A year ago, Camille Grammer was branded “America’s Most Hated Housewife” on the cover of Life & Style magazine because of her mean-girl persona on season 1 of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills: She organized the infamous “Dinner Party From Hell” where fake-cigarette-smoking psychic Allison DuBois predicted her rival Kyle Richards‘ death; she invited the girls over for a tennis session where she danced around in a short skirt and kissed their husbands; and even after making up with Kyle, she gave her a book titled How to Behave and Why as a “joke.”
In season 2, Kyle continues to be nasty and judgmental, but suddenly Camille is a changed woman. She’s gone from “sexy divorcee temptress” to a penitent, blushing, virginal Housewife. You can see it in the reunion shows, especially part 2 from this past Monday: Camille has herself posed on the couch just so, with every movement carefully choreographed. If she leans too much into one of the fights or tosses out a snide remark, before anyone can go after her, she’s suddenly rearranged herself back into a perky, demure little pose with a matching smile.
On Monday, Andy Cohen took his “James Lipton moment” to ask each of the ladies their favorite curse word. “Let’s start with the queen of the curse,” he said, looking eagerly toward Camille. But she just laughed and offered up the odd response ”poopystink,” which sounds lame even for playground-insult standards.
“Season 2 Camille,” Andy laughed, referring to her transformation. The Housewives teased her on both sides of it: One said, “She’s innocent!” while another took Andy’s side and chimed in, ”Let’s see season 1 Camille’s favorite curse!”
Reality Tea puts it best: It’s a personality transplant, and thank God for Andy to point it out. In the reunion, Camille acknowledged that she’d changed—mostly, she explained, because she wasn’t under the stress of her divorce to Kelsey Grammer like last season. Andy jumped on this, too, asking if she made a calculated effort to seem like less of a bitch after she became the villain of last season.
No, Camille responded, clarifying that she’d been humbled by the divorce and just wanted to stay out of the drama. She pushes the same message in her final season 2 blog on the Bravo site, urging her readers to remember that life is precious. Furthermore, she reminds them that even though the Housewives have their differences, they’ll always support each other:
I just think that women bicker, of course, because we’re not all going to agree on everything, but at the end of the day when we really need to be there for one another, we are. That’s what I like about this group of women, they will support each other.
