Sacha Baron Cohen Targets ‘Real Housewives of Orange County’ Stars in ‘Who Is America?’

Sacha Baron Cohen targeted liberal politicians — including former presidential candidates Jill Stein and Howard Dean — as well as reality show couple Gretchen Rossi and Slade Smiley (formerly of The Real Housewives of Orange County) for the penultimate episode of his Showtime series Who Is America?

While Dean was one of the targets named in initial reports of the series (tabloids wrote about Rossi and Smiley’s prank back in February), somehow no one linked it to the series once it was announced. The couple said they only figured out it was Baron Cohen when Tito Ortiz told them at a photo shoot shortly after when he thought he’d been duped by the comedian.

Here’s who else the comedian targeted this week: 

Target: Gretchen Rossi and Slade Smiley, former Real Housewives of Orange County stars
Character: Col. Erran Morad
What Happened: Baron Cohen’s Israeli self-defense expert visited the home of the two Housewives stars to teach them how to defend their bathroom through music. Baron Cohen played the cello and hit on Rossi, and the couple politely took his card as he left.
Response: While Rossi and Smiley weren’t named in initial reports about the series, Page Six reported back in February that the duo had been pranked by the comedian for an as-yet-unknown project. 

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Target: Jill Stein, former presidential candidate
Character: Billy Wayne Ruddick Jr., Ph.D.
What Happened: Ruddick asked Stein whether she believed in climate change but showed her a graph about how the temperature changes over one year. “You’re demonstrating how the seasons change,” she explained to him. When he told her about his theory that the CIA was weaponizing weather, she interrupted him to explain what actually creates hurricanes.
Response:   None as of airtime.
  

Target: Howard Dean, former Democratic presidential candidate and Vermont governor
Character: Billy Wayne Ruddick Jr., Ph.D.
What Happened: Ruddick’s segment with Dean focused on the question of whether Hillary Clinton is a woman — using “evidence” of a photoshopped picture of the shape of a penis in Clinton’s pants. “I could make up a picture of Donald Trump in drag,” Dean countered, but conceded that he “had not” seen what Reddick called her “lady parts.”
Response: Dean was one of the politicians named in the Drudge Report’s initial reveal of some of Baron Cohen’s targets ahead of the series premiere. Before the episode aired, Baron Cohen posted a clip of Dean’s segment on his Twitter account.

Target: Jan Brewer, former governor of Arizona
Character: OMGWhizzBoyOMG
What Happened: The YouTube character had the former Arizona governor open a Shopkins toy and then had a discourse with Brewer via the small toy about being able to buy a machine gun while mentally ill. While Brewer indicated that “ethnically cleansing” the other toys was crazy, she said he could still buy the machine gun.
Response: None as of air.

Target: Bill Jilla, Dinner Reviews Editor
Character: Rick Sherman
What Happened: After being told Sherman was a chef with the potential to earn a Michelin star, Jilla agreed to sample a tasting menu prepared by the ex-con. The first course was a sampler of different beans on toast, which Jilla said was “incredible.” Sherman told Jilla the second course was inspired by a fellow ex-con who smuggled veal into prison via a condom in his anus — and the dish was an eight-day “anally aged” veal. Jilla said it was the “best braised veal” he’d had in his “entire lifetime.” The story about the third course was that he accidentally ate human meat in jail, and then served Jilla ethically sourced human flesh he called “fillet of vegetarian-fed Chinese dissident” with a cauliflower puree. Jilla ate the dish, and called it “butter soft” and then sent a message to the supposed dissident’s family back in China thanking them for the meat.
Response: None as of air.

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Target: Ataana Badilli, spiritual healer
Character: Dr. Nira Cain-N’Degeocello
What Happened: The comedian’s ultra-liberal character decided to combat misogyny by wearing an empathy pregnancy belly and “giving birth” himself via his “male birth canal” (he’d been widening his anal cavity in preparation, he told Badilli, who agreed to support him spiritually). A “doula” helped “deliver” a baby doll, but the head then allegedly got stuck. The doula turned out to be a “cleaning lady,” whose hand then also got stuck, and Badilli eventually walked out.
Response: None as of air.

Who Is America? airs Sundays at 10 p.m. on Showtime.