Gina Kirschenheiter threw some shade at Shannon Beador during an interview with her Real Housewives of Orange County co-star Emily Simpson. This interview was taped before Shannon’s recent DUI arrest.
While also discussing her sobriety as Emily, 47, shared details about her weight loss and thoughts on the season 17 cast, Gina, 39, accused Shannon, 59, of “creating lies” about her in an effort to distract from what was going on in her own life with now-ex-boyfriend John Janssen.
“I think the problem in the past was, I just don’t think there was chemistry and energy with the cast,” Emily said on the September 5 episode of New York Live after being asked about why this season’s show has gotten so much attention. “This is the first season in probably the five years that we’ve been on where I think we have a phenomenal cast. I think the energy is there. The dynamics are there. The past is there. Everything is just connecting, finally.”
Although Gina has been appearing on RHOC since 2018, when she joined the show for its 13th season, season 17 was much different for her since she wasn’t drinking.
“It makes everything different. It made my whole life different, honestly,” she said of the decision. “I just felt that I came to a point where it was getting in my way and I felt like it was getting a little bit more control of me than I had of it and I didn’t like everything that was coming along with that and I really think it was a success for me. I’ve never felt so clear and I was very in it more this season.”
After Gina chose to live sober, Emily decided to make a major lifestyle change as well after finding herself at her heaviest at the end of the season.
“By the time the season was done, I think was probably at the heaviest weight,” Emily, who briefly used Ozempic, shared. “I was just at the very heaviest I’d been when we wrapped filming and I wasn’t happy. I felt terrible. I had no energy. I didn’t want to get off the couch. I felt bad about myself and I really was like, ‘I have to do something. I want to have energy. I want to be able to be with my young children and keep up with them.’ And so I did.”
Moving on to Shannon, who criticized all who discussed her relationship with John as she targeted the lives of others, Emily said that Shannon’s hesitancies to share details about her life put the rest of the cast in a “very precarious type of situation.”
“We’re being authentic and sharing about our real lives and then someone else isn’t,” she noted.
And Gina agreed.
“For me, it became a problem especially when it’s like, ‘Okay, you’re not willing to share what’s really going on in your life and instead you’re now going to make up lies about my life to distract from your truth.’ That’s where I draw the line,” she stated.
As for what fans can expect from the upcoming reunion, Emily said, “It’s gonna be a good one.” Gina added that it will be “explosive.”
“We’re burning the house down,” Gina teased.
The Real Housewives of Orange County season 17 airs Wednesdays at 8/7c on Bravo.
