Image: Courtesy of MTV/Laguna Beach.Is Laguna Beach the gift that keeps on giving or the high school nightmare that never dies? We can't answer that for you — it's all about perspective. However, the MTV show from the early aughts seems to be cropping up a lot lately and the drama is still so very real.
Kristin Cavallari touched on one intense episode from back in the day in the opening pages of her new book, Balancing In Heels. "What Happens In Cabo" had teens on pins and needles, waiting for what was going to happen between K-Cav and her high school boyfriend Stephen Colletti.
"We loved hard and fought hard," she wrote of the romance. But it was also complicated: "My relationship with Stephen went from our own high school romance to the fodder of a hugely successful television show.
"Normal high school relationships are dramatic enough, but ours now had the added pressure of being seen by MTV viewers across the country as well as being manipulated by the show's producers, a set of adults were very suddenly involved in the intricacies of our lives," Cavallari went on."Surprisingly, the producers had a bigger effect, as they controlled and mapped our lives more than we were aware. One of the most hurtful things they did was pressure Stephen to spend time with another girl from the show, Lauren, while he and I were dating. It certainly provided some juicy conflicts, but it also affected me deeply. I felt threatened. On one side, it seemed like the producers were trying to break us up, which was intimidating. On the other side, I was worried that my relationship with Stephen was becoming less stable, even though I knew if we hadn't been on television, he wouldn't have been spending time with another girl."
So was Colletti's relationship with Lauren Conrad completely fabricated? That's still sort of murky territory. But it definitely did a number on the trust between the actual couple.
"Stephen was the most important thing in my life, and there was nothing I cared about more. I hated fighting with him on camera because it felt like I was airing all our dirty laundry. Even then, I knew that couldn't be good for a relationship," Cavallari, who is now married to football star Jay Cutler and a mother of three, added. "One time in particular, they showed me adamantly telling him, 'I don't want to talk about it '— meaning, I didn't want to talk about whatever it was on camera, but it sounded as though I didn't want to deal with the issue at all."
And then there was that Cabo trip...
"On a trip to Cabo San Lucas, when Stephen and I were actually broken up, I jumped up on the bar to dance with my girlfriends. Then I kissed a guy I was seeing at the time, completely unaware of how my actions were affecting Stephen (only teenagers are able to be so self-involved!). Not one of my better moments! Then Stephen started shouting 'slut!' at me from across the bar. It was a scene. There are certainly some clips I wish I could erase from everyone's memory."
Ultimately though, being on the show didn't just impact her relationship with Colletti: It made it tough for Cavallari to get close to guys in general. "What Stephen and I had together was real, and that's what made me get through the producers' attempt at manipulating us," she wrote in her book. "We talked about everything the entire time. When we saw each episode, it was clear to us what was real and what was fake...but that still didn't make it easy. I think always having my guard up for those couple of years filming made me reluctant to trust men."
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