Gina Kirschenheiter introduced The Real Housewives of Orange County fans to Katie Ginella at the start of Season 18. What she likely didn’t expect was for the newbie to immediately dredge up drama with Heather Dubrow.
DECIDER recently sat down with Kirschenheiter, who revealed how she really felt about Ginella’s rookie season.
“It’s hard – your first year is hard,” she said. “And I think she kind of – there were times when she was having a hard time navigating through all of it, which I think is really normal.”
Ginella — a former golf reporter and mom of four — dared to face off against Dubrow in Thursday night’s (Aug. 1) episode, accusing the latter of lying about calling the paparazzi to take photos of her and her husband in Disneyland. Ginella claimed she had proof from a close friend who works with the photographers — but Dubrow swore on her children’s lives that she did no such thing.
The allegation was just the tipping point for Ginella, who previously accused Dubrow of rudely brushing her off the first time they met at Sutton Stracke‘s Christmas party. She also found it odd that Dubrow tagged her in a photo of herself before they were ever even friends — although, Dubrow speculated that her social media manager must’ve meant to tag Givenchy, not Ginella.
Kirschenheiter, for her part, described Ginella as “really sweet, kind” and “pretty open,” which was evident during the girl’s night when she went against her better judgment and aired her grievances with Dubrow to the rest of the ladies.
But Kirschenheiter also admitted, “I don’t quite have a 100% read on her within this environment.”
“I am looking forward to being able to do this again with her next year, should that happen, because I think that she’ll get more comfortable,” she continued. “But Katie as a person is great!”
Despite Ginella’s contentious start, Kirschenheiter was happy to bring on another Real Housewife who was around the same age as her. I mean, who else (besides Emily Simpson) would complain about Dubrow’s small portions of food with her?
“I do think that it is cool to have somebody too that, we’re the same age, so it’s kind of fun because me and Katie joke with each other differently than how I joke with all of the other women – except for obviously, Emily, but she’s just in a different bucket, always,” Kirschenheiter said.
It looks like we’ll just have to keep watching to see how things play out for Ginella!
The Real Housewives of Orange County airs every Thursday at 9/8c on Bravo. New episodes are available to stream the next day on Peacock.
The post Gina Kirschenheiter Says ‘RHOC’ Newbie Katie Ginella Had A “Hard Time Navigating” Her Rookie Season: “Your First Year Is Hard” appeared first on Decider.
