Last night was “Must See TV” for black women. First, “Black Girls Rock” celebrated all our positive contributions. The awards show, which is the best thing BET produces all year, featured performances by Erykah Badu, Jill Scott, Elle Varner, Shirley Caesar, Melanie Fiona, and Mary J. Blige. I was pleased. Favorite moments included:
- Nia Long’s skin. I don’t know what kind of natural juices and berries she is using, but homegirl was GLOWING. Pregnancy looks good on her. But then again, what wouldn’t look good on Nia Long?
- Jill Scott bringing her spoken word “Womanifesto” to a national TV audience. I love Jill Scott. SHE FAHN!!! But she is “not just an ass”.
- Learning who Elle Varner is. I had heard the song “Only Wanna Give It To You” quite a few times. It makes me feel good when I hear it on the radio, but I had no idea whatsoever who the singer was. Now I know. She is a pretty girl, and I appreciate that her performance/image doesn’t come off as overtly sexual, as young songstresses usually are. Interested to see what else comes from her.
- The minimal amount of wrinkles on the “senior” women like Gladys Knight, Angela Davis, and Patti LaBelle. If I look like that at 67 I’m going to the club.
- Regina King referring to her boo Malcolm Jamal Huxtable as the sexiest husband on television. Black love!!!
- Tracee Ellis Ross being so genuinely excited to honor Angela Davis. “Angela Davis is a relvolution”. YES!
- Seeing all the little black girls in the audience. Something is really special about seeing a gaggle of little girls watching something that doesn’t involve Rocsi, Terrance, or Chris Brown’s gyrations. And they looked so nice in their little dresses! Much better than when Whitney used to bring Bobbi Christina to stuff. Awwww. Black girls rock!!
So after all those rainbows and butterflies and black women building each other up….. Bravo tore us right back down with the season premiere of “Real Housewives of Atlanta”. And they did it during the last hour of Black Girls Rock because…… well, they hate us lol. And they wasted no time putting a big NeNe vs. Sheree showdown right in the first episode. No sisterly love to be found here but I cracked all the way up. My RHOA highlights:
- Sheree’s timing in telling NeNe she needed to get her teeth fixed was perfect. I will now be playing much closer attention to the bottom row of NeNe’s alleged “$50,000” grill.
- NeNe feeling the need tell people that she is now rich off her Trump checks. Girl, BYE! Then she proves it by bragging that she paid “CASH MONEY” for her son’s car. Cash is great. I’ve bought all my cars cash. But girl, please understand that paying $13,000 for a used Dodge Charger does not make you “The 1%”. Also I’m pretty sure that calling a car ghetto and then telling us what you “seent” earlier is a violation of The 1%’s bylaws.
- Phaedra’s funeral with doves, Cadillac hurses, and tophats. I think I will be cracking up all season over her budding funral business. Yes, funral. This is ATL. It might just be a fune.
- Kim’s
slaveassistant Sweetie (she even has a slave name man) upgrading her hair & makeup game this season. She done bought some tracks and some Wet & Wild lipstick cuz she on TV, child. I see you Sweetie. I kinda wish I didn’t, but I do. - Miss Jay throwing Cynthia shade talking about her “little modeling school”. Cynthia is trying to become the poor southern model’s Tyra Banks. And selling dreams to 35-year-old aspiring models in the process.
- Kandi’s sex toy line. I wasn’t interested until she starting talking about hooking iPods up to vibrators so they would vibrate to the beat. Perhaps I can enjoy Maxwell more than I already do…
And there you have it. The good, the bad, and the ugly on Sunday Night Black Woman TV. I thoroughly enjoyed live-tweeting the shananigans and laughing at all the comments from the Twitter community. Join me next week – @MissShellySays
