The OC blonde is back.
Gretchen Rossi has returned to The Real Housewives of Orange County after a 12 year sabbatical with the same disdain for Tamra Judge, unflinching blonde waves, and no plastic surgery… or so she says. She’s “MAGA Barbie” come alive, and she’s not apologizing for that—or for her Fox News haircut.
“It’s funny, because I see these girls out making comments in their media and press interviews about my hair being dated or whatever,” she told The Daily Beast’s Obsessed (hair as Fox & Friends as ever). “What’s so funny about that is if you actually go and look on Chat GPT, ’90s bouncy wave bob cuts are what’s in style right now. So I’m very on trend right now with my hairstyle.”
“What’s even funnier is one of them went and just cut her hair exactly like mine,” she added, pointing to co-star Emily Simpson, who did just rock a bouncy lob on Watch What Happens Live.
Rossi is the latest Housewife to return to RHOC in its renaissance, avoiding all the mistakes of the fallen Alexis “Jesus Jugs” Bellino, who left an indelible mark on Season 18 (as the most hated Housewife). Re-introduced through newbies Jenn Pedranti and Katie Ginella, Rossi has emerged from Bravo purgatory to take on her original sparring partner, Judge.
The two heralded the first-ever Housewives feud as we know it, dating all the way back to Season 4 in 2008, Rossi’s debut. Seventeen years later, the blonde bombshells are still going at it like Obama was just elected president. Talk about a true recession indicator.
Some fans (and several cast members) have begged for a Judge takedown for years, sending out a bat-signal to Rossi—one she answered right away in her first group scene, taking on Judge at a steaming hotpot dinner.
“I’ve never been afraid of her. I’m afraid of what she’s capable of doing and the lengths she goes to, for sure,” she said. “But I’m not afraid of her in the sense that I’m not going to stand up when I feel like someone is being a bully or continuing to harm people.”
“I was probably the one person that was willing to speak up and call her out on it,” she added. “And I think that’s why [she] and I have always butt heads, because she’s so used to manipulating situations.”
Polarizing from the jump, Rossi’s status as a love-or-hate Housewife is alive as ever, even in a friend-of role. She’s used to the criticism, dating all the way back to rumors she cheated on her dying fiancé in her debut and claims her next boyfriend, Slade Smiley, was a Housewife hopper.
Returning as a legacy cast member, Rossi’s approach is more refined than ever.
“I’ve never been a wallflower. I’ve always stuck up for myself, but I think that back in the day, you could sense some timidness,” she said. “And now I’m coming in with the facts, and I’m just going, ‘Okay, no, this is such B.S.’. You saw it in the first episode where I [told Tamra], ‘You’re the liar beyond liars. You have been lying for years.’”
“I run at adversity. I don’t run away from it. Tamra’s the one who’s always out running. You address her, and she goes running. Stay tuned, because you’ll see a lot of that this season.”
That, of course, is a reference to Judge temporarily quitting the show following a cast trip to New Orleans—something Rossi takes credit for.
“Oh, no, I was definitely involved in that,” she laughed, claiming the truth of the matter is much stranger than fiction. “There were so many twists and turns, and so many things that I was trying to figure out what was happening.”
Whatever that means, viewers will find out very soon, as the New Orleans trip is set to kick off any episode now.
But that’s not the only chaotic cast trip the RHOC ladies will embark on this season. The final trip to Amsterdam—where the season concludes—is absent one cast member, and it’s not Judge. Rather, Ginella will miss out on the Eurotrip, and Rossi lies at the center of that fallout, despite coming into the season by her side.
“You have to stay tuned to see how that all works out, because there’s some dynamics that change there, which was really sad. It was,” she shared.
The Real Housewives of Orange County airs every Thursday at 9 p.m ET/PT on Bravo/next day on Peacock, and fans can catch up with The Daily Beast’s Obsessed recaps here.
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