'Selling the OC's dynamic duo unpacks the season that was with ET, reacting to comments made by their co-stars on and off the show.
Alexandra Jarvis and Alexandra Rose might be eagles that fly alone, but they've got a flock of support when it comes to the audience of Selling the OC.
In the week since the Selling Sunset spinoff premiered on Netflix, viewers have flooded both women's comments sections and DMs with praise for how they handled the drama of their debut season on reality TV. It's love bombing that caught the pair off-guard.
"I have been surprised at how discerning people are," Jarvis admits to ET, Zooming in to video chat alongside Rose, "and how they are watching behaviors and, really, they're really put off by the bullying, which is so pleasant to see, 'cause you know we weren't sure."
Within the first 24 hours of the show's release, "Show Villain vs. Actual Villain" memes popped up on Twitter, with Jarvis and Rose labeled the former, co-star Alex Hall the latter. It's a conversation that surprised Hall, who sort of acts as the nucleus of the friend group in the office, but not Jarvis and Rose.
"In real life, she is just a bully," Rose says. "She's actually a leader amongst her peers, people love her and they love her energy and I think people follow her 'cause she gives off that energy of being a leader -- which is a great characteristic to have -- but she's using it the wrong way by bullying everybody and influencing everyone that is following her to bully. So, as you see in the show, everybody goes along with what she said, with what she did, follows her around, but she does it in such a bad way and it's made her look like a terrible person."
"I think people seeing right through some of the B.S. and them seeing that she is actually the villain, like that's just how she is," Jarvis adds. "She's a bully."
In an interview with ET, Hall explained her dismissive treatment of Jarvis and Rose (regularly asking them why they were involving themselves in the group) as warranted, because, she says, she'd been reassured by production multiple times that the duo was not part of the ensemble -- at least not to start.
"Bottom line is, it doesn't matter who was casted first and who wasn't," Rose fires back. "The fact that she treated us with such disrespect goes to show her true character and shows how much of a bully she is. You should never, ever, ever, ever treat someone like chopped liver [and] shun them because they aren't casted, or they didn't get the part. It's just flat out being a bully and I hope [that] interview backlashes on her and everybody is going to see the kind of person she is."
"She doesn't get to decide who gets a seat at the table, you know?" Jarvis says, pointing out that, at some point, it must've become clear to Hall that she and Rose were part of the show. "It's just a shame. I mean, I am glad that she made those comments because it really shows how much she just did not want us there. She did not want us involved."
In that same interview with ET, Hall accused Jarvis and Rose of unsavory business practices, alleging they eavesdrop on other agents' phone calls to steal listings.
"Lies, lies and more lies," Jarvis exclaims.
"She is just pulling stuff out of her you-know-what," Rose cracks, claiming she never even sees Hall working in the office unless cameras are there.
"That is Alex Hall being Alex Hall," Jarvis sighs. "Her trying to discredit the work that Rose and I have put into our business by trying to act as though we need to steal something? We do not. We work off of a list. We've actually we've created-- we have a lot of systems we have put together ... [that] other people in the office are actually using."
"We set a precedent in the office, and everybody knows it," Rose says.
"It's just a shame that she feels the need to continue to lie and just dig a deeper hole for herself," Jarvis says.
Jarvis and Rose say Hall's treatment of them was not unique to filming the show. Jarvis, the most recent addition to the Oppenheim Group team, claims she never felt welcomed by any of the agents in the office.
"It's like they had their own little clique and nobody else was welcome to be around them or hang out with them, so it was not a surprise to hear them say such nasty, vitriolic things about us," she explains. "It's not surprising. It's shameful."
"I can tell like a lot of the female castmates viewed me as competition right when they met me," she continues. "They were not at all wanting to partner up, or hang out or anything like that."
"Whenever we would have team meetings in the office, they would all be in their little clique and they would talk so loudly that Alexandra Jarvis and I could not get a word in, and if we did say something, they made nasty, negative comments," Rose shares. "Their remarks were rude, like anything that we say or do is offensive. I swear to God, it's like anything that comes out of our mouth is, like, the worst thing that's ever said in the history of being said."
"Very junior high," Jarvis interjects. "I mean like, laughing, mocking at us. ... I think our favorite scenes were scenes with just her and I, or with our clients viewing houses. Any time we were with the rest of the group, we just kind of expected some level of mistreatment."
Jarvis and Rose's co-workers/co-stars called them "snakes" and "bullies" throughout the season, the group's issues with the duo coming to a head on a company boat day on the season 1 finale. The two called out what they viewed as hypocrisy among the team, with the agents claiming to be offended by Kayla Cardona's flirty behavior toward Tyler Stanaland, a married man, but not bothered by his touchy-feely moments with Hall and Polly Brindle. Speaking with ET, Hall defended the wider group's feelings, noting that Kayla attempted to kiss and (allegedly) sleep with Tyler (on multiple occasions), while she and Brindle partook in friendly cuddles and "noseys," this sort-of wet-willy on steroids in which one person places their mouth over another's nose and blows hot air up the nostrils.
Hall's comments echoed what Stanaland said to Jarvis and Rose on the boat, but they stand by bringing up the so-called double standard.
"Tyler was all over Polly and all over Alex Hall," Rose recalls. "When everybody lashes out at Kayla and bullies her [over] what happened between them, it's just hypocritical and they think that bullying is me addressing a situation and it's not. It's just putting it out there, what's going on. So, no, I don't regret it and I think the viewers like what I said."
In his confrontation with Jarvis and Rose, Stanaland accused the two of constantly starting drama when they show up for group events. They deny that reading of their actions.
"We would show up to events and you could just feel, I mean, it was this palpable tension of, they did not want us there," Jarvis says. "If that's their mindset when we show up, it naturally puts this hostile energy out there, and no matter what we do or say, they're going to complain about it."
Both women say they received apology phone calls from Cardona after she got a chance to view the episodes, which the cast screened together a few weeks before Netflix launched the season into the world.
"Kayla is good," Rose says. "She called ... and apologized to me, and said she wishes things had worked out differently, but she has seen people's true colors, so we're friends. I still err on the side of caution, 'cause you have to be careful, and Tyler actually called me, like, four days, three or four days ago, calling, apologizing and saying he regrets what happened on the boat. He wants to pursue a friendship if possible, and I also told him-- I said, 'Listen, Alex Hall and Polly, they are bullies,' and he said he agreed."
"Kayla, she called me, as well, right after we previewed the show before the rest of the world saw it, so I do feel like that was a genuine apology," Jarvis adds, "and I think she realizes things differently, and I think she is owning up to things."
Jarvis and Rose note that any call they're receiving from their castmates now that the show is public is taken with a grain of salt, a question of their co-stars' intentions, seeing as only Kayla reached out before seeing how the viewers reacted to what unfolded across the season.
"We were around the rest of the castmates after we previewed all the episodes, but before it had premiered, and they still treated us the same way," Jarvis says, "and I was actually shocked by that because I thought, surely, they will see how they behaved and maybe have like a different perception, but they did not."
"I mean, time will always tell," she continues. "Just because someone says the words, 'I apologize,' I have to see the actions behind it, and I've got to see, are you going to actually change course? Are you going to be mindful who you follow, or who you go along with? Because that's important."
For Rose, the fact that not one of her castmates reached out after watching the scene in which she recalled her troubled upbringing -- she was born to drug-addicted parents, entering the foster system at five years old -- was particularly upsetting, seeing as how they repeatedly accused her of coming from a life of "privilege" throughout the season.
"Not one of them came up to me and said a word," she laments. "It just goes to show the character of them, they're all the same and if they wanna flip flop and try to be friends with us 'cause we're getting a lot of love? It's just called being fake and called being two-faced and I have no interest in building relationships with people like that."
The two say their main focus moving forward will continue to be building their business. They have no plans to entertain a friendship with Hall.
"We will be professional -- always professional with them -- but, you know, a friendship is built on trust and she has burnt so many bridges and has lied so much that there's just no way that I personally could trust her to have a friendship," Jarvis remarks, before admitting she would possibly do a real estate deal with her "depending on the scenario."
Viewers watched Jarvis attempt to work with Brindle on season 1, opening up her listing for Brindle's client to tour. The visit soured when Jarvis referred to Brindle as "honey," though, a term of endearment she pulled out again at a group casino night hosted by Gio Helou. Brindle nearly exploded on Jarvis while telling her to stop calling her "honey," which inspired Jarvis to refer to Brindle as "dear" instead.
"My intention was not to poke at her," Jarvis offers in her own defense. "I actually say 'honey' in my sentences and, honestly, I try to deescalate those confrontational moments with Polly, because she gets so aggressive and heated and just down right mean, and so I'm more or less just trying to like, 'Listen, honey...' you know? It's not that big of a deal, but the thing is, I understand she doesn’t like it now, but I just think she's really overreacting and it just she's a bit too dramatic."
The "honey" debacle coupled with Jarvis' vocabulary (for instance, invoking the phrase "Let the record reflect..." in an argument) played into perception among the team that the lawyer-turned-realtor is condescending, a label she rebuffs. She is happy to see the audience embrace her way with words, though. She pulled out some quirky idioms (like, "Eagles fly alone and birds fly in flocks, and they're a bunch of birds" and "I lend trust on credit, but I'm not afraid to call in a debt") during the season.
"The way my brain works, it's like I have this bank of just stuff going around," she says of those quotes, which she maintains were not scripted or premeditated. "My dad was like that, too, and it just comes out and I feel like it's because I've always loved reading books that put things into a visual perspective, and so for me it just kind of paints a picture ... and it just comes out, you know?"
She'll have to brainstorm some new phrases to pull out in a potential season 2, though there's no news to share about a renewal -- at least not yet. Still, Jarvis and Rose have some ideas of what they'd like to see play out in a second go-around.
"I think Rose and I just want to continue focusing on our work, our real estate, that's our priority," Jarvis shares, "and for the audience to get to know us more and, you know, hopefully Polly and Alex Hall's mics will be muted a little more."
"Yeah, we want to continue to be an inspiration to people who want to get into real estate," Rose adds, "and we've gotten tons of messages from so many thousands and thousands of people saying how much of an inspiration we are, and how empowering we are as women, and we want to continue that and get bigger listings and sell them."
As for the biggest takeaway they're walking away with from season 1? It's another idiom, courtesy of Jarvis: "Kindness and class always prevail."
All episodes of Selling the OC are now streaming on Netflix.
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