They’re in Miami, Bitch

Miami looks awesome in Bravo’s latest reality guilty pleasure Miami Social.

As it is its wont, the Magic City has been lovingly photographed so as to look like a tourist guide come to life. It’s colorful, it’s hot, and it’s vibrant. It’s sexy. It’s It.

She is the Snow White to the rest of the country’s Queen in a way.

But you should have read or heard the response the show elicited in the weeks leading up to tonight’s premiere of Miami Social, bon mots so full of transference of vanity and wickedness for a city inhabited by the Miami Social Seven – mortgage banker George; his ex, Sorah, a realtor/property manager/remodeler; entertainment journalist Michael; fashion producer Ariel; photographer Maria; and reality-TV alumni Hardy, a nightlife impresario, and real estate agent Katrina, both of whom appeared in previous seasons of Big Brother and The Apprentice, respectively – I couldn’t help but wonder why folks were so worked up over it.

All the pretty people are here, Miami Social tells its rest-of-America audience. So are the gorgeous weather and the hot spots. Come on down to South Beach, and live like the “close circle of friends that make Miami spin.” They are the people you’ll want to be, after all.

Except these…seven dwarfs aren’t the best ambassadors Miami could ask for, and I guess that’s why folks weren’t so keen on the show. Those watching it are like the Prince, in love with the city, hoping they were the ones who get to kiss the life into the Magic City, perhaps. They were and are rather unimpressed with the Miami Social Seven, to the point of character assassination, and that’s not just because they’re shallow, as everyone I’ve talked to likes to say, or big fish in a small pond.

No – I thinks it’s because the Miami Social Seven are extremely ordinary. And they’re on TV?!

But in the show’s biggest ta-dah, each and every single one of the characters these people has become to fulfill their reality-TV destiny is – get ready to let out a gasp – totally human. Like, “Everybody wants this. Everybody wants to be us” by Miranda Priestly is the mantra by which they live, and they’re serious about their pursuit. Too serious in some cases. But they dare have real issues, and watching them deal is appalling at times, and aggroying, and just urgh.

OK, the rule of reality TV is that the bitchier characters are the most interesting, so let’s be done with less bitchy ones first, OK.

There’s George (a.k.a. Mopey), a dude so milquetoast I often found myself rooting for his crazy-chick girlfriend Lina. I mean, really, what she does to him by the end of the first episode is so rude and unbelievable (she disappears on him by going on a mysterious “work” trip), of course producers had to end the hour with Lina calling George asking for a ride home from the airport.

Sorah, George’s ex, I can only call Shrinky because she spends the first two eps listening to George bitch and moan about Lina, that is when she’s not analyzing her budding relationship with Gonzalo, a younger stud who lives in her building (where George also lives, for added Melrose Place-esque drama).

Then there’s Michael (a.k.a. Happy…as in Gay), whom I know offline (in the spirit of full disclosure). He’s looking for love in all the wrong places, the poor thing. Seriously, Rule No. 1, dude: Don’t hit or get worked up over your trainer. Stop trying to make that happen. It’s a good thing he’s quite sassy, and always good for a laugh because on the other hand is…

Ariel, or Really Happy…as in Bitchy Queen. He was prominently featured in the show’s promos because he’s shown barking “Get the fat girl out of my table!” atop “the Gans” (fab short for the Gansevoort South), the group’s hangout. Clearly the most polarizing villainous of them all, we’ll be watching what happens with Ari, who btw, quit modeling because he doesn’t like to be told what to do, and not because he got tubby and sweats too much and should shave his neck every once in a while.

Maria I call Kooky. She’s the Switzerland of the seven, and gets along with all. Switzerland, incidentally, is to where he ships her daughter for boarding school, which gives us one of the scenes Andy Cohen probably will revisit in the reunion: Maria pulling a Lorelai Gilmore (by way of Carrie Bradshaw), telling her tween, “No kissing with cold sores!” Hip, huh.

Finally, there’s Hardy, who’s a bit of cipher, made interesting (but then again no) not by his man-about-South Beachness but by his trophy girlfriend, who’s got baby fever (I trust she’s just a recurring character).

With a name like Hardy, you’ll agree he doesn’t need a dwarf name.

And then there’s Katrina (a.k.a. Strutty). A self-described workaholic who’s always lunching with Michael or gossiping with the other girls instead, she gallops into every scene dressed up to the nines in a confidence that cleverly disguises (and accessorizes) the unraveling of her marriage of the studly Ben (who should be upped from recurring character status but pronto).

If these are the people that make Miami spin, odds are you’ll get a bit dizzy. You may accuse Miami Social of being all style and no substance, but it’s reality TV that’s airing in summer, not a cerebral serial. Lost-ish they are, but Lost this ain’t.

Enjoy the show for what it is. And give these dwarfs a chance.

They’re in Miami, bitch, and they have feelings, too.

Photo: Bravo.