SYTTD: S1, E2, Pt. 1 – Rocking the Dress

Hello beautiful and welcome back to this deranged project! We’re diving right back into the tulle and jewel-encrusted mouth of hell with Season 1, Episode 2 of Say Yes To The Dress.

I’ve divided this episode into 2 parts. Although they’re listed as a single episode and appear as a single episode, they are absolutely two distinct pieces. Halfway through you get a credits sequence after showing the bride’s wedding, and then the title plays all over again. So I’m treating them as two separate episodes, as god intended.

This episode is historically significant in the lore of SYTTD because it’s the first one where over-the-top wedding dress queen Pnina Tornai appears. Not only do both brides that say yes buy a Pnina gown, but she customizes one of them for the bride. One of my most strongly held beliefs is that Pnina Tornai has been trapped inside of Kleinfeld’s for years and years, churning out increasingly complicated beaded-tulle-satin monstrosities, and introducing her on the second ever episode of the show makes that argument even stronger.

But I won’t get ahead of myself. Let’s meet our first bride!

Hala Sabry is an incredible SYTTD bride by every metric. She arrives at her appointment with a massive budget, an entourage of ten people, and a wedding that scheduled in 180 days. Seasoned viewers of the show will know that a bridal gown has to be ordered 6-8 months in advance, to give the designer enough time to actually make the gown and account for alterations. Hala is truly pushing the boundaries there, by looking for a big and dramatic princess ballgown with a huge train.

Hala’s consultant is a relatively new consultant at Kleinfeld’s, Claudia. Claudia has only been at the store for six months and still doesn’t really know what she’s doing, but ignores all advice with the confidence of someone with way more experience. After Hala hates the first few dresses that Claudia pulls, manager Elise has to get involved to try and get the appointment back on track. This pisses Claudia off even more.

Claudia openly makes fun of the dresses that Elise pulls with her bride, which is probably not how you should behave in a professional environment that is also being filmed and broadcast nationally. I’m sure this will work out great for her! Luckily, Hala falls in love with a Pnina Tornai ballgown, and all nine people in her entourage are supportive of her decision. Pnina Tornai, making her first-ever appearance in the show, comes out to tell Hala how beautiful she is.

Personally, I think this dress is hideous, and very emblematic of the terrible clothing we were all wearing back in 2007. But I’m not Hala and I didn’t have to wear it, so good for her! She seems thrilled. Other than the drama between Claudia and Elise, this entire appointment goes great and only takes up the first 8 minutes of the episode.

Moving on to bride number two, who already bought a dress from Kleinfeld’s and immediately regretted her decision.

Terry Porcelli doesn’t get an Informative Graphic. She’s a self-described “rock’n’roll” bride who wants something sexy. Unfortunately for Terry, she got swept up in the moment during her first appointment and ended up with a very conservative and traditional ballgown. Terry informs us that, when she told her fiancé about dress number one, he told her that she was “ruining the wedding.” I am once again asking us to ban men.

Also, the first dress looks fine. If anything, it’s not exciting enough to ruin a wedding.

Anyway, Terry loves Pnina Tornai and came to Kleinfeld’s specifically to try on a Pnina gown. Terry Porcelli is already an iconic bride for being the original Pnina Girl on SYTTD. To absolutely no one’s surprise, Pnina also turns up at Terry’s appointment, where the bride is struggling with liking the top of one dress and the skirt of another. I think we can all see where this is going.

Yep, Pnina customizes a dress for her. Terry ends up with a truly classic Pnina Tornai dress: sheer corset, horrific ruffled skirt, looks vaguely like the bridal version of a saloon girl in a Western movie. Yeah, I hate this dress, but I honestly can’t be that mad about it. Hating Pnina Tornai dresses is a pillar of this show! Thank you Terry!

This episode also has a weird B-Plot about brides that come to Kleinfeld’s just to play dress-up, and don’t ever intend to buy a gown. Ronnie and Mara, the owners of the store, discuss how much the consultants hate this. It wastes their time, they don’t get a commission, but they’re doing the same amount of work.

Dawn Birch is the first bride who comes in to play dress-up, and spends three hours wearing a blush Lazaro gown in front of a mirror while consultant Camille takes deep breaths and tries not to scream.

The second bride that’s here to waste time is Lashon Seastrong. She openly admits in her confessionals that she just came to NYC to visit a friend, and they thought it would be fun to try on wedding dresses.

Lashon is paired with consultant Sarah, the youngest consultant at Kleinfeld’s. Sarah also knows that Lashon is up to, and is barely keeping it together as she pulls close to a dozen dresses for the bride, knowing that the entire enterprise is a massive waste of her time.

I was honestly not expecting Pnina Tornai to show up in SYTTD before Randy Fenoli, but miracles never cease. Let’s see how this episode stacks up, shall we?

Final Score:

• Entourage of 5 or more people – +3 points
• Manager intervention – +5 points
• Bride “wants to be a princess” – +3 points
• Bride “wants to be sexy” – +3 points
• First ever Pnina Tornai appearance! – +10 points
• Pnina Tornai designs a custom gown – +5 points
• Bride has a “bridal moment” – +5 points for Hala, +5 points for Terry

Total: 39/100

See you guys next time. Bye beautiful!