It is, of course, a super-classy, insightful and mind-expanding show…
So, how come The Real Housewives of Orange County is taking potshots at little ol’ Greystones?
Having debuted in America on the Bravo channel back in March 2006, The Real Housewives of Orange County proved such a hit that it spawned a franchise that now covers other spoilt, upper-class corpse brides in New York, Atlanta, New Jersey, Washington D.C., Beverly Hills, Miami, Potomac and Dallas.
The original of the species, RHOC (as the show’s fans like to call it ) is still going strong, and has even managed to produce two successful spin-off shows, Date My Ex: Jo & Slade and Tamra’s OC Wedding.
We haven’t actually seen any of these TV shows, but a quick glance on YouTube merely confirmed our earlier suspicion – RHOC is indeed a super-classy, insightful and mind-expanding show.
Akin to an endless Amy Schumer sketch with all the humour and the humanity bled out, after only 20 minutes of this blow-dried nonsense, our heads were fit to explode.
We were on a mission though. To find out exactly which one of these desperate housewives has Irish roots. To be more precise, O’Toole Wicklow roots stretching all the way back to Greystones.
It was in May of this year that local genealogist John Grenham was contacted by the producers of The Real Housewives of Orange County. They were in Ireland, filming up at Powerscourt, and they needed to get an Irish family tree whipped into shape pronto for one of the ladies on the show.
Turns out her uncle had already done some serious research, and Grenham was quickly able to find parish records going back to 1901. The housewife in question had 19th century ancestors by the name of O’Toole, with the forename Phelim recurring in every generation, and all based in Greystones.
And this is where it finally gets interesting, folks. The only reason we even began this search in the first place is because our good friend Richard Roche in the US of A emailed to share with GG the following snippet of dialogue heard on this fine, upstanding American TV show. Namely…
“If you walked into this town called Greystones, every person there would be a 2nd or 3rd cousin.”
Eh, how offensive is that? How base. How rude. Don’t they know that’s Newtownmountkennedy?
Turns out, thankfully, that the line was a little misquoted. And somewhat out of context. It was the genealogist, Grenham, who was riffing on Greystones, advising the housewife with the local roots that she should “just go down to Greystones, tap anyone on the shoulder, and they’be be your fourth or fifth cousin”.
It’s kinda disturbing to know that our future may be bright but our past came out an odd shade of orange.
So, you know, call off the dogs. And put away the pitchforks. For now.