[Televisionary]

The more things change, the more they stay the same. It's yet another good day at Jeff Lewis' office, as seen in last night's season finale of Flipping Out ("Back in the Market"). Sure, there's the remains of, er, human feces to be dealt with at yet another job site, a surly moving contractor to be yelled at, and delays with completing the Encino property before Jeff's clients can move in, but that's just par for the course as far as I am concerned. I thought it was about time that Jeff started to interview for someone to come in as a new house assistant (especially after the incident at Valley Oak) to replace Chris Keslar, but I never imagined that it would be someone quite so terrifying as ClownHead... I mean, Jett. Everyone is oohing and ahhing over how "attractive" Jett is but his hair was actually quite scary to me; the mane equivalent of a trainwreck you can't quite look away from. (Shudder.) Jett seems nice enough, if already in w

I can't believe Chris Keslar left. After all the complaining and half-sobbing and trying to get Ryan to notice his skills, I had figured that Chris was at least sticking around to the season finale of Flipping Out this season. But, alas. The one-time house assistant for Jeff Lewis lasted a measly three months before quitting after an incident involving forgotten guacamole. This week's episode of Flipping Out ("Tapped Out") showed Jeff in a pretty precarious position, as he's forced once again to contend with client-from-hell Courtney, deal with the loss of yet another employee (seriously, he's lost Steven Bowman, Chris Elwood, and Chris Keslar in just the span of a few months), attempts to sell Commonwealth in order to raise some cash, and loses his battle to control his anger after Jenni makes a pretty big mistake that could potentially cost him $30,000 (though one, it should be noted, that is quickly corrected). One has the sense from watching this week th

Just a few quick thoughts about last night's episode of Flipping Out ("Looks Like New"). While the action surrounding Jenni and the dissolution of her marriage to former trash guy-turned-house manager Chris Elwood seem to have subsided this week, the real drama this week was surrounding Jeff Lewis' new house assistant Chris Keslar. (Fun fact about Chris: he's the brother of Project Runway 3 contestant Angela Keslar.) Chris has been upfront about his interest in the real estate business since Jeff first hired him and has made his dissatisfaction at the details of his current position clear to all. This is a guy who would like to be shopping for tile and finishings for Jeff's homes... rather than cleaning up after the dogs at Commonwealth. And this week, things went from bad to worse as Jeff pulled a power play and decided to put Chris in his place, first telling him that he'd have to take the bus back after dropping off his car to be serviced (which, yes,

Oh. My. God. I knew that there would be major fallout from Jeff's decision to install a hidden camera in his office in an effort to catch Chris Elwood slacking off, but even I was ill-prepared for just how much absolute drama this would create. For a series that has always been a hotbed of drama but has couched it in some hysterical set-dressing, I was pretty surprised by the gravitas of this week's episode of Flipping Out ("Tear Down") for a number of reasons. Jeff Lewis has always been a control freak who has had a hard time keeping his anger in check and, well, expressing emotion in a sympathetic and encouraging way. So I was surprised by how calm Jeff was when he took Chris Elwood into his office and told him that he was going to be fired, permanently this time. Jeff could have screamed and ranted and raved about violations of trust and turned this into the Spanish Inquisition but instead he calmly told Chris that he had installed the camera and had caught him us

I was on the edge of my seat last night. I wasn't watching Damages , Lost , or any of the haute-tension dramas that seem to fill up my TiVo in recent years but rather the series that is keeping me entertained all summer long: Bravo's Flipping Out . Last night's episode of Flipping Out ("Closer Inspection") had all of the elements of great television drama: mystery (who did crack the shower's glass panel at Valley Oak?), suspense (would Jeff catch his employees goofing off by using his nanny cam?), guilt (would Jeff crack under the strain of concealing from his staff/friends that he was secretly videotaping them?), denial (ahem, Jenni), and a soupçon of humor in the form of Chris Elwood, who may have very well damned himself by answering interior designer Zenzi's call by saying "Bonjour, chez lui," rather than the ascribed telephone greeting. That Chris would answer the phone without knowing who it was in that fashion was shocking to me and I

I have a serious, serious problem: I am completely addicted to Bravo's docusoap Flipping Out. There, I said it. Whew. I went on and on about this hysterical series last year when the cabler aired the first season of this series, which focuses on the high-paid antics of real estate prospector Jeff Lewis and his band of co-dependent staffers, including executive assistant Jenni, housekeeper Zoila, and trash guy Chris, and his tempestuous relationship with former lover-turned-business partner Ryan, as they flip houses and, well, spend a lot of time dealing with Jeff's OCD-fueled tantrums. If you're looking for a guide on how to make money in the sinking ship that is the Los Angeles real estate business, look elsewhere. Now in its second season, Flipping Out hasn't changed it's modus operandi; it's still not really about the houses themselves (though the progress Jeff made on Commonwealth is stunning in itself) but about these incredibly flawed but captivating cha

Jeff Lewis is clearly insane. And yet I can't stop watching him. I'm talking about the focus of Bravo's docudrama Flipping Out , which wraps its six-episode run on Tuesday night. I've been a pretty outspoken champion for the quirky (and at times soapy) reality series, which follows the travails of OCD-suffering "real estate investor" (i.e., speculator) Jeff Lewis, his business partner Ryan, and Jeff's troika of long-suffering assistants and lethargic maid Zoila. The reason I am writing today is about onions. Yes, onions. In this week's episode, Jeff flew off the handle at second assistant Bowman because he didn't check the box containing his El Pollo Loco lunch at the "restaurant" (I'll use that term loosely) and was absolutely aghast to discover that it did contain onions, even though Bowman said he had asked for no onions. A cardinal sin, if there ever was one. But what got me the most (besides for the ingenious way that the produc

I have a serious problem. Pardon me if I seem a little embarrassed talking about it, as this is a new development and one that, frankly, puzzles and surprises me. Here goes: I am addicted to Bravo's new docusoap Flipping Out . There, I said it. The first step to dealing with problem is to admit it exists and I've now put my issue directly on the table. I first came across Flipping Out a few weeks ago when I scored a screener episode with the first two installments. I will admit that I was skeptical about the program and started to watch it fully expecting to be rolling my eyes within the first few minutes. And then something strange happened: I was sucked in and couldn't stop watching. I sat through the first two episodes in one sitting, hungry for more. Let's backtrack for one second. For those of you not up to speed, Flipping Out is Bravo's latest addition to its docusoap ouevre, which includes programs like Work Out , Real Housewives of Orange County , Blow Ou