'The Real Housewives of New York City'

An East Coast extension of the cult-enslaving "The Real Housewives of Orange County," the show follows the lives of five women, none of whom is remotely housewifely or, for that matter, "real," at least in a demographically representative sense. (Not a one lives in Queens, for instance.) But I suppose "Five Rich Social Climbers and a Camera Crew " just didn't fly with the marketing department.

There is a reason both these shows have names that ring vaguely of bad porn. They are porn, if not sexual then psychological. Here is a camera giving a mass audience glimpses of what, under normal circumstances, should never be glimpsed. The fact that everyone keeps their clothes on is almost beside the point -- sex we can see pretty much everywhere these days. But the inner self-justification and celebration of a bunch of tautly tanned rich women? Bring on the cheesy thumpa-thumpa music and the shirtless tennis pros.

Why is it that reality TV seems so much harder on women than on men? Maybe it is the feminine tendency toward confession. But women always appear more naked on these shows; on "Big Brother," "Survivor" and "The Hills," the men so often just hang their heads and look goofy while the women try to explain, which always makes you seem more scheming and duplicitous.

So it is on "Housewives of New York." With a blithe lack of awareness that is almost endearing, each woman introduces herself as a member of New York's society elite and then proceeds to behave in a way that defies every definition of "elite" and "New York society." I don't know if these gals have ever heard of Babe Paley or CZ Guest, but surely they have heard of Truman Capote. (He wrote "Breakfast at Tiffany's"? Philip Seymour Hoffman recently won an Oscar for playing him?) When Tru, beloved author and darling of the inner circle, dared to publish even fictionalized accounts of what went on in those East Side super apartments, so utter and thorough was the collective snub he was basically never heard from again. That's how it works in elite society.