Hell Hath No Fury Like a Sacrificial Lamb

Well, possums, we cannot lie. We and Martha Stewart are delighted, albeit for different reasons, to see Ariane Duarte go. We were enchanted by the symmetry of the whole thing. Lamb was the first thing she cooked on the show, and also the last, but this time around, the rascal lamb did not redeem her.

As the Mitford sisters would have put it, we roared when, at Judges’ Table, an audibly exasperated Tom Colicchio said, “She doesn’t know how to butcher leg of lamb; what is she doing here?”

Uh, Tom, funny you should ask that. It seems to us that what she’s doing there is gathering wins and accolades from you, and being symptomatic of a season with a lower talent quotient. Y'all chose her; you should know.

Ariane broke down the lamb, yes, but she also broke down. Have a look at her exit interview, the good bits of which we’ve transcribed for you.

“Leah was not a good team player, and neither is Hosea. He’s a wimp. He’s crying, he’s nervous, nervous, nervous when we’re waiting to go to Judges’ Table, with his tail between his legs…I don’t hold grudges, life’s too short, and that’s how I left ‘em. And you know what? What goes around comes around.

Leah is a young girl [contemptuous laugh]. She’s a party girl, she likes to have a good time, she likes to be the center of attention. She can cook, no doubt about it. She’s never wowed me. And she’s got a lot of growing up to do.”

“Um,” Miss XaXa interrupted, “isn’t that the pot calling the kettle…”

“More like mutton addressing lamb.”

The Talented Miss Kostyra, or Martha Stewart and the Ghost of Christmas Past

It should be no surprise, possums, that we still judge the “holiday” episode to be an abomination in matters both great and small—e.g., Scallopgate II, T Mobile sponsoring paternal cancer. And yet, although the great healer Time and its handmaiden Oblivion have softened some of the edges of whorishness and mendacity, there are still one or two things that we could not forget and could not understand.

For example, why, oh why, had Martha Stewart selected New Jerseyite Ariane Duarte as the Quickfire Challenge winner? Not only had Ariane failed to fulfill the requirements of the challenge, she also seemed to be exactly the sort of person that Martha—our Martha, the Martha we know and love, the Martha who irons her linens in the middle of the night to relieve her stress, the Martha whose own daughter says, “Martha’s scary; you just don’t want to fuck with her”—would never pick, and in selecting her, Martha had been guilty of betrayal to herself. But why? We pondered and pondered, but it made no sense at all.

And then we read Patricia Highsmith’s The Talented Mr. Ripley, and at once the scales fell from our eyes. Of course! Why hadn’t we seen it before? Ariane’s win was due to nothing less than blackmail.

No, no, possums. It’s not what you think. Let us explain.

A long, long time ago, possums (though we can’t say exactly how long, having been taught that it’s churlish to refer to a lady’s age), a crime was committed in Nutley, New Jersey. In an unusual turn, the victim and the perpetrator were the same, a certain Martha Kostyra, one of five children of Eddie Kostyra and Martha Ruszkowski Kostyra. That fateful night (for, under poetic license, it had to be night), and watched over by the spirits of Wilkie Collins and Carl Jung, Martha Kostyra—middle-class, ethnic, not New York and most certainly not Connecticut—was killed and buried in the psychic backyard of New Jersey, where, if the dark imaginings of David Chase are to be believed, so many bodies are interred. Her place was taken by the woman who would attend a silk-stocking Seven Sisters school, marry a Yale Law School graduate with a desirably un-ethnic surname (ironically, he’s Jewish), and amass a net worth of over $600 million.

And while Martha Stewart was doing all of this, Martha Kostyra lay buried in that psychic backyard, her metaphorical bones absorbing the toxicity of the New Jersey soil. At first, Martha Stewart could not be brought down, not by inadequate husbands who couldn’t handle her success, and not by disappointing daughters who dabbled in Sapphic sex and mediocrity. No. It took sexism and the feds (SEC-ism?) to bring her down. And then she had to go to jail and afterward pretend (not very successfully) that she had been humanized and cared what people thought.

And then, another fateful day, when, in the Top Chef kitchen, Martha Stewart came face to face with the ghost of Martha Kostyra, Jersey girl par excellence. Except that this revenant, this apparition, was named Ariane Duarte. Can you imagine Martha’s horror, possums? It’s positively Gothic. All these years she thought she was safe, soaking her past in the milk of myth and WASPishness that would remove the stink of its imperfection and humanity. And yet here was Ariane the Anti-Martha Stewart—dark, loud, ethnic, middle class, slatternly, slovenly, slap dash—the embodiment of everything Martha Stewart had tried to forget and had thought dead with Martha Kostyra.

How could it not seem like blackmail by the gods of fate? What choice did Martha have but to appease this ravening shadow self, this creature from the black lagoon of her subconscious? She would smile placidly, as if nothing were wrong, and, displaying her unrivaled self-mastery, hand that sloppy New Jersey bitch the win, hoping that it would be enough.

And that, possums, is our theory as to why Ariane won. It’s the only thing that makes sense.

Does Martha Stewart Think Her Hands Are Too Wrinkly?

It’s a question we asked ourselves, possums, after reading this blind item in The New York Post:

“WHICH lifestyle diva used a hand model for close-up shots in her latest book? She deemed her own hands too wrinkled”

Let’s see, possums. The term “lifestyle diva” was invented for Ms. Stewart. She does have a new book, as you can see in the still from tonight’s episode. And she is of an age where, thanks to the nature of time and the thousand natural shocks that flesh is heir to, wrinkles (on one’s hands or elsewhere) are a distinct possibility. What say ye?

We, of course, refuse, absolutely refuse, to believe that she is such a perfectionist that she would deem any part of herself imperfect. Not our Martha, not ever.

Oh, and speaking of imperfections, what the fug is going on with Padma’s outfit? As we noted, for last week’s episode she brought out the cleavage in full force, even during the Quickfire Challenge, where she wore a brown t-shirt so tight and cleavage-enhancing that we thought that, rather than any cotton garment, she was simply sporting that Mexican mole sauce slathered all over her naked torso.

But now that Martha is here, she packs the bazooms away? Why, Padma, why? Surely you don’t fear that a Martha who has been in the slammer (and a West Virginia one at that) would go from Camp Cupcake to actually craving “cupcakes,” do you? Look, Padma, Martha will make you her bitch, just not in that way.

Preview: Catering, Botulism, AIDS, Martha Stewart, Miss Universe, and Natasha Richardson’s Dead-Gay-Daddy Issues

Yes, possums, this is the episode in which the refrigerator doesn’t work, but human refrigerator Martha Stewart does; in which Fabio poses for clothed pics with a naked-pics-disgraced Miss Universe from Venezuela (beauty queens being the country’s top export along with oil and bad telenovelas), and the chefs cater an event for amfAR hosted by Natasha Richardson.

(Natasha’s daddy, Oscar-winning director Tony Richardson, died of AIDS. Despite being married to Natasha’s mum, Vanessa Redgrave, and leaving her for Jeanne Moreau, the late Mr. Richardson liked bangers with his mash. Of course, it should have been no surprise; trailing after Vanessa Redgrave and Jeanne Moreau is the classy, European arthouse equivalent of marrying Judy Garland and Liza Minnelli (we’re looking at you, Vincente Minnelli, Peter Allen, David Gest). We should know; both Nessie and Jeanne are two of our supreme faves. Speaking of which, for God’s sake, the man was directing Diana bloody Ross in Mahogany (until Berry Gordy took over); can it get gayer than that?

And let us not forget to mention that Vanessa Redgrave’s father and Natasha’s grandfather, Sir Michael Redgrave, also sailed, as the French so charmingly put it, à voile et à vapeur. We remember reading with delight this anecdote in The Guardian: “The billboard outside the Odeon cinema, Leicester Square, said: ‘Michael Redgrave and Dirk Bogarde [another famously closeted British actor, if you’ll forgive all the redundant adjectives] in The Sea Shall Not Have Them.’ Passing by, Noel Coward said: ‘I don't see why not. Everyone else has.’”

Is it any surprise, then, that, perhaps unconsciously, Natasha Richardson herself has married an incredibly desirable man who is also the world’s least likely to go gay, i.e., Liam Neeson? We think not. It all makes sense, possums, and now you have a glimpse into how our minds work when we see Natasha Richardson holding a canapé on a Bravo catering show.)

Oh, and the ever constipated-looking, South Florida chef Michelle Bernstein also appears. Woman, please get some more fiber in your diet.

Preview: Padma Lakshmi Extends, Ahem, a “One-Pot” Challenge

Finding Out They Make Little Boys Gay, Hasbro Recalls Almost One Million Easy-Bake Ovens

Well, possums, we had a feeling there was a problem with those Easy-Bake ovens, and now some of them are being recalled.

The Associated Press begins its report thus: "Lots of young girls have an Easy-Bake Oven, or have a friend who has one. Now, Easy-Bake Ovens that have been sold since last May are being recalled because a girl can burn her hands on them."

Awww. Isn't that cute? Isn't that droll? A girl can certainly make condescending jokes, can't she?

However, when discussing the recall of the toys, which (ding, ding, ding!) "are purple and pink and resemble a kitchen stove with four burners on top and a front-loading oven," the AP changes its tune a little. Now it is not just girls who are in danger of getting burned. Instead, "Hasbro says it has received 29 reports of children getting their fingers or hands caught in the oven's opening. Five children have been burned."

So it's children, is it? Not just girls? We demand to know: Just how many little gay boys have gotten "their fingers or hands caught in the oven's opening"? And how many have been burned? If a whole generation of little homos is dissuaded from cooking by traumatic experiences related to faulty Easy-Bake Ovens, the whole future of Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia could be at risk.