Next Monday’s Watch What Happens Live on Bravo has a very special pre-taped interview with former Real Housewife of New York Jill Zarin. She has a lot of questions for Bravo and Andy Cohen, and she discussed with him the litany of emotions she felt about her unceremonious dismissal. In the preview clip below Jill expresses a belief that Bravo and Andy had favoritism towards Bethenny Frankel, who she had a major feud with in Season 3 of Real Housewives of New York.
Just a few weeks ago Jill Zarin talked to Good Morning America about how the wounds from rejection still stung. “It didn’t feel good. Nobody likes to not be asked back to the party.”
This January, Jill gave an even lengthier interview to The Hollywood Reporter about how the firing went down, and how she feels she deserves extra compensation for helping “cast” the show (Jill was the one who got Bethenny Frankel on the show.)
“First off, I like to say I was fired because I’m not embarrassed about it. I didn’t do anything wrong, so I really don’t know why they fired us and kept the other girls. We were told that they wanted to begin season five filming over Labor Day, so the other ladies and I were preparing story lines, basically putting our lives on hold until shooting. In June, it wasn’t even a question if they were inviting me back. By August, conversations started to change. They were hesitant to commit and delayed the announcement. Then I got a call the Wednesday after Labor Day that Bravo decided to bring back LuAnn [de Lesseps], Sonja [Morgan] and Ramona [Singer], but the rest would not be decided until the end of the week. I’m smart enough to know that they were putting out contracts to new girls, and whether they signed would determine our fate. So, at 5 p.m. on a Saturday night I get a phone call from my producer, and she told me that Bravo had made the decision to let the four of us go.
They’re getting a lot of money now, so that’s another thing I’m disappointed about. I didn’t get to make the money I feel I deserved. I didn’t just help make the show popular; I cast it.”
When she asked Andy why she was “fired,” he replied:
We discussed it that day, we discussed it many times, that we were looking to shake the show up. The viewers were the ones that, to us, dictated that wanted something change. That last reunion, I think that you would agree, was incredibly toxic for everyone involved. And when it was over, I think the viewers, and the producers, and Bravo all separately said ‘What can we do to change it?’ because if we bring it back as it is, we know that the relationships are probably not going to change.”
What it felt like for Jill:
“It felt like a death. It felt like my funeral. I was heartbroken. I felt like you were my parents, and I felt that when it was like Betheny-Jill, I felt like you picked favorites. I always did. I even felt Ginger got it bad because you used to have Giggy next to you, and not Ginger. I think the hardest thing for me when you fired me was that you didn’t let me say goodbye.”
As Jill says “I tell it the way I see it, it doesn’t mean that’s the truth.”
