A LONG ISLAND CORONATION
Latest reality ‘Princesses’ take throne on Bravo
MANHASSET, N.Y. What’s in a name? If it’s a bottle of nail polish — and you’re a Long Island princess — a whole lot.
Amanda Bertoncini’s long red fingers are clicking over the candycolored choices at NuBest Salon and Spa. She’s “really into pastels right now,” but really, her mani monikers are even more important. She homes in on the lilac-colored You’re Such a Budapest. It’s great and all, but “I’m not a pest!”
“Do you have, like, a green?” Bertoncini, 27, asks one of the technicians as four of her fellow princesses — stars of Bravo’s new Housewives heir, Princesses: Long Island (premiering Sunday, 9 p.m. ET/PT) — kick up their stilettos and settle in for some pointed pampering. “I forgot what it’s called — like, So Psyched?” Bertoncini is wearing a leopardprint, maximum-cleavage maxi dress and towering turquoise heels.
Then a pale blue polish pops out. The name? Can’t Find My Czechbook. “It’s perfect,” Bertoncini declares with a grin. There was the WASPy, plummy,
Gatsby Long Island. There’s the hedgerow-hemmed, hedge-fund-funded Hamptons, Long Island. And there’s this shiny, suburban, mostly Jewish swath just east of Queens on the North Shore of Lawn Guyland, known for brassy, sassy Daddy’s girls, aka “princesses.” Or so goes the stereotype. Like the Jersey Shore clan before them, who reclaimed “guido” with gusto, the six princesses on this court say they aren’t offended by that ethno-religious slur of an acronym that starts with J. And yeah, they may work for Dad, carry Louis Vuitton and Chanel, have aspirations of lip gloss and perfume empires and live at home in relative luxury, but they don’t aim, or claim, to represent every Jewish person or Long Island resident.
No matter that various ItalianAmerican organizations didn’t exactly cozy up to Snooki’s fuzzy slippers. Shari Levine, Bravo’s senior vice president of production, isn’t worried what, say, the Anti-Defamation League will think of her network’s show. “Because you know what? We have shown these people to be who they are. They’re very much themselves and very self-aware. They are the first ones to laugh at themselves and say: ‘This is who I am. This is how I was raised, and I love it.’ ”
In subjecting yet another subculture to the spotlight, “our goal wasn’t to focus on a group and to give it a distorted lens but to show how a group has a cultural relationship with each other and see the choices they make and the influences they have,” Levine says.
But push the postmodern philosophizing aside: “We’re entertaining,” says a freshly spray-tanned Erica Gimbel, 29.
“We’re like six Barbie dolls; everyone can relate to one of us,” says Bertoncini, whose boyfriend, Jeff Hoffman, drove her here today because her outfit wasn’t accelerator-friendly. Hoffman, 39, who works in sales, is wearing a red visor embroidered with her initials in white.
There’s even a Snooki-sized princess: Ashlee White, 30, who stands 4 feet, 9 inches (“That’s what I say”) and whose size-5 neon orange platform pumps are “Krazy Glued” to her feet. “If I can’t wear stilettos, I don’t go.”
“Just because we’re from a privi- leged environment doesn’t mean we don’t go through issues,” says Chanel “Coco” Omari, 28. She’s the only one who comes close to wearing a tiara: a headpiece fashioned from a $5 gold necklace. Omari is “a girl on a budget, believe it or not.”
To wit: She may get biweekly blowouts, but today’s buffing and filing excursion is a treat for Omari; she typically DIYs her hot-pink digits every week. Bertoncini swears she expertly applied her giraffe-long eyelashes herself.
“People take that term (princess) and think we’re handed everything on a silver platter, that we only shop and we’re only into material things,” Gimbel says.
Indeed, Joey Lauren, 30, says she grew up with only a “bronze” spoon, which dished out a Honda Accord when everyone else was getting a BMW, and a public (vs. private) college education.
Being a princess isn’t all pool parties and Jelly Apple pedis. Gimbel’s hands are getting the hot wax treatment. “That is some serious sweat,” she says, examining her sticky green blouse. “That is not very princess-like.”