Most Talkative: Stories From the Front Lines of Pop Culture, Andy Cohen [the best books to read txt] 📗

from India and a friend of theirs from the State Department. I’ve always thought that the unexpected is the single greatest advantage a docuseries holds over any scripted drama or comedy. The axiom “truth is stranger than fiction” reigns supreme at Bravo. But therein lies the rub: You can’t predict or prepare for the unknown. We had been filming the DC cast members for months by the time our crews followed a giddy Michaele and Tareq through their preparations for this gala evening. And we shot plenty that day: Michaele trying to figure out how to pin herself into her elegant red sari, Michaele looking for the invitation that may or may not have existed (was she acting?), then the two of them climbing into the limo and heading toward 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Since the production crew didn’t have credentials for the dinner, they left after filming the Salahis’ arrival at the White House gate. We only learned the following day—along with everyone else in America—of the alleged “gate crashing” incident. I was on vacation in Indonesia, perusing the New York Post online, when I noticed a blonde on the cover and idly thought, “Huh, she looks just like that woman we cast in DC.” Then I checked my e-mail, which was filled with frantic messages from Bravo: Call if you get this!

Speculation that the Salahis had used the state dinner as a stunt to be cast on the show was rampant—and ridiculous. The series wasn’t being cast at the time the Salahis’ “invitation” “arrived,” it was being wrapped. The dinner happened in the final two episodes of a nine-episode series. But this was much more than a tabloid media firestorm. It was a federal case. Not figuratively, but again literally. It ignited a huge debate over national security, the competence of the Secret Service, and, to my great frustration, the ethics of reality TV. I eventually came to believe the Salahis’ situation could be likened to being told you might be on the list for a club, then showing up and winging it with the doorman to see if you’ll be let in. In this case the club was the White House and the doorman was the Social Office, who must’ve been enchanted by Michaele’s beautiful red sari. Whatever the reason for the slipup, they got in.

The press went after Bravo as hard as the couple; we were excoriated for “rewarding” the Salahis’ behavior by putting them on the show and making them more famous. During the months between the state dinner incident and the series debut in August 2010, I told anyone who would listen that being on this show isn’t always a reward—and that the verdict on that is up to the individuals who choose to be on and those who choose to watch. I found myself having to defend my position in private as well as in public. I just wanted everyone to wait and give it the chance it deserved. Anderson Cooper, who is a friend and a fan of the Housewives, told me that he considered the Salahis repugnant whores for attention, and he wasn’t giving them any of his. He wasn’t alone. My mom was utterly repulsed by the Salahis. “You have to cut them out, Andy, they’re HORRIBLE! Vile people!” she scolded. “The show is good, though!” I protested. This was the first time the public would have any significantly preformed opinion on any Housewives cast members before the show even premiered. And those preformed opinions were ugly.

We had set out to do a show about, among other things, what people in Washington will do to get closer to power, and in the Salahis we had an extreme example. We aired the show, and the other women forever resented the Salahis for turning it into their own private circus. When I heard reports, more than a year later, that Tareq had reported Michaele missing, my heart lurched. I worried that something terrible had happened between these two seemingly desperate souls. I had to laugh when it turned out she had merely run off into the “Open Arms” of the guitarist from everybody’s favorite eighties rock band, Journey. Now that would have made a great episode.

After the DC finale, we premiered The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills, a location I initially objected to because it seemed almost redundant—hadn’t we already done it with Orange County? Wrong again. It was a huge hit, and people loved seeing a show about really rich people who were really, really rich! Of course wealthy people had been on all our other series, but since the show is a reflection of reality, many did not stay wealthy. Overextension, downsizing, liens, loans—it all happened, in almost every city. The Beverly Hills women, though, lived in football-field-sized mansions. We had succeeded with our casting, too—the women all had real connections to one another, and did I mention that they were really, really rich? The world of the Beverly Hills Housewives was so fun and frothy and pink and fantasy-like that I thought we had a real-life Dynasty at last. That this show, of all the franchises, would turn so tragically dark surprised no one more than me. The ladies, as it turned out, were hiding a terrible secret.

When our producers at Evolution Media in Burbank started trying to cast various women in Beverly Hills, no one was interested at first. Finally, one woman wanted in, and she was our tipping point, giving us the biggest competition we’d ever seen to get on a Housewives show. Soon we had a line of Bentleys outside the production company and a lobby full of fur-wearers with similar faces (I’d later learn they all shared the same surgeons), as five hundred women tried to become Beverly Hills Housewives. For the first time, I started hearing from publicists and agents and potential Housewives themselves. We had established actresses wanting to get on, and even Sumner Redstone’s girlfriend at the time applied. The company put 122