'The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills' rookie Annemarie Wiley tells ET some behind-the-scenes drama played into what aired on TV.
Annemarie Wiley is done talking about esophageal issues, at least in social settings.
"I wish there had been zero conversations about the e-word," the Real Housewives of Beverly Hills rookie, 40, confesses to ET. "I never want to hear that word again."
The nurse anesthetist is wrapping up her debut run with the three-part reunion, which starts airing on Wednesday. For Annemarie, season 13 largely centered around her accidental investigation into co-star Sutton Stracke's narrow esophagus, ultimately leading to a fiery feud with Crystal Kung Minkoff. As Annemarie spitballed theories behind Sutton's medical condition, the conversation turned toward a possible eating disorder. On the show, it appeared as if Annemarie was the one to mention this first, but she claimed on camera that it was Crystal who floated the idea. Now, she says, that's not really what happened, either, and that the situation was more nuanced.
"That conversation happened because Crystal asked a question about an eating disorder, and I was answering the question about an eating disorder," she explains. "Neither Crystal nor myself accused Sutton of having an eating disorder."
Annemarie describes it all as a "miscommunication," one that didn't sit lightly with Crystal. She's shared her own battle with bulimia over the course of her three seasons on RHOBH, and been adamant she would never speculate about someone else struggling with an ED. Crystal maintains it was Annemarie who brought up the subject and pinned it on Crystal, for which, she says, she's still not received an apology. It's all unpacked at reunion.
"I explained that I was never accusing Crystal of having said that," Annemarie offers. "When I watched it back, I was wondering why Crystal was so mad. I didn't even know that she thought that I was accusing her of saying that Sutton had an eating disorder, that wasn't even clear to me. So, once I understood that that was the way it was perceived by Crystal, that's why I explained that I wasn't saying, 'You said it...' nor did I say it. It was a discussion we were both having."
"I will apologize if I’ve hurt someone’s feelings, 'cause I will always do that, but that wasn't my intention of doing it," she adds. "But if she needs an apology from me, I’m not above doing that."
It seems safe to say these two did not resolve their issues at the all-cast sit-down taping.
"I thought after the finale that we were in a better place, because I was ready to move forward and put everything behind me," Annemarie shares. "I don't like to harbor those ill feelings, or that resentment towards anyone, you know? And then you're going to see some more things come up from her at the reunion. I don't think she's ready to let things go, so I feel like, at this point, I need to just you know follow her lead and if she wants things to move forward, and we can get to a better and lighter and more fun place, then I'm all for it, but I think she's still has some things that she's kind of working through."
Part of Annemarie's beef with Crystal lies in her feeling that Crystal didn't respect her work as a certified registered nurse anesthetist (CRNA). Crystal claims Annemarie misrepresented herself as an anesthesiologist, a doctor rather than a nurse, when they first met.
"It is very disrespectful to accuse someone of title misrepresentation when it's because you don't understand what the title means, or when you fabricate something, so that you have something to talk about especially when you're talking about someone’s profession that they worked very hard to obtain those degrees and obtain those licenses," Annemarie fires back. "That is very disrespectful."
"The title thing happens a lot of the time because people have either never heard of CRNAs before, or they don't know what we do," she says. "I mean a lot of times I get mistaken for doing aesthetics because people have never heard of a certified registered nurse anesthesiologist, and in Crystal's defense, I don't think her wrongfully accusing me of title misrepresentation, I don't think she understood that it would snowball into what it did."
Annemarie says there's a sort-of "turf war" between anesthesiologists and nurse anesthetists in the workplace, a fight she deals with every day on the job. That's where Annemarie's heated feelings came from during her explosive fight with Crystal at the Homeless Not Toothless charity gala, she says. On top of that, she also claims Crystal was being two-faced.
"Crystal and I had met prior to filming, and she was so sweet and she was so helpful," Annemarie notes. "She was really different off-camera than she was on camera."
"I just really felt like she was just stabbing me in the back repeatedly," she continues. "We would be texting like, 'What are you wearing tonight? What are you gonna wear to this?' Like, even on the way to my first night meeting the ladies at [Kyle Richard's] house, we were texting from outside the car, right? And then when I see everything play out and she says [in a confessional], 'Oh, that b***h is nosy...' and I'm like, we were just texting! Why are you calling me nosy now?"
Looking back, Annemarie says she feels as if Crystal "took advantage" of her as the newbie, which is why she called her out on the cast trip to Spain for supposedly talking trash about the cast off-camera to Annemarie.
"Funny thing is, she actually did admit it later on," Annemarie says, claiming Crystal owned up to labeling the ensemble "fake socialites, shallow and uneducated" off-camera. Crystal maintains she did not say these things, and that Annemarie twisted her words.
"She did admit it to the ladies," Annemarie doubles down. "When she said that about the ladies, they were in a bad place and that's what led her to say that to me and she apologized."
During their showdown in Spain, Annemarie requested Crystal thank her for making Crystal relevant. She still stands by that ask.
"What was Crystal talking about before I came in midseason, right?" she muses. "She wasn't talking about too much, and I think that she's kind of gotten a pass for not having too much going on, and so when I entered the show, she kind of saw that as an opportunity to create some drama for herself and create something that she could really talk about."
"I mean, people are talking about her a lot now, right?" she quips, going on to allege Crystal "told me" she purposefully took shots at Annemarie to secure screen time.
She doubled down on that in a new Instagram post, writing, "Do not backstab someone, then admit to them off-camera that you lied about them for a storyline, then cry on their shoulder behind closed doors about keeping up the lie and the fighting stressing you out and causing your blood pressure to elevate, then extend an olive branch on-camera, only to not let it go and backstab them once again."
Viewers won't get a Homeless Not Toothless fight sequel at reunion; Annemarie says she kept her cool during the taping.
"I feel like I got all my points out," she says. "I said all my truths. I feel like I stayed calm the entire time, I wasn't going to get into any back-and-forth arguments with anyone. I was like, when it's my turn to talk, let me know when they're done and I will continue, you know? So I felt good."
The same might not be said for her castmates, though. She previews "a lot of surprises," even for some of the ensemble, as Kyle faces questioning about the state of her estranged marriage and rumors surrounding a possible romantic entanglement with country singer Morgan Wade (which Kyle's previously denied).
"Hopefully everyone is satisfied with what she provided," Annemarie says. "I'm just praying for her, and I'm praying for her family and praying for her happiness."
There's also Sutton's mystery medical event; the reunion trailer ends with a chaotic moment, as Sutton appears to convulse onstage.
"It is a surprising moment," Annemarie previews. "It's just another one of those moments that reminds you to keep things in perspective."
Annemarie's got a lot of perspective after her freshman run, after facing intense criticism from viewers online.
"I would love to be able to say, 'Oh, it doesn't bother me at all, it's fine,' but it does," she admits. "I pride myself on being such a kind and inclusive person, and so for people not to you know really have a sense of who I am and what I stand for, and then to be receiving backlash from it? That's why it's so hard, 'cause it's like, if people are judging me on me, I can take that. But when I feel like they're not, then that's where it gets really hard."
Annemarie, who's married to former NFL player Marcellus Wiley and a mom to four kids, didn't get much personal story on the show, having joined production nearly halfway through filming. That led to a lot of internet speculation about her character.
"I am a very strong, independent woman, and I was raised to have my own beliefs and my own opinions," she counters. "I just want to show people my fun side. I just want to have a good time. Show people who I am."
Should she return for season 14, Annemarie hopes to open up more about her personal struggles. She says a lot was unfolding behind the scenes on season 13 that didn't make it to air.
"My mom was diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer, and she passed three months later," she reveals. "I was dealing with adoption trauma, which I opened up to [Dorit Kemsley and Erika Jayne] when we were in Spain."
"There were a lot of things that people didn't see about me, and they didn't understand about my life," she adds. "I started this and agreed to do this because I want people to be able to relate to me. I want people to find something in myself, whether it's as a mom of four, as a professional, as a former athlete, as someone who was adopted, as someone that's biracial -- whatever it is, I want people to relate to me, and I want to be able to show people that you're not alone. There's somebody out there that's like you."
The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills airs Wednesdays at 8 p.m. ET/PT on Bravo. Episodes stream next day on Peacock.
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