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Vicki Gunvalson’s daughter Briana Culberson opened up about her time on the Real Housewives of Orange County, addressed the infamous “family van” scene, and revealed why she stopped filming.
Eighteen years ago, viewers met Briana as she prepared for prom night – before her mom explained that she can’t have sex. In a later episode, fans witnessed Vicki screaming on the phone because a family van picked her up before a cruise.
During an interview, Briana addressed the early history of reality TV when RHOC began.
“Reality TV was just starting to become kind of exciting, or something that people were talking about, so it was like a whole new world,” said Briana, in an interview with BravoTV.com.
“I didn’t, like, want to be on TV,” she said. “I didn’t want to be recognizable or anything. I think I’m too simple for that. My mom, on the other hand, just absolutely loved it. Had to do it … It was a family decision.”
But Briana didn’t realize what it would entail.
“I had no idea what I was doing. We had no idea what we were getting ourselves into,” said the star. “I became a woman on TV, and that was very unexpected.”
“I’m glad the show started when I was 18, because it would have been a lot different if I was on the show younger and social media was a factor,” Briana added. “I can’t imagine social media as a young teenager to begin with, but add being on television, and that would have been so much more stressful. So I think I came in at a good time … It’s definitely cool to have my years of 18 to 30 documented on TV.”
She mentioned one scene in particular: the famous “van” scene.
“The family van obviously is hilarious, because that is my whole life with my mom,” explained Briana. “That family van moment wasn’t like, ‘Oh, remember that one time Mom acted really crazy and was yelling at the guy on the phone?’ No, that’s my whole life, even to this day. She doesn’t like something at a restaurant, everybody knows about it.”
“So it’s funny to me because that’s such a big moment to so many people because they think that was so outrageous, that was so hilarious,” she added. “To me, that was my whole childhood. So I like that people got to see that little piece of my mom.”
Though Briana appreciates those past seasons, she doesn’t yet want her kids to see it.
“My kids are getting older. They’re 10, 9, and then 2 and a half, and 1, but my 10- and 9-year-olds don’t know really anything about the show,” she said. “[People] recognize them, or another mom will say, ‘Oh, your mom’s on that show,’ so they get curious, and they’ve asked me to watch some episodes.”
However, she let the older kids watch the series premiere – or at least part of it.
“[At one point in the episode] I was getting my hair done and my mom was telling me, ‘Don’t have sex tonight,’” recalled Briana. When the scene popped up, she decided not to let her kids keep watching. “I’m like fumbling for the remote like, ‘OK! Let’s go swimming or something!’”
“I could not remember that that was on the episode,” she laughed. “So I was just like, ‘Oh, I’ll just show them the first one.’ Of course, my kids are making fun of me. They’re like, ‘You look weird.’ I’m like, ‘I was 18.’”
Apparently, her kids claimed their grandma Vicki “looks different” now, because she, according to Briana, “had a lot of plastic surgery.”
“So they were quite confused,” said Briana. “I’m not ashamed of it or embarrassed of [the show]. It’s just not something we talk about day to day.”
She also revealed why she decided to stop filming.
“We had to move so much with the military and everything. In the first couple years of their lives, [my husband Ryan] was deployed, and I had to take a leave of absence from work because he was gone for eight months at a time,” said the star. “So we were all over the place, and in my head, I was like, ‘I really don’t want to add the stress of trying to teach toddlers to be on their absolute best behavior because cameras are in the house… They were already going through so much.”
She believes she “made the right decision” to leave the cameras behind – “at least for now.”
“[But] I never completely emotionally close the door to reality TV,” Briana explained. “I just think that I just wanted to take the time and just kind of step away and have a quieter life for my kids.”
