Rinna recently left the franchise after eight seasons on the Bravo show.
Lisa Rinna opened up like never before while discussing the reason why she left The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills after eight seasons.
The 59-year-old actress accepted an invitation via direct message from a reporter at Interview Magazine and offered some behind-the-scenes nuggets as to how the Bravo show is filmed and what ultimately led to her announcing her exit earlier this month.
Rinna told the magazine she loved filming the show and that "filming's fun" but "what is not so fun is the airing of the show." As Rinna tells it, "filming is one thing. But once you see it, once it goes out into the universe, that I don’t love, because it takes on a life of its own. When filming, you have your drama, but it’s contained in a sense. And once it goes out, you get opinions and all the stuff that goes on, that’s the part I don’t like."
Rinna conceded that producers are the ones with "the power in the edit" room and that she or her cast mates "do not have any power in the edit whatsoever." That being said, "if you get a nicer edit, you're happier."
But this past season, Rinna said too much boiled over and it made for a tumultuous season, which ultimately led her to walk away from the franchise.
"I f***ing hated this year," she said when asked about how she felt filming this past season. "For a lot of reasons. My mom died, we all know that. But that’s not the biggest reason. The story just didn’t get told as two-sidedly as I would’ve liked."
As fans know by now, Rinna and Kathy Hilton had a lot of drama in season 12 stemming from a cast trip to Aspen, Colorado, where the women recalled Hilton having a "mountain-sized meltdown" in a nightclub. Rinna alleged that Hilton went further when the two were alone, insulting certain cast members during the outburst, including her sister, Kyle Richards.
Tension boiled over between Richards, Rinna and co-star Erika Jayne in the RHOBH season finale, after Rinna continued pushing the narrative that Hilton's alleged tirade gave her PTSD.
"It was unfortunate that there weren’t cameras in Aspen," Rinna explained to Interview. "It was something that happened so spontaneously. In the moment, I didn’t think to turn on my voice memos. When somebody’s having a nuclear breakdown, you don’t think, 'Oh, I should be filming this.' That doesn’t come across your mind. When you’ve actually tried to save somebody and get somebody out of a club because they were hurting themselves, you think, 'What the f**k do I do? Do I call the police? I don’t know what to do.' So yes, it was unfortunate that in this sprinter van, there were no cameras. Because we were done filming. We’d shut down."
Rinna reflected on her time with the Bravo franchise after announcing her exit.
"This is the longest job I have held in my 35 year career and I am grateful to everyone at Bravo and all those involved in the series," Rinna told People in a statement. "It has been a fun eight-year run and I am excited for what is to come!"
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