Say Yes To The Dress And Also The Couch

Plus: Truth Seekers, The Witches, and What's Making Us Happy

by Linda Holmes Welcome! It was the week when Kim Kardashian West was just making a lot of social media choices. It was the week when The Bachelorette continued to prove that it will implode in the presence of actual human emotion. And it was the week when Paul Rudd handed out cookies. Let's get to it. Opening Argument: Say Yes To The Dress And Also The Couch I'm not sure what it is about Say Yes To The Dress, which has now been running for (checks notes) about 116 years on TLC (okay, it's 13 years). I go for long stretches of time where I don't watch it, and then I dive back into it as I have over the last week or two, and I just ... watch people choose wedding dresses.  If you're not familiar, the gist is that it's an unscripted-ish show where brides come to Kleinfeld, a Manhattan bridal store, and choose their dresses. Accompanied by family members, friends, future in-laws and various goofballs, they try on ball gowns, fit and flare dresses, mermaid dresses, high-low dresses -- all of which are things I didn't really know anything about before I watched this show. Some of the brides are sweet and lovely; some are annoying and spoiled. In about 95 percent of cases, the bride finds her ideal dress and leaves happy. In the cases where she doesn't, it's usually because she allegedly does something wrong during her appointment with her consultant (salesperson): She tries on a dress that's way above her budget and can't like anything else after that, or she listens too much to her entourage and gets confused, or she gets worn down by insults by her mother. (Very insulting mothers are a recurring theme.)  Having never shopped for a wedding dress and rarely shopped for formal dresses at all, I am not an obvious candidate to enjoy this show. After a certain period of time, you feel like you've seen just about every kind of dress there is in the world, and just about every kind of woman trying to look comfortable while wearing them. (Every now and then, a bride tries on a dress that looks really comfortable and stretchy, and I always internally vote for that one. Girl, you are going to have a long day. Wear jammies material.)  Like most reality shows, Say Yes To The Dress has done increasingly weird things to try to spruce itself up over the years. For the first season, it was mostly women helping each other try on clothes; then they added Randy Fenoli, a one-time bridal designer and beloved-ish friendly elf of sorts. He works at Kleinfeld as a kind of uber-consultant, flitting from one appointment to another telling women what looks good on them and pulling dresses -- "pulling," here, refers to retrieving a sample dress from the stockroom so the bride can try it on. Randy has gradually occupied more and more of the time on the show, eventually got himself a spin-off, and then went back to designing dresses (while still working at the store and on the show). This means that women who are coming in for dresses sometimes have a dress "suggested" to them by a staff member whose line it comes from, which is the most toweringly obvious conflict of interest that has ever really not mattered at all.   As you might imagine, a lot of the show is about women liking and not liking various parts of their bodies. Women hate their arms, or love their butts, or want to emphasize their chests or not. They worry about what makes them look too short, too fat, too boxy, too old. They worry that something is too pageant, or too matronly, or that the skirt looks like napkins or the lace looks like a nightgown. Dresses don't always make a lot of sense to me personally -- like why practically everyone regardless of body type has to try on a bunch of strapless dresses, or why so many gowns seem to have sheer cutouts so you can get married looking good and naked. (Sheer lingerie-inspired dresses are seemingly one specialty of Pnina Tornei, a "featured" designer Kleinfeld puts many of its brides into, who often shows up to consult personally on customizations.) But look: To each her own, more on her wedding day than ever. Perhaps it's the very low stakes. They buy a dress, or they don't, I think it looks good on them, or I don't. The only really bad thing that ever happens is that you see someone who is clearly being emotionally wrung out by a member of their entourage in a way that's legitimately uncomfortable to watch (usually, as mentioned, a mother, although it can also be a friend or even a tyrannical, bossy child who is in the weird position of approving an adult woman's clothing).  There are a number of spin-offs and brand extensions -- there's one called Say Yes To The Dress: Atlanta that's more chill and stereotypically southern -- it's less speedy, less high-pressure, featuring brides who are notably younger on average but often seem a little less flashy about being probably equally rich. The trade-off on that one is that you do see a lot more clashes with conservative parents and grandparents who want the bride to be extremely covered up, and those are not always fun. People talk about cleavage on Say Yes To The Dress: Atlanta the way people talk about lions on Survivor: some are intrigued and eager for the experience, while others are frankly terrified.   I think the people who made this show probably originally figured it would be wish fulfillment, and that people watching would be fantasizing about what kind of a dress they would wear. I have actually never really thought "I would wear that" or "I would love to wear that," which is consistent with the fact that I've never, ever been a bridal dreamer. At this point I would be considered an old bride anyway; I certainly wouldn't stuff myself into anything at Kleinfeld. They're constantly telling these brides that the one thing people will remember about your wedding is your dress; I'm not sure I remember any of the dresses from weddings I've been to unless I regularly see them in pictures. I think the satisfaction of it is just the extraordinarily simple path from "needs a dress" to "likes a dress" to "buys a dress" that appeals, especially right now. (I'm sorry every thought I have ends with "especially right now," but it's just how it is. Especially right now.) You can catch Say Yes To The Dress in endless TLC marathons, on demand on cable or on TLC.com with a cable subscription, and on a variety of streaming services, free or for purchase depending one what services you have. Newsletter continues after sponsor message We Recommend: If you haven't yet watched the Netflix series The Queen's Gambit, maybe make some time for that. We have a really, really interesting conversation coming to the podcast next week, and I think even if (like me) it's not your exact cup of tea, you'll find a lot to think about.  We're also catching up on all the pieces of the NXIVM Cinematic Universe -- all the stuff that's come out about the group NXIVM, whose leader was just sentenced to 120 years in prison for crimes including sex trafficking. There's The Vow on HBO, but there's also the Showtime miniseries Seduced, which follows the experience of India Oxenberg, the daughter of actress Catherine Oxenberg. And of course there are podcasts -- of course there are -- including the first season of Uncover from the CBC.  I've also been checking out the Wondery podcast Dr. Death, which (like its predecessor Dirty John) is headed to television. Suffice it to say it's very ... unsettling. That, along with a lot of other recommendations, came to me via a recent callout on Twitter that I made that was intended to scout out binge podcasts for house cleaning.  What We Did This Week: Daniel Smith/Warner / HBO Aisha reviewed the HBO series The Undoing, which she was underwhelmed by.  I reviewed the Sarah Cooper Netflix special Sarah Cooper: Everything's Fine, which I liked a lot.  And Glen reviewed the Amazon series Truth Seekers, which (kind of) reunites Nick Frost and Simon Pegg.  This was our first week of daily podcasts! We talked about Bad Hair, horror movies for scaredy-cats, The Witches, the new Borat, and how things currently stand with The Great British Baking Show.  We also sat down over at our Facebook page to do a little live conversation about the show, how we're changing and not changing, what to expect in the future, and fun facts to know and tell about our newest host, Aisha Harris. You can still watch the replay!  What's Making Us Happy: Every week on the show, we talk about some other things out in the world that have been giving us joy lately. Here they are: What's making Shereen happy: Voters doing the cha-cha slide in Philadelphia, PA What's making Bedatri happy: Lunarbaboon on Instagram What's making Stephen happy: The Rocky Horror Picture Show What's making Linda happy: Chameleon: Hollywood Con Queen podcast Stream your local NPR station. Visit NPR.org to find your local station stream. What do you think of today's email? We'd love to hear your thoughts, questions and feedback: pchh@npr.org Enjoying this newsletter? Forward to a friend! They can sign up here. Looking for more great content? Check out all of our newsletter offerings — including Music, Books, Daily News and more! You received this message because you're subscribed to Pop Culture Happy Hour emails. 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