into the camera, which I must admit I find a bit invasive: "Good evening. And welcome to The Bachelorette: The Men Tell All." A reality-show name with a colon in it? What is this, his fucking graduate thesis? And did I miss the memo that The Bachelorette: The Men Tell All is the actual title of the show now? Why is this the first time we're privy to a descriptive sentence letting us know the thesis statement of the episode before it even starts? How come the past weeks weren't tagged with helpful openings like "Welcome to The Bachelorette: Greg Lives In A Broken-Down Shanty on the Outer Valence of Coolsville" or "Welcome to The Bachelorette: Ryan Wears a Really, Really, Really Gay Hat"? It could've helped. I'm just saying. So Chris welcomes us, having no idea which word of this newly-minted title to emphasize, deciding on the curious "Men" over the fairly obvious "All." But we'll leave him alone early tonight, because he's obviously nervous about having so much screen time, for once. Plus, he's feeling awkward about the fact that his protruding belly can see its own reflection in his shiny shiny shirt, and he's mad at his mother for picking those clothes out for him in the first place. Other boys may be just the chess princes, but he's been to the mall, and Chris is the only Chess King. And yes, since you asked. I just checked. And I am a total supermodel.

"For weeks, we've all be glued to our televisions, watching Trista in her search for love." Who is the "all" to which he is referring, exactly? People who have never heard of American Idol? People who have that really weird cable plan that only includes one hour of network television a week? People living in politically neutral countries that no one's heard of where they avoid war and whose main export is, like, doilies? "The tables turned and the power finally in a woman's hands, emotions ran high and egos were bruised." "Finally." Take that, thousands of years of gender inequality! It's payback time, and Trista sure is the Miami Heat Martyr willing to give herself over to this bunch of Poindexters in order to turn the tide. "When it all began, there were twenty-three other men involved, and tonight they're back and ready to answer the questions that you've been dying to ask." Like what, for the love of god? LIKE WHAT? "Who will Trista choose?" But we know they won't answer that. And besides, we already know the answer. And, also, shut up, Chris Harrison. But tonight he won't shut up. Not tonight. Tonight is his night. To be the stah.

"Please welcome...our bachelors!"

And through history we go, through two rows of broken-hearted (er, I meant "ego-shattered") suitors on taupe couches. Also, one dork in the first row on the left is trying to make himself look really big because he's occupying not only his own seat, but also the seat that was supposed to be filled by Greg. Isn't Hollywood the land of dreams? Can't someone dream up a new couch to account for the missing personnel? Anyway, the camera pans past each ousted bachelor in a gauzy, nostalgic way quite reminiscent of The Hall of Presidents, the only real difference being that in most cases the Disney animatronic characters have far more believable hair than most of these guys. Let's travel back! Down the rows we go, past Brian C. (meh), Jeff (hut!), Peter (duh), Eric (who?), Wayne (old!), Billy (snore), Brian H. (ooooh), Jack (ew), Brian K. (who?), Duane (gack!), Gregg H. (who?), Paul (who?), Matt (who?), Josh (gay), Chris (who?), Brook (yee-haw!), Mike (ew), Russ (spawn), Bob (yay!), Brian S. (who?), Rob (awwwww), and Jamie (AWWW!). The audience -- equipped with TRL-type lung capacity but without the added inhibition that Carson Daly might show up and touch them a little weird -- screams with glee after each name read. Clearly they've been implored to do so, or I'm guessing, say, Wayne (for example) wouldn't be getting such an overwhelming outpouring of "squeeeeee!" But they give it up in particular for Bob and Jamie, as well they should. With each scream, the prideless ninnies sound more and more like steam in a heater cracked up to ninety trying to escape through a closed vent. Pipe down, ladies. Upon further reflection of that horrific noise, I think it's possible that the vent is also filled with kittens. Squeeeeee!

"Now obviously," Chris vamps quickly, thinking it can pass without comment, "we are missing one of our bachelors tonight. Greg T. wasn't able to attend, and we wish him the best." And you've got to give him credit for realizing how dumb it is to gloss over this when there's been so much press on it (if you believe that the words "the press" and "Page Six" are, in fact, synonymous, as I do), but Chris can't even choke that sentence out without a knowing sneer. For those of you who don't know, Greg was on his way to Los Angeles to tape this very reunion show, and he was busted at JFK with a controlled substance known to drug enthusiasts and fans of '80s cultural artifacts as "cocaine." In an airport. In New York. In 2003. With cocaine. Some people just deserve to be in jail. But he saved himself in a way, because he made it plainly obvious that he's not mentally competent enough to be put to death for the crime. What he did deserves a few knowing sneers. So seriously? Go, Chris.

Now sitting in a chair in the center of the stage, Chris offers, "Fellas, it's good to see you again." Chris has already spoken more cumulative words in this episode than he has for the whole of the season up until now. Alex McLeod must be fuming that she doesn't get to save face like this. Who's that, you may ask? Well, exactly. Chris exposits, "You know, we've never done The Bachelorette before, so we really didn't know what it was going to be like in that first Rose Ceremony, when the tables were turned." Seriously, I'm going to track down the person who uses that exhausted expression and personally sever his or her "connection." There are no tables. Sell the tables. Write some new copy. Shut up. "What was it like for you guys?" Bob hazards that it was "crazy." Brook hazards in agreement that is was "crazy." Russ hops to the challenge of making sure no one in either the room or in America will ever like him again, hogging the spotlight with the observation, "Those Rose Ceremonies, you have no control. You feel like you're a piece of meat up there." The crowd goes wild because of the red neon sign that just dropped down just away from the camera's gaze, reading, "Go wild!" Russ smiles wickedly. It's not for you, Russ. It's for turning tables. And, maybe, the meatpacking industry? Difficult to know for sure.

Either way, Russ wins himself an invitation to the "hot seat," which is the other, empty seat right to Chris's. After Russ and Chris share that handshake/hug/backslap trifecta that signals the opening move in The Nongay Ballet, Russ takes a seat and gets ready for the third degree. And Chris isn't pulling any punches: "Russ, of course, was the first guy to kiss Trista. But it may have been the kiss of death." Now that is a great line. So few lines in reality-show host copy include a silent, cliffhanger-y "dum-dum-DUUUUUM!" just following them.

"Let's take a look at your journey...through The Bachelorette." Hey, who set the alarm for Montage O'Clock? On a video monitor, we work our way through Russ and Trista's very brief, very unloving love affair. He meets her and introduces himself as "Russell." We're reminded for the billionth time in his interview: "When I watched The Bachelor, I turned to my buddy and said, 'I'm gonna date that girl someday.'" We know. WE KNOW! We've heard it six thousand times. Does anybody else feel like there's almost no character more important on this show than the ubiquitous "buddy" to whom Russ offered that precious sound bite? He's like the father whose picture hangs on the wall in The Glass Menagerie, important to all but with no lines of his own. And I'll bet the "buddy" really said it and Russ is just taking credit for it. Or maybe he just said, "Dude, pass the Corn Nuts," and Russ translated it as people talking about him him him him him. Back on Montage Island, Russ gives Trista a bracelet. Russ chisels his way through Vegas. Russ and Trista kiss at Ghost Bar, and the crowd at the reunion show actually squeeeees all over again, as if this is a moment of glee and not something you're supposed to respond to with absolute fucking horror. Russ tells us through a late, drunken haze, "My gut feeling is that I will be the last man standing." The other guys judge him, including Charlie, who notes, "I thought Russ was a [bleep]ing cheeseball the whole time. I mean, there's no doubt about it." And you'd know one when you saw one, wouldn't you, Dippity-Don't spokesman? From inside her soundproof isolation tank, Trista appears in a box at the bottom left of the screen and puts her hand over her mouth in shock at Charlie's comment. Her man, cussing and carryin' on! Or, um, her runner-up, cussing and carryin' on! After all, how am I to know? Brook judges the bracelet. Russ becomes aggressive. Russ and Trista fight in Sedona. Russ gets booted. The audience applauds. Chris and Russ hold for adulating applause for one second too long, giving me the necessary amount of time to note with some level of certainty that the bowl of fake fruit sitting on the table between them has more personality than most of the guys sitting on those couches.

Chris is there because Chris knows how to ask the tough questions: "What's your reaction? First of all to Trista, hearing that stuff for the first time? And about what the guys think about you?" For some reason, Russ throws that question to the long-forgotten (yes, he was my show boyfriend for a brief time. Yes, I am that fickle) Rob, with whom I guess there was some simmering animosity to which we were never privy. Rob constructs a sentence in which every word might as well just be "duuuuude," so chill is he in his delivery: "He forgot that there were twenty-four guys that were also having the unique experience." Ew. "Unique experience" describes taking LSD or dabbling in naturism during the summer; I just don't think this qualifies. And anyway, Chris sees Bob shaking his head, and asks him, "The whole purpose of this was to try and beat the other twenty-four guys, right?" Bob non-replies, "The one thing that surprised me the most is that Trista didn't kiss on the first date, because I know Jamie tried a little lip lock, and it worked out the complete opposite of the way it went for us." Heh. When in doubt, change the subject, return to the practiced material, and nail the joke. I can dig it. Jamie, from his seat, responds genially, picking up a pillow from his couch and throwing it at Bob. No roughhousing with the feng shui, boys.

Chris ignores Jamie: "You were, as we saw, the first guy to kiss Trista, in Vegas. Did you know that at the time?" Russ says he figured it out because it was the first group date, but that "each of us had alone time with her that night." Brook combatively butts in, really mad, claiming, "You took all of it." He then spontaneously laughs maniacally when Russ looks him in the eye, Satan's power surging through him. Oh, that laugh is creepy. I hope he doesn't do something really weird like start dancing like a marionette puppet or something. He's too happy about his sadness right now. Brook is freaking me out. But Josh, wearing une belle chapeau, agrees, "We were all hanging out at the club, having a good time. And then basically y'all took off." Russ defends himself that he was following Trista to the room, employing the logic, "If I was [sic] so aggressive, she wouldn't have brought me to the room." Okay. Prick up your pointy devil ears, Mephis-STOP-IT-eles, because I only have it in me to say this one more time: She. Took. You. Back. To. Her. Room. Because. She. Was. Wasted. Booze talks, she walks. The proof is in the proof. I'm running out of ways to say it.

Chris pulls an I'd-like-to- bring-the-house- down-a-little-now routine with his question, transitioning into a much darker place: "I know you've taken a lot of grief publicly," to which Russ offers a plaintive "More than you know." And I feel bad for him for exactly one second, arguing with some small part of me that Russ's only crime was appearing on television and that he's been made into a national pariah and that's not right. I have a friend whose insecure behavior with women reminds me a lot of Russ's treatment of Trista (and his subsequently revisionist ways), and at worst he's misguided but he's certainly not evil. But seriously? Screw it. It's a reality television show. I don't have time for complex emotional layering. So, for the purposes of this season, Russ sucks, okay? Chris continues: "One national talk-show host called you a stalker and said Trista should get a restraining order against you." Yeah, that's some hard-hitting investigative prowess, Joy Behar. Why am I so convinced that it was she who said that? Anyone got a line on that? ["Caroline Rhea would be my guess, except I don't think being on a show that airs at 3:20 AM in fourteen markets across the country qualifies one as 'a national talk-show host.'" -- Wing Chun] Russ rationalizes that these attacks are not attacks on Russ, but rather judgments on "the character that I am on the show." Chris is at the ready: "But wait. You played yourself on the show." And the crowd? Goes wild. But we knew what Russ meant. Though I think I'd give a lot more credence to the whole "I was edited to be the villain" defense if the rest of the guys -- who lived with him even when the cameras went elsewhere -- didn't seem to think he totally sucks. Because they all kind of seem to think that. Russ cops to having had feelings for Trista, though again he words it badly: "I stayed around long enough to experience more than what some of these guys did." Boo! Hiss! season, they should just have the bad guy played by a puppet wearing a handlebar moustache who they can throw rotten fruit at. And his name should be named Arc E. Type. We've seen this a million times. It's not 1999 anymore.

Any questions from the audience for Russ? Anyone? Oh, here's one now. A blonde girl in a black tank top who thinks maybe she can be famous too because she's been on TV once steps up to a microphone and asks, "What happened to you on the fantasy date?" Russ cuts right to it: "Romantically, I wasn't into it anymore." Trista appears again in the bottom corner of the screen, shaking her head in disagreement. Look, sister. If your puss is going to occupy a quarter of my television's surface area, could you at least make yourself useful down there and provide the sign language translation? Isn't that what people in your box usually do? Actually, come to think of it, the presence of the box does serve to obscure a significant portion of Chris's weird and distracting khakis, so I'm done complaining. Russ tells us, "I just wasn't into it anymore." Yeah. I think I could force myself out of love with someone too if they told me, "I wouldn't touch you if a card in an envelope in my purse said I could...also if you were the last man on earth." Poor Russ. The Joy Behar Shitlist is the social kiss of death.

It's Bob's turn in the hot seat, because America needs to be reminded that it still knows how to love a hero. The crowd goes into paroxysms of joy as Bob walks onto the stage. Before he's allowed to sit down, Chris indicates Bob and does the spokesmodel wave over him, asking, "What happened to the rest of Bob?" Look. He wasn't overly fat before and he isn't overly skinny now. I'd even venture to say he looks kind of exactly the same as he did on the show. Still, Bob goes where the material is honed: "Now that's a fat joke." Chris tells us that -- despite the fact that we ignorant viewers knew Bob merely as "funny" and "popular" -- "there's a serious side to Bob." Wait. More than one emotion making up a person's total self? It's unheard-of! He must have dementia or perhaps an imbalance of the bodily humors! How can both "funny" and "serious" live in tandem in the mind of one man without driving him mad? Perhaps his excess of emotional capacity is what resides in his ample gut. We're treated to a montage of what Chris calls "Deep Bob," which begins with his dance from the first episode, a clip which is followed by Trista in interview telling us, "Bob just has this amazing sense of humor. He cracks me up. I love that!" Didn't love it enough, though, didja? DIDJA? Whatever. We've all gone for hot over normal at one time or another. I'm with you, Trista. But I'm never going back there. More clips of Bob's hilarity, and of Bob getting chosen for Rose Ceremony after Rose Ceremony despite enormous ass. I mean odds. Despite enormous odds, I mean. Sorry. We then see Bob getting thrown over for Greg in the hunt for the final rose. Greg, will you accept this nose candy? A seen-for-the-first-time interview finds Trista telling us, "I could see him being my best friend, but not necessarily the person I could marry." Zowch. That's gotta sting. I guess she didn't get up to the "It's not you it's me" chapter of Lines to Dump Guys You Won't Believe! And Neither Will He book she keeps on her nightstand. Chris notes this as well, calling "the 'F' word" "the worst word a guy could ever hear." Bob adds, "A fat friend." If you keep drinking from it, Bob, that well will soon be empty. Chill out on the fat jokes. Go find lunchmeats funny for a while. Or foreign films. Or airplane peanuts, the differences between men and women, or curling. You are obviously a superlatively amusing individual. Harvest it. Just don't harvest it, add polyunsaturated fat, and eat it. You're better than this one note. Get out there and play another note.

Chris does note, on the other hand, "You did take some heat on the message boards." He did? Y'all, lay off Bob. "But the media was also kind of hard on you as well." Bob recounts a quick story in which a radio DJ kept referring to him as "Fat Bob," until Bob took the reins and turned the tables (sorry), referring to said radio personality as "Stupid Steve." And again, I'd probably feel worse for him if I understood why these people deserve to be interviewed on the radio. Fame is odd. Bob gets his biggest laugh so far in telling us, "I went on the show a little heavier than I usually am," saying that he sees that in retrospect as an asset: "Everybody else was all buffed and ripped and everything else, and I was bringing a little something extra." Heh. A lot of something extra. Boohoo, Bob. You had me and then you ate me. Chris takes pains to remind us that Bob is an athlete, and that the reason he was so perversely, morbidly obese on television is that he "blew out [his] Achilles." But he pronounces it as if saying any vowel sound other than the long "e" would mean you would certainly be sentenced to death. "Ee-KEE-leez." That's how he says it. That's wrong. In closing, Bob notes that his strategy on the show was a sure-fire winner, as he tells us, "I bulked up. The way I look at it, I've got nothing to lose. I'll always look better than I did on the TV show. These guys? One Fatburger and it's all over for them." Dude. Here are some other things you can go and find funny: the IRS. Car commercials. North Dakota.

Another blondie from the studio audience -- this one with black-framed glasses and a business casual cardigan -- tells Bob, "You're definitely our favorite bachelor." She's gonna get buzzed if she doesn't phrase that in the form of a question. Her question regards the aftermath of the Rose Ceremony in which Bob was booted, asking if he was "crushed" when Trista backhanded the compliment about giving him the fifth rose that didn't technically...well, exist. He responds magnanimously, "I know how she meant it. I think she meant it to be a real heartfelt gesture, so I took it as such. I was really happy about it." Chris asks about other relationships Bob has been in since the end of the taping, and he trims the hedges with a long answer that culminates with his lifetime ideology: "Have a good time." The verdict is in, people: fat people are jolly. But he doesn't stop there: "I was always stuck in the mold of trying to please other people, and now I please myself." Beat. "And that sounds really weird." Masturbation? Fertile ground for comic exploration. Y'all, let's give it up for Bob.

Jamie is called down to the hot seat with the invitation, "Who eats dog food from a forty-pound bag?" I can barely suppress the Stonecutters call-and-response, "We do! We do!" that creeps up on me pretty much, like, whenever someone asks a question. Jamie waves at the crowd, and said crowd goes wild for it. Chris takes us back to that first fateful night in Encino: "Not only did you impress Trista, but you were an odds-on favorite with most of the viewers. Including my mom, by the way." Hey, Chris? I know that's the first-ever reference you yourself have made about your mom. And still, that's enough about your mom. Montagecakes, where we discover Jamie in a series of shirtless, running poses. I'm drunk on a six-pack of Jamie, y'all. Trista deems him "the perfect catch," but Shannon, OriginalBachelorCast Member, adds onto that, "He's just so nervous around Trista that he doesn't act like himself." Jamie winces repeatedly from the sign-language box as he watches himself. Trista thinks he "has some insecurities about himself for absolutely no reason." Cue amazingly awkward kiss on the beach, followed by Jamie not getting a rose. Trista ends with a remark about Jamie having to "believe in himself," and we learn from Jamie in his interview that he has a history of "panic attacks," and that his decision to appear on television was a strength, rather than what he thinks that she perceived as a weakness or a "lack of confidence." He does seem like a good guy. But awkward self-consciousness does not make for particularly great television. Chris asks Jamie if he wishes he'd made a move on Trista during the shower scene, but Jamie is glad he played it cool, adding, "Typically, on a first date, I do that. Take a shower with a girl." Heh. Not bad. Way to call this show out on its inherent non-reality. That I can get behind. He refers to the failed kiss as a "spectacular TV moment," going on to define panic attacks and blaming Trista for thinking that he was just a nervous loser. But Jamie is single, he wants to let us know, and the crowd goes slightly wild, including one woman aaaaaall the way to the right of my screen who does what I can only categorize as a "You go, girl" dance in response to his continuing singlehood. Stop it! Stop it! You're going to make him nervous!