Doubts about Bethenny’s Divorce Rumors

(May 29, 2012) – It feels like decades since I crashed Bethenny Frankel’s wedding. That was way before I began to write this blog and some of the details have grown fuzzy over time. But I was definitely there in person and the only reason I am thinking about it is that yesterday I was cleaning my house and tuned into a marathon of Bravo’s Bethenny Ever After, a show I rarely watch. I have to say that, for me at least, the fun of being a voyeur to her life is gone.

Back in the day, I was just as charmed by Bethenny as anyone else. It was entertaining to watch her build an interesting life. I felt for her as she was embarrassed on camera when the Jason the First proved to be an uncaring boyfriend. I thought it was interesting to watch her and Jill Zarin hunker down in the Hamptons and forge a genuine friendship. I was disgusted by how cruelly Kelly Bensimon treated her with the infamous “I’m up here; you’re down there” comment. I enjoyed seeing her relationship with Jason the Second develop. I even liked watching them in Costco when whatever it was that she was selling was a complete flop with the other shoppers. Back then Bethenny was Reality TV gold. She just knew in her bones how to get us to root for her. Judging from what I was seeing on the television yesterday during that marathon, she’s lost her touch. At best, she’s boring. At worst, she’s annoyingly self absorbed.

When she’s not bemoaning the stress of buying and decorating a multimillion dollar apartment, it seems that she’s highlighting her husband’s unfocussed career goals and attributing the success of other people’s romantic lives to their association with her.

In that scene in Mexico when Jason says he feels judged because he didn’t make it (whatever that means), I felt for that guy. He is not an actor. As far as I can see, he never wanted the spotlight and yet there he is on her show like a trooper, spilling his deepest insecurities about not being good enough and she responds at first coldly and then begins to shout at him in frustration. It is very difficult for a viewer who has not earned millions of dollars after selling a liquor brand, to root for a woman who is dismissing her husband’s feelings of inadequacy. It just feels wrong that I, someone who met Jason once for a nanosecond while I was crashing his wedding, would care more about his feelings than his own wife.

In Bethenny’s defense I must say that I get why she’s overwhelmed. She may be a wise cracker who talks a good game, but just like all of us, she’s insecure. She yakked her way into fame and fortune and now she is obviously scared. She knows her new money is slippery. Historically fast cash has a way of sliding out of someone’s wallet. In just a few years she’s gone from getting jittery about how she’ll pay the rent and finagling invitations to Aspen to being in a store where some nut thinks she’s in the position to buy a $70,000 mirror. Despite her big pay day, Bethenny is in no position to purchase anything other than an apartment that costs that kind of cheddar.

What I do not understand is why she won’t give her husband a break. I know this may seem minor to some people but I thought it was almost disturbing to watch her ridicule Jason for eating the chips she bought at GNC. Clearly he didn’t care what she thought. He kept chomping away as she tried to make him feel selfish for eating everything in their apartment without worrying about whether anyone else had the chance to have any. Believe me I know husbands can be annoying, but seriously almost any man is worth a bag of chips; no?

Jason is a decent man. I remember when my friend Cory and I thought we’d been discovered while crashing his wedding. We were standing near the bathrooms when he came striding down the hallway. We literally dove into the coat check room and stopped breathing, hoping he wouldn’t discover us there. Then someone stopped to congratulate Jason. While I am not as tall as six footer Cory, I am certainly not a short woman. We both tried to remain crouched in the darkness as long as we could, but at one point, we had to straighten up. When Jason discovered us there, two women standing up in the darkness of a tiny room, Jason couldn’t have been nicer. Rather than assume we were swimming in the lady pond, or less appealing, two wedding crashers, he apologized and said he just needed to use the men’s room before helping Bethenny, who as we all know, was nearly 8 months pregnant at the time.

I know there are oodles of rumors that the Hoppys are on their way to divorce court. While I wouldn’t be surprised if that were true, judging from what I saw during the marathon and finale last night, something inside of me tells me that it isn’t. Back in March, I was in a Manhattan restaurant when Jason and Bethenny celebrated their second anniversary. They definitely looked happy to me. Jason was very much in charge. He seemed to be friends with the owner of the restaurant. I am sure they’ve had their ups and downs before and after that night. But for that one night at least, they certainly seemed to be in love. Too bad the cameras weren’t there to record it. Or maybe that is just it. Maybe this marital strife storyline is manufactured to create the drama Bravo demands.

All photos are courtesy of BravoTV.com unless otherwise indicated.

Tags: Bethenny Ever After, Bethenny Frankel, Divorce, featured, Jason Hoppy

Category: Bethenny Frankel, Jason Hoppy