'Being Mary Jane' Recap - Season 4 Episode 4: Clothes Don't Define The Man

Mary Jane Paul (Gabrielle Union) is in love!

In Being Mary Jane‘s fourth episode of season four, our heroine is finally settling into her relationship with British comedian Lee (Chike Okonkwo), and it looks good on camera. This week, the couple found themselves at two dinner parties, setting tables and drinking wine with old and new friends. 

At both dinners, MJ’s brother PJ (BJ Britt Jr.) was in attendance. He spoke of his new boss/the woman whose home he’s crashing at during Kara’s (Lisa Vidal) dinner party. And while he claims the relationship is platonic, MJ spots a Rolex that Olivia (aka PJ’s sugar mama) gave him.

MJ and Lee get the opportunity to meet Olivia during the second dinner party, and she speaks highly of PJ’s real estate skills. But if you ask us, something is very sketchy about the whole kicking-it-no-strings-attached setup they have going. And when Olivia’s 20-something daughter drops by and refers to PJ as her “hot” new baby sitter, the weird is scaled up another notch.

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In Kara’s world, the high-powered producer is trying to manage outshining Justin (Michael Ealy)—who’s been assigned to work with MJ after last episode’s “win”—while having a healthy sex life. Kara still claims to not have time for a man, but this episode we find out she and NFL player Orlando have been knocking boots. Here lies some of the steamiest sex scenes we’ve seen on the show as the 40-something Kara takes on the job of teaching the 34-year-old Orlando how to sex her down the right way.

Led by the guidance of a peach (‘remove the seed with just your tongue’), Orlando gets discouraged at first, but puts in the work to make touchdown upon touchdown happen in the bedroom.

Work for both Kara and MJ are unavoidably tense; they are in a constant stand-off with Justin and Ronda (Valarie Pettiford). Despite the opinions of her co-workers, MJ pursues a young man who went viral after getting assaulted by his father for wearing a skirt in public. After some push-back and securing a famous skirt-clad rapper on her talk show, she convinces the young man to tell his story.

“Whether you like it or not, social media is news,” MJ tells a bitter Justin about locking down the story. 

What’s interesting is the parallel of this kid, who’s essentially being ostracized for wearing skirts, and MJ’s inner strife with Lee being “too feminine” for wearing skinny jeans and crossing his legs when he sits. Clearly, MJ is just looking for problems in her first healthy relationship, but it does create interesting dialogue on clothing, sexuality and narrow definitions of men.

In addition to Lee and the young man opening up MJ’s eyes to a broader definition of what a man ‘acts’ like, she also finds out her arch nemesis Justin has a girlfriend…who’s Black…and dark skinned. 

Lesson here: Never judge a book by its cover or what kind of clothes he wears.