'The Real Housewives of Miami's Larsa Pippen is holding nothing back as she celebrates living her 'best life' in spite of the haters.
It went down in the DMs for Larsa Pippen. "It" being her return to The Real Housewives of Miami for the show's revival as a streaming series on Peacock; Larsa previously starred on season 1 of the now-former Bravo spinoff, but did not appear in seasons 2 or 3.
"I was chatting on Instagram with [Real Housewives executive producer] Andy Cohen and he basically was like, 'Would you think about doing this show?'" Larsa recalls, speaking to ET over video chat. "We were just talking about the show and he basically said, 'Let's chat in a week and talk about the show,' and then it just happened."
Next thing Larsa knew, she was thrown back into the world of reality TV after a decade away from it -- a decade she also spent away from her fellow returning cast members, which includes Alexia Echevarria, Marysol Patton, Adriana de Moura and Lisa Hochstein. Larsa and Lisa never overlapped as cast members on RHOM (Lisa joined in season 2), but oddly enough, the Hochstein Med Spa owner was Larsa's closest tie to the group going back into it.
"We're really good friends," Larsa says, explaining that she and Lisa always existed in the same social circle while Larsa lived in Miami. She only recently moved back to the East Coast after spending the last few years in Los Angeles. Before that, Larsa was living in Chicago with her estranged husband, NBA legend Scottie Pippen, and their four kids. They moved back to the Midwest at the tail-end of Larsa's time on RHOM season 1, making a return to the series for future appearances nearly impossible at the time.
"He was like, 'Let's go to Chicago for two years, work for the Bulls,' so that's what we did," she says. "We took our kids back to Chicago and went back to our house in Chicago. I just watched the show from Chicago."
Larsa says she stayed in touch with Alexia, who appears the be the great connector of this cast, and was excited to reconnect with Marysol. "We really weren't close season 1, so I've gotten to know her a whole lot better this season, and I've really enjoyed spending time with her," Larsa shares. "I think she's amazing. It seemed very natural for me to be a part of this band."
One 'Wife didn't seem to think so, though. From the moment Larsa stepped back in front of the RHOM cameras, Adriana began questioning her intentions.
"Is that Larsa?" Adriana scoffed in a confessional, her interview bites cut together with Larsa's onscreen return. "We really haven't stayed in touch that much. Her face is different. Her boobs are bigger. Her butt's is even bigger. I think she is now becoming the Kim Kardashian look-alike."
"Larsa left Miami, but the minute the Kardashians shunned her out, now she's back in the group and trying to really regain our friendship and trust," she later added. "So, there's mystery there and I'm curious."
Adriana's fixation on the Kardashian family of it all didn't faze or surprise Larsa, though.
"I kind of expected it," she says of being the most talked-about cast member going into season 4. "I kind of expected it. I never give my side of the story. I'm always the kind of friend or whatever that doesn't really give her side of the story. This kind of gives me a chance to give my side of the story, so I was really excited about that."
Larsa was quite close with the Kardashians, especially Kim, for years, until a mysterious falling out sometime in 2019. In the fall of 2020, Larsa opened up on the Hollywood Raw podcast about the ordeal, blaming the distance between her and Kim on Kim's now-estranged husband, Kayne West, whom Larsa claimed felt "threatened" by her. There were also unsubstantiated rumors around the time of their friendship breakup that Larsa had hooked up with Khloé Kardashian's then on-again, off-again beau, Tristan Thompson, which Larsa denied.
"Honestly, Kim and I are in a good place," Larsa shares of where she stands with the family today. It seems that Kim's split from Kanye may have opened a door to repair the relationship.
"I love them, I love her," she adds. "I wish nothing but great things for them. I feel like they wish nothing but great things for me."
There are more Kardashian comments to come courtesy of Adriana this season. Fans are eagerly anticipating an explosive dinner party exchange teased in the trailer, in which Adriana shouts across a table, "You left this group of women, come back with a butt as big as Kim Kardashian's, trying to become the new Kim Kardashian, which you're never gonna be!"
"I don't know why Adriana would say that," Larsa says of the moment, hinting it comes out of nowhere. "She likes to fight. She's one of those people that loves to be in a cat fight. She's got her claws out, and I feel like that was just an easy dig at me. I don't know. I mean, like I said, I'm in a great place personally. I'm growing, I'm loving, I'm in a great place. I'm not going to let someone else, who's not in a great place, discredit all the work that I've been doing on myself."
Larsa also hints that her clapback to Adriana's Kardashian comment will be worth the wait.
"I will say I'm kind of out of character," she teases. "When someone attacks me, I don't know how to act sometimes. I need to tone it down a tad bit. I'm just not used to being attacked."
While that was an in-her-face attack, Larsa's also clueing into some behind-her-back digs made by Adriana as she watches the episodes in real-time with the audience. Adriana has said even more about Larsa's appearance when Larsa hasn't been around, making multiple comments about her possibly surgically enhanced rear-end.
"I feel like everyone should be comfortable in their own skin," Larsa says of the comments on her appearance. "I feel like I'm not a judgmental type of person. I feel like I accept everyone for who they are. If you look better, I don't care what you're doing. As long as you feel good about yourself, I will praise you. Other women are not like that."
"Because they don't feel good about the way they look, they want to sit there and criticize how someone else -- who looks way better than you, by the way," she adds. "I don't know. I feel like that's not really my personality. I'm more of a girls' girl. I'll never tell someone they don't look good."
Larsa says Adriana has "nothing else going on," so she spends all her time focusing on Larsa. "You need to focus on all the right things that make you happy," she advises her co-star. "Sometimes, people are not focused on things that will give them happiness. Living a life with purpose will give you happiness."
"[Adriana's] like the weasel," Larsa cracks. "She's like the weasel, like the little brother that just annoys you the entire time you're at home. She's definitely the weasel of the crew."
"When you have nothing else going on, you're going to sit there and you're going to criticize the person that's across from you that's building an empire, that's working on their family, and their friendship, and their growth," she adds. "Other people are just bored and pointing fingers."
That laundry list of accomplishments is what Larsa was most excited to share by returning to TV. The last time viewers saw her, she was a literal Housewife, "playing house" (as she says) and raising her and Scottie's four kids: Scotty, Jr., 21 Preston, 19; Justin, 16; and Sophia, 13.
"I was married, my kids were younger. Now, I feel like I'm older, more mature, more confident," she says of the evolution she's gone through in the last decade. "I've been scrutinized so much in the last three years. I'm like, 'S**t, I might as well be on reality TV because I'm taking a beating in real life.'"
"I'm proud of myself," she adds. "I'm an entrepreneur. I've achieved so many things in three years, all these other women have had 40-some years to work on their brands and, for me, I was playing house. Now, this was my chance to do the things that I'm passionate about, the charities that I want to be involved in and help grow, the brands that I'm so passionate about. I feel like it was a good experience for me."
Larsa has a number of brand partnerships, a jewelry line... and an OnlyFans account. The latter sparked immediate conversation among the group, with some of the women assuming Larsa was posting NSFW material to the social media site known for its X-rated content creators.
"I had no clue that it was going to be such a hot topic with the girls," Larsa admits. "I also feel like, basically, they live in a bubble in Miami. They don't really know what's going on with the rest of the world. I have younger kids that are-- my daughter's on social media, my kids are, so I hear like, 'Oh, get on TikTok. Get on Discord. Get on...' all these different platforms. So I already know what platforms exist, what everyone's on.
"Sometimes, when you judge things, it's because you're not as knowledgeable about it," she says. "That's kind of what happened on the show."
Larsa told the women she averages $10,000 on the platform, despite not charging subscribers to follow her. Instead, she charges fans per interaction. Special video content, direct messages and photos cost a certain amount to gain access to; Larsa also creates personalized experiences for some of her subscribers.
"Think about it: If you could do something that was super easy at home and text with people?" she proposes. "You become friends with these people. I'm friends with the people, my friends on OnlyFans. I like them. I care about them. I check in on them."
"It's really fun," she says. "I do like the one-on-one and the exclusive content, things that I wouldn't post on Instagram."
But just because it's not for Instagram doesn't mean it's not appropriate. Foot pics are about as risqué as Larsa gets, it seems.
"My kids take my photos most of the time, just so you know," she reveals, helping to fill in the blank to a big question the women seemed to have: What do Larsa's kids think of her sexy social media? Apparently, they're totally cool with it. Her kids' support was also important when it came to returning to reality TV.
"I had a conversation with my kids because I was like, now that they're older, like, 'Do you guys want to be on TV? Do you guys care if I do the show?'" she says. "They basically said, 'You can do the show. We'll film with you,' and they were excited to do it."
Scottie also offered his support. "We had a conversation, because he had to sign off for the kids being on the show," she notes. "He was fine with it. I said, 'Do you care if I do this show?' He was like, 'No, if you want to do this show, if you want to be in the hot seat, that's on you.' He was just like, 'That's on you.'"
The second time around seems sweeter for Larsa, especially because she knew what she was getting herself into this time. During season 1, Larsa didn't even know she was filming a Real Housewives series.
"It was a cooking show!" she exclaims, confirming that the first batch of episodes was a social club-themed series that was rebranded as Housewives in edit. Not being tied to cooking parties, Larsa is able to show off more of herself and her new "best life," which includes her reentry into the dating scene -- another topic ripe for commentary from the other women.
"I feel like I'm better with someone than I am alone," she offers of her approach to dating. "I don't know how to ever really date, to be honest with you. I feel like if I talk to a guy twice and he invites me to a restaurant and I go and all of a sudden, I'm dating this guy and I'm like, 'No, we've never been hung out alone. It's like we went to dinner with other people.' I don't know."
With that said, though, Larsa is interested in finding her Mr. Right, and she's prioritizing a man with "boss" energy over good looks.
"I think, by next year, I should be married," she says. "Why not? By next year, I'm going to hone in and put that energy out, what I want."
Sounds like the perfect set-up for season 5... but until then, check out The Real Housewives of Miami season 4, streaming exclusively on Peacock. New episodes debut on Thursdays.
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