Jill Kargman attends the "Influenced" New York screening at Florence Gould Hall Theater on May 06, 2026 in New York City. Getty Images ‘Odd Mom Out’ is now in STAR of the Bravo series “Odd Mom Out,” Jill Kargman, a screenwriter for 10 years, just wrote and stars as yenta Dzanielle, an Upper East Sider know-it-all — of which there actually is no other kind — in her new movie, “Influenced.”
More New York than the Statue of Liberty, she writes and mocks New York. Its opening guest list, at the Florence Gould Theater, was possibly determined by how many sequins guests could wear. The men’s room probably had paillettes glued to their BVDs.
The film’s funny. Foul. More than teeth came out of that bridgework.
Kargman co-writes and stars as a social-media whocares chasing “1 million” faux friends — black-card status-obsessed Upper East Siders — until an unexpected oops shakes what’s under her bra, etc.
A funny foul-mouthed slice of NYC’s Upper East Siders, it’s the momzillas who do lunch after lunch with events, parties, galas, trunk shows, charity meetings, bar mitzvahs. It’s sprinkling glitter on their graves. It’s putting New York on. There’s even a nice scene in a crappy cemetery where meanwhile a plane flew so low you could’ve gotten a haircut.
“Look,” she says, “I developed a writing system. I’ve done 12 books. I even wrote while I had a TV show for three years. I wrote while I was in the Hamptons and they were cranky. I kept writing even when my husband, daughter and I were on Christmas vacation.”
OK, OK, a mazel tov to you. The film’s at NYC’s Quad Cinema now.
Fridamania shortly hits NYC like a tequila. Painters, poseurs and Park Avenue patrons might soon leave their tweezers for “Frida Week.”
It’ll be silk behinds at the Met. An opera about Frida Kahlo and husband Diego Rivera, through June 5. Rizzoli’s hustling an art book about them. Amigos will pretend they knew Frida when she hadn’t a canvas to splash onto.
The Museum of Modern Art is also doing an exhibition, through Sept. 12, with art students, collectors and people who rehearsed pronouncing the word “curator.”
Arriving will be — more exciting than a visit from Prince Harry — the family of Frida Kahlo. They will be at dinners. Openings. Invites are coming. Hostesses are buying tequila, scrambling to find menus they can pronounce.
NYC’s opera crowd will do Champagne. The book crowd — prosecco. Museum people will sip opinions. And somewhere Frida herself is looking down and saying: “Caramba! I told you so.”
Preacher’s ex-wife in Southern California says it’s been no prayer picnic. New book about her 18-year marriage kaput. Three kids to raise. Myesha Chaney. She was on Oxygen TV reality show “Preachers of LA.” She says:
“My entire life I feared hitting rock bottom. Lowest point is where fear actually dissipates because you experience the worst that could happen, and you live to talk about it. No amount of cameras — or no ‘lie that reality TV sells’ could ever equate to the kind of truth-telling it takes to get up after everything falls apart.”
Out May 19 is “Honest: A Memoir of What I Built, What I Lost, and Who I Became.”
EITHER Jill Kargman or this California preacher’s wife tells of a woman in black crying. “I’m going to miss him,” she sobs. “My husband. I knew he ran around but I’m really going to miss him.” A bypasser asks, “When did he die?” The woman replies: “Tomorrow morning.”
Only in a few other cities, kids — not only in New York.
