Previously: We meet the cast of the very first Real World. Eric Nies is an ass.
It's Eric. Oh, goody. And he's talking. Even. Better.
Eric is talking about some commercial he made that is very "controversial" because it's "too hot for TV." It's basically him and this model ripping off each other's clothes for Jovan Musk -- a fine, high-class product that is considered to be the Colt 45 of fragrances. Julie asks if he wasn't laughing. Eric says, no, because it was like they were "going at it." The fuck? Then, with all the subtlety of a small child at Show-n-Tell, he asks Julie and Becky if they want to see his modeling book. They shrug and say, "Sure."
"I'm Too Sexy" plays as Julie and Becky leaf through various pictures of Eric in water, Eric with his shirt off, Eric with his shiny, hairless man-titties a-gleam, standing in water, Eric looking like a towel boy for a gay bath house, etc., etc., etc. Eric covertly watches their reactions as he stirs the spaghetti. He's wearing a baseball hat backwards. While I hate every single hat Eric wears, it's sort of handy way to mark continuity in an episode. shot shows him handing Julie a spaghetti strand and murmuring, "Might be kind of hot." There's a shot of them both eating spaghetti noodles.
Julie says, "You're pretty cute in pictures," and then laughs when she realizes how that sounds. Becky is stone-faced, as per usual. I'm convinced Becky was high the entire season.
Scenic shots of New York. Julie's VO talks about Eric appearing on some talk show about sexy ads. The house gathers around. Heather looks bored. The rest of the cast looks indulgent or indifferent. Eric looks nervous.
Faith Daniels flaps her gums about ads so steamy they can "never be shown" on the networks. We see Eric whoring himself on the talk show. He comes out in his boxers. Cut to Eric talking about how they wanted him to come out in a g-string, but he thought that would just set himself up to be humiliated, so he decided to come out in shorts instead. Hah! More likely that the show producers realized Eric Nies' toolbox in a g-string would qualify the show as part of sci-fi programming. Julie looks skeptical.
Cut to Eric. He talks about how the commercial and the "controversy" will help him to get national "exposure."
Cut back to the house, in the living room. Eric asks what they think. Kevin shakes his head and says he thinks Eric should keep his clothes on. Zing! Score one for the Kev-ster. Eric says, half-jokingly, half-defensively, that he's going to take his clothes off as much as possible. Anyone who's watched RW New York realizes that's not an idle threat. Heather B. scoffs that it shows how the entire world is all about money, and that for the right price, anyone will take their clothes off. Ooh. As much as I dislike Eric, this is some pretty mean shit they're throwing down. More, more, more!
Damn. Eric asks Julie if she'd take off her clothes for the right price. She says if it was something like those Calvin Klein Obsession commercials, she would. Kevin is genuinely shocked. Cut to Julie's one-on-one, where she says there's nudity in poor taste, but those Obsession commercials are not, and those are fine, but things like Penthouse and Playboy, where men are jacking off to it, are not. Grrr. Must. Refrain. From. Scathing. Condescending. Comment!
Eric: "When you sell cologne, you should be able to smell it, instead of taking off your clothes. I mean, you can't smell the TV. So you gotta find a way to sell the product." OH MY GOD! Did anyone else realize that you could, indeed, NOT SMELL your TV? Quick, write that down! It must be the missing commandment that Moses forgot to bring down!
Back in the living room. Heather's yelling that there's no difference between Penthouse/Playboy and Calvin Klein, that nekkid is nekkid. Eric asks what she would do if a record label asked her to pose scantily clad for her album. Heather says she would do it if she had no talent, but since she does, that's not an issue. Heather, baby, you're fabulous. But I wouldn't go tootin' your horn so vociferously about the "talented" part.
scene. Heather rapping. I have three words to say about this: JEE-sus Christ.
Heather, in her one-on-one, talks about the Sugar Hill Gang and their song "Hotel/Motel," and how it showed her something that she thought she could do, too.
Back to Heather and her song, "The System Sucks," which is about date-rape.
Julie's one-on-one. She talks about the subject matter of Heather's rap being very serious and how she was impressed with Heather's focus and ambition.
Heather's one-on-one. She talks about how her artistic side is intrinsic to her whole self. Then she rips Eric a new one. Did I mention that I love Heather? She says Eric has a problem with self-image, that he's too concerned with how he looks, and how people should be aware of themselves to a certain degree, but when you're so self-conscious it runs your life, it's a problem.
Eric's one-on-one. He's wearing a doofy hat that makes him look like a reject from Strange Brew. He says that maybe it's a conflict with his roomies, or maybe they just have a problem with the work he does. Well, if you consider "moron" a job, I guess I, too, have a big problem with the work you do. Shitwad.
Montage of Eric on subway. Eric's VO explains how people act differently toward actors and models, because they think they're a step up from everybody, but in "reality, we're no different from anybody else." Except dumber, Eric, and so puffed up with self-conceit and a complete lack of any sense of reality. You forgot that part. And probably, the really talented and great-looking actors and models can get away with that. The dumb-as-dog-shit, mediocre-looking ones should maybe get a clue, or develop some kind of inner life, or heck, maybe go to DeVry, or hey, maybe even start shilling their own rip-off of the Abdominizer!
Eric at a shoot. Eric's VO explains how he ended up as modeling, by bare-backing -- er, I mean piggybacking -- on the career of another model-friend who brought him to the agency. He says he's not as tall as the other guys and doesn't have that chiseled look that's in vogue, but he gets by on his personality and attitude. Someone, please, KILL ME NOW.
Julie's one-on-one. She's saying how Eric is a wonderful model. Then she immediately contradicts that by saying, "He gets the job done. He does what he's supposed to do."
Julie's eating the spaghetti dinner. Eric watches her like a lost puppy. He asks if she's done yet. Julie asks why he wants to take the plate away from her so bad. He says, "Because I wanna eat it!" She tells him to take some. He says he won't eat off her plate, he'll wait until she's done. Then he starts yelling at her about how she's eating spaghetti and shows her how to eat spaghetti "the right way." Apparently that's considered table manners on Planet Eric.
Becky's one-on-one. Apparently she decided to adopt some sort of Fiddler on the Roof meets The Blues Brothers theme, because she's wearing a babushka and heavy sunglasses. She says that she thinks Julie and Eric are becoming friends, and that there's an attraction -- but it's mostly coming from Eric. She thinks that Julie regards Eric as someone sweet and cute and friendly, but Eric is a Young Male who is, like, on the prowl. Translated: Dogs like to piss on any tree they can.
we see a montage sequence, as "I'm Too Sexy" plays. COME ON, Bunim-Murray, is this the only song that's applicable? Couldn't you have played "You're So Vain"? Or "Dedicated Follower of Fashion"? Anyway -- there's Eric playing with the cat, Eric eating, Eric in his goofy Austrailan Outback hat. Here's Manimal eating three Valium in a row.
Montage of "gritty, urban" side of Manhattan. This means lots of shots of street murals. Heather's rap plays over the montage.
More Heather rapping. Julie looks pensive as she listens. There's some boring interaction between Heather and her producer where he tells her to put more power into her voice.
Heather's one-on-one, where she says that most people think she sounds really angry when she raps. Yes, maybe because rapping isn't synonymous with SHOUTING.
Back to Heather in the studio, arguing in a friendly fashion with her producer. Julie pipes up, "It sounded good to me, Heather." Heather jokes, "That's 'cause you don't know anything about hip-hop!" Julie laughs agreeably.
Heather's one-on-one. She says that with Julie and the beeper/drug dealer incident, she knew that Julie was "into" stereotypes, and she wanted to help Julie understand what Heather was about, and her background, and different types of lifestyles.
Oh, oh, one of my favorite scenes from a RW, ever. Heather and Julie are taking Norman's dog out for a walk. The dog poops on the sidewalk and Heather walks away, refusing to clean it up. Julie sternly admonishes her and says they have to. Heather asks, "Why? It's not like anyone's gonna know what dog did it." Julie scoops that poop all the while Heather says, "Ooh, that stinks!" and offers to hold the dog.
Julie starts racing down the street. Gouda, who is one enormous dog, takes off after her on his expandable leash. Heather is forced to run after them, despite the length of the leash. Gouda yanks her across the street. He's running so hard that he pulls Heather off her feet, and she does a two-second Superman-I'm-flying-type position before hitting the sidewalk in a full WWF-type smackdown, yelling all the way. She gets up and kicks the dog. Which is not kosher.
Julie is cracking up. She falls down on the sidewalk.
Heather's one-on-one. She refuses to walk the dog, ever again, and says she wanted to kill Julie, Norman, AND the dog.
Julie eating in the kitchen. Heather walks up to her and says, "Here -- it's my second day in kindergarten," and hands Julie an old photo of herself in a little red dress, which is just as cute as hell. Julie laughs. It's sweet to see this rapport happening between the two of them.
Julie's one-on-one. She's saying how Heather seemed really bitter when they first met, but that she's getting to know her and really enjoying it.
Heather. She's laughing, talking about how Julie didn't understand any of the slang that came out of her mouth, so she finally wrote her up a cheat sheet.
In the loft, Eric is scamming on some girl via the phone, as Julie reads her hip-hop cheat sheet.
Julie says, stumbling over the words as if they were particularly incomprehensible Latin verbs, "Is she your honey. Your skin -- hey, is she a skeezer?" Heather is laughing so hard she almost climbs onto the counter.
Eric tells his honey/skin/skeezer to hold on and yells at them to shut up. In his one-on-one, he talks about how the girls didn't know about Missy and their relationship. In Julie's one-on-one, she sing-songs, "Whooo, Eric luuuuves Missy," and does a funny imitation of Eric saying, "That name should only be said with respect!" and ends it with, "What a bunch of crap!"
Eric says how he thought Julie was so sweet. Julie says she thinks what's going on between Eric and Missy is that he has a huge crush on her. Eric says that there's a snappish side coming out of Julie.
Montage scene of Eric and Julie together. "Opposites Attract" plays.
The montage ends. Back in the kitchen, Eric tells Becky an anecdote about how Julie was laying to him at "six in the morning," asking him if he wanted to get strawberries and pancakes. He says it all in a histrionic, high-pitched voice that reminds me of when my best friend in junior high was convinced that Joe Mendoza walking by her locker and sneezing was a sign that he had the screaming thigh sweats for her, and she was going to convince us, even if she had to filibuster everyone into submission. Dear Eric: SHUT UP. Sincerely, the TV-watching Western world. Julie contradicts him throughout the entire story. Becky gives examples of similar situations she has with opposite-sex friends. Eric gets more and more loopy, trying to convince Becky that it was a Big Deal.
Becky's one-on-one. She saying how Eric just wanted to give Julie a hard time, and how it's like grade school and when a boy liked a girl, he would hit her. Gotta get up pretty early in the morning to get one by Becky, I gotta say.
scene -- thank God, we're out of the fucking loft! Julie's in a hip-hop dance class, wearing this god-awful peach-colored bike short and bra set. I must say Julie's sporting a very Playmate-of-the-Year bod. My goodness! Who knew? Eric's on the sidelines. He has entered a lust-induced hypnotic state as he watches Julie and her girls bounce all over the place.
Eric then takes off his jacket and decides to join the class. The dancing disaster that ensues is enough to make Fred Astaire spin, then rise from his grave, hop a plane to San Francisco, knock on my door, enter, and stab me in the eyes with a pen so I don't have to watch this lead-footed lummox try and approximate rhythm ever again.
Julie's one-on-one. She talks about what a blowhard Eric is.
Eric's one-on-one. He expresses his amazement at how the dance class taught actual steps and "how to go from one move to another." Okay. Is Eric Nies some sort of psychology experiment about how much annoyance a human being can stand before she sticks a pen in her eye?
Julie's one-on-one. She talks about what an ass Eric made of himself in class, but then ends it with, "I was impressed." What. The. Fuck?
Eric and Julie in a cab. She's got her head on his shoulder. Ack! ACK! He says, "You looked good tonight." She mumbles something in response.
Heather's studio. Eric's trying to do something with two turntables and a microphone. Unfortunately, it's not inserting them in his rectum. A studio guy tries to give him advice. It does not help. The studio guy is being really, really nice.
Eric's one-on-one talks about how he had a friend who DJ's, so he "really knew what it was about." Dear God: Please strike Eric dead now. Sincerely, MBTV.
Heather shouts at Eric about how to freestyle. He says he's going to sound real dumb. Heather shouts, "You're supposed to make it up -- it's freestyle!"
Eric raps. It's pretty bad, but I guess no worse than anyone else put on the spot to freestyle, if he had no talent for rapping. But, since it's Eric, that makes it about fifteen times as bad. Eazy-E rises from his grave and goes to get a large drink.
Julie's one-on-one. She says that Eric is a wonderful person. Dear Julie: Please lay off the crack. Sincerely, manimal.
Becky's one-on-one. She wanted to set up Julie with a friend of hers at this party of Eric's. Eric put his foot down. How dog-in-the-manger of him.
Montage shots of Eric sweating and jumping on the dance floor. Julie looks uncomfortable and dances more sedately. She's wearing a pale-pink leather blazer that I think I remember seeing from various L.A. Gear ads in the late eighties.
Eric's in a department store modeling. Suddenly, I flash on the John Waters film Eat Your Makeup, and I start praying that someone will come along and make Eric "model" himself to death. Alas, all that happens is that Julie pops up and squirts him with a water gun.
episode: We hear some stuff about the rest of the house. Oh, and there's more Julie and Eric!