"Real Housewives Was The Downfall Of Our Marriage" PK Paul Kemsley

Paul Kemsley sits down with Paul to reveal the reality of filming The Real Housewives of Beverley Hills with ex-wife Dorit. (00:00) Intro (00:39) How PK Joined The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills (07:08) PK's Life Before The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills (09:07) How RHOBH Impacted PK's Family Life (12:00) The Behind-the-Scenes Politics of RHOBH (14:44) Why PK Left The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills (17:57) Does PK Love Himself Today? (20:29) PK Opens Up About Online Trolls and Reality TV Fame Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 0:30Speaker 01

  Welcome to We're Talking. In this episode, I sit down with Paul P.K. Kemsley to talk about his time on The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills, why he entered the world of reality TV, and what happens when you lose control of your own story.

• 0:59Speaker 01

  You have a strong relationship.

• 1:01Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:02Speaker 01

  Okay. You are married, right? Prior to the show. You have a beautiful child.

• 1:08Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:09Speaker 01

  Right? And then even you professionally, I feel like you're now back.

• 1:14Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:15Speaker 01

  You're not where you were.

• 1:16Speaker 02

  No, but we're doing okay.

• 1:18Speaker 01

  You're doing okay, right? You're back.

• 1:19Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:20Speaker 01

  So you now have everything that you want.

• 1:25Speaker 01

  Why do you get involved in a franchise like that, right? With The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills?

• 1:32Speaker 02

  I think there were a lot of reasons.

• 1:38Speaker 02

  I had a very dear friend of mine who's another one of these super unbelievable kings of industry, this particular guy in the music business, about as big as you can get. And when we went to LA, he said to me, there are only three entry points in LA, P.K. Money, power, and celebrity. That's what he told me.

• 2:03Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 2:03Speaker 02

  And I'm like, okay. He said, well, money, you've got to have the money you used to have. And then even and some, and then build schools and do some of the charitable initiatives that you used to do, because I was very involved in charities and stuff. Power, he said, you've got to own a studio, own a bank, be in government. So your quickest entry point, if you want to live in LA, is celebrity. So when he says, if you want to live in LA, he was talking about the recreation of potentially of what I had done previously and knowing that that was the world that I came from. So at that very time, one of the publicists that I was working with, I'm going to give her a name shout because I love her, her name's Dawn Miller.

• 2:48Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 2:49Speaker 02

  And she's a British girl that worked out of LA. And she said, oh, P.K., they're casting for The Housewives. Now, I'd never seen the show, ever, didn't know anything about it. All I knew was that Lisa Vanderpump.

• 3:04Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 3:04Speaker 02

  Who was my friend, was on it. That's all I knew. Right? And I said to Dorit, I think she just had Phoenix. So this was, Phoenix is now 10, so this is 10 years ago. Why don't you just go and do a read in a cast, have a casting? So I lined up the casting. She came back, said it went horribly, and then three weeks ago, three weeks later, they came back and they said, we'd like to film you guys at home.

• 3:32Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 3:33Speaker 02

  So what I do know is I know how to close a deal.

• 3:37Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 3:38Speaker 02

  Yeah. And that could be in real estate or whatever.

• 3:40Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 3:41Speaker 02

  So I said, right, this is what we're doing. We're filling the house with flowers. We're going to get the most eclectic group of guests around the table. We're going to stick boy jewels in one corner, pelé in another, whatever. Do you know what I mean? We're going to have our friends, and we're going to bring in entrepreneurs, and it's going to be the richest guy in the room and the poorest guy in the room. This one can sing. Oh, this guy can't see, but he can paint.

• 4:03Speaker 01

  Yeah, everybody. And the backdrop too, is because what I understand, I mean, the house was...

• 4:07Speaker 02

  The house was spectacular. The backdrop was great. I knew how to do it. So we did it. And as they say in England, Bob's your uncle. She got the gig. Now, whether or not...

• 4:23Speaker 00

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• 4:54Speaker 02

  I mean, that proved that, I don't know, because we haven't seen the end of the movie yet, but I do know that that show was fun until it wasn't.

• 5:10Speaker 02

  I was blind to what was going on, what was happening. I didn't act soon enough.

• 5:19Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 5:20Speaker 02

  And because my personality is a double-down guy, like, I'm not, I don't like walking away from a bet. I used to... No, we'll get this bet right. Get this bet right.

• 5:32Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 5:33Speaker 02

  Had no regard for the global awareness of this show, none, literally none. And I think even now, you look back 10 years ago, social media and Twitter is not, was not then what it is now.

• 5:46Speaker 01

  Right.

• 5:47Speaker 02

  Right? The toxicity of it, you know, the fact that a lot of it is not even human beings commenting, it's bots, and I know a lot, I know a lot about that now. And, you know, the rest unfortunately is history, and I will maintain that I have absolute accountability for going down that avenue. And I made some very significant mistakes in not acting when I saw it going wrong.

• 6:17Speaker 01

  Right. So then...

• 6:19Speaker 02

  So, you know, and I think that when you're asking me these questions, it's got to be about my perspective, because Dorit's got her own perspective. And I'm not, as I've said a million times before, I'm, she is the mother of my kids.

• 6:33Speaker 01

  Right.

• 6:33Speaker 02

  What she chooses to do and say about me is entirely up to her. Her versions, her perspectives, her truth are her truth. Doesn't mean they're the truth.

• 6:45Speaker 01

  Right.

• 6:46Speaker 02

  They're her truth.

• 6:46Speaker 01

  Right.

• 6:47Speaker 02

  I have my own.

• 6:48Speaker 01

  Right.

• 6:49Speaker 02

  I don't want that period of my life to define me. I don't want it to represent, because the truth is, a lot of it is down to the editing.

• 6:58Speaker 01

  It is.

• 6:59Speaker 02

  And they create these scenarios that just didn't happen. Do you know what I mean? And the accusations and the rumor and the hearsay, and they whip it up and they love it. But there are victims.

• 7:12Speaker 02

  Yeah? And I'm not calling myself a victim. I'm not a victim. I'm out of it. Yeah, it was uncomfortable, but I don't want our kids to be victims of those decisions.

• 7:22Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 7:22Speaker 02

  Do you understand? I don't, and I won't allow that, right? And I won't allow, when I say I won't allow, I'm talking about not in a controlling sense, I mean, in an emotional context. I will do my very best to not add fuel to what I'm trying not to allow.

• 7:40Speaker 01

  Right. Because it, because you're trying, you're trying to contain a fire.

• 7:43Speaker 02

  I'm trying to contain a fire, but I'm also saying, okay, well, that's not my fire anymore. You want to blow that fire up, you want to create that fire and live in that fire, that's your choice.

• 7:56Speaker 01

  Right.

• 7:56Speaker 02

  I choose not to live in that fire anymore.

• 7:58Speaker 01

  Yeah. All right. So then, from just your relationship with television, if I look at that. So this is season, what is it, season seven of Real Housewives, 2016. What was initially, what was your feel around reality TV?

• 8:18Speaker 02

  I...

• 8:19Speaker 01

  What was your take on it?

• 8:20Speaker 02

  I, first of all, believe that I had the most beautiful, charismatic, sharp, ferociously ambitious wife, and I wanted to show her off.

• 8:34Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 8:35Speaker 02

  And I also felt, because I've always been able to control, direct, storyline, businesses...

• 8:48Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 8:49Speaker 02

  You know, and I was...

• 8:50Speaker 01

  You were in control previously.

• 8:51Speaker 02

  I thought I was in control.

• 8:53Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 8:53Speaker 02

  And even it's my simplistic, moronic position, and this is like, oh, P.K., you really are an idiot. I was like, it's kind of cool to be a celebrity. You get tables at the right time and...

• 9:06Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 9:06Speaker 02

  You know, I joked about this, I joked about this with James Corden, right? When he asked me after one year, he said, why do you do that show? I said, well, I didn't want to be in the five to 10 club. So he said to me, what do you mean? I said, well, when you come to LA and nobody knows who you are and you want to get a table, they offer you five or 10.

• 9:28Speaker 01

  I see it.

• 9:29Speaker 02

  So I say, he goes, where are you now? I said, 8 o'clock. He goes, yeah, I'm 7:45. He goes, do you know what I mean? And that was kind of funny for me. Also, I'd been in the public world, but I've been public for many, many years. So for me, yeah, I had my ups and downs with publicity and all that, but I wasn't really on social media.

• 9:49Speaker 01

  Right.

• 9:50Speaker 02

  I wasn't aware of what that show can do, and I'm not blaming that show on my divorce or my relationship or who I think Dorit is now versus who I think she was or who I am now. I think the biggest question I have that will never be answered is, is that, is Dorit where she was always going to be and always going to end up? Or was I responsible for putting her in that world and then that world created what happened now? But there's no question that before we did that, like, if you talk about happy times,

• 10:35Speaker 02

  I mean, I remember living in Tribeca, we had a beautiful apartment, Dorit and me, and then we had the baby, and life was pretty fucking good. You know, I used to have this big TV. I used to watch my football on a Sunday, Dorit made dinner on a Friday. We went and saw movies, took the baby for a walk. Who drove the bus into the wall? Me. Much like I had done many times in my life. But it's kind of like...

• 11:09Speaker 02

  The analogy is, is if you go and buy a candy store. And then you say to your best friends and your lover and go and have what you want. It's our candy, go eat.

• 11:18Speaker 01

  Right.

• 11:19Speaker 02

  You've got to realise they're going to be consequences to that. And you always rely on people to be aware and have certain disciplines. And then you lose control of that. You lose control of that, whatever it is, that thing that keeps moving forward and growing.

• 11:36Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 11:37Speaker 02

  In a not always beautiful way and an ugly way. And then the show likes to go back and only talk about bad things. So then you start reporting on this and that. And I'm like, well, what about that? And then they build up this vision of who you are as a person, who you are as a couple. And you, and then you start repeating it.

• 11:59Speaker 01

  Oh, really?

• 12:00Speaker 02

  You start believing it. And then suddenly you find yourself, what are you talking about? I'm nothing like that guy. What are they showing? I'm nothing like the person they're showing. And then I'm looking at my wife and saying, like, who are you? Right? It's like, it's scary when you look at it.

• 12:18Speaker 01

  Yes, yes.

• 12:19Speaker 02

  And you lose control of that, of that thing.

• 12:23Speaker 01

  Of that thing. So, so my wife and I in twenty eleven, way back, we were offered a reality TV show to follow our life.

• 12:35Speaker 02

  Right.

• 12:35Speaker 01

  Yep. And I was all for it. I was like, this is great. We should do it. My wife said, no.

• 12:43Speaker 01

  It, it's going to, it'll destroy us because we could lose ourselves. And what you're just saying to me is that it's this depiction of you. It's, it sounds like what you're saying is that you, you lost yourself. There was a storyline that's created, that's not you. It's bits and pieces of who you are, who the, what the relationship is, is it's, and then, you know, I'm in reality TV. There's a double down on that storyline. We know that if it bleeds, it leads. So we know that the negative always rises to the top.

• 13:20Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 13:21Speaker 01

  But then I think what's so hard for me with, with Real Housewives in particular is, is that there's multiple people in the show. I'm sure there's a competition for the A.

• 13:34Speaker 02

  No, of course.

• 13:34Speaker 01

  Yeah, the A storyline.

• 13:36Speaker 02

  And that's getting even worse. I mean, what I see now is fractured relationships, fractured friendships, broken marriages, sadness, money issues, health issues. And they're all doubled and trebled. And some of them are steeped in truth and some of them have no truth. And, and the audience seemed to enjoy watching implosion. And then they picked their side and they believe they know what they know because they listen to what somebody's saying.

• 14:15Speaker 02

  I mean, one of the weirdest things for me, and it took a lot of discipline, but I made a decision not to talk about it. Like, I'm not, you know, we've talked, we've spoken in very generic terms.

• 14:30Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 14:30Speaker 02

  You know, I'm not gonna come out and start saying, that's not true, that's not true, that's not true, that's not. How about the whole lot ain't true? The whole lot ain't true. And the only real victims are going to be the kids. So I'm gonna do all I can to protect them and to protect, you know, their lives and their journeys. And I'm not, and I do not believe it's in their interests for me to publicly litigate our divorce. Right? Will I inevitably have to use the court system? I don't know. Maybe that's avoidable, maybe it's not.

• 15:09Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 15:10Speaker 02

  Right? But the reality is, is I know that I'm not free from blame for sure. But I'm not controlling the last two years and I wouldn't have encouraged it. And I would have strongly recommended in any capacity, my capacity as a manager, my capacity as a business guy, my capacity as a father and a husband. If I'd have had somebody who would listen, I would have said, that is the wrong thing to do.

• 15:39Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 15:39Speaker 02

  Right?

• 15:39Speaker 01

  Is, is, is that why you left the show?

• 15:43Speaker 02

  No, it's not why I left the show. I left Dorit, which is why I left the show.

• 15:50Speaker 02

  And we were in a separation and then Dorit, in fairness to her, it was a big job and she had to continue. And then Dorit decided what narrative she'd do. And at the point that she was doing that, listen, I'm not in that world anymore. I'm, you know, I'm involved in business, thank God again, and I'm doing some great stuff and I, I'm out of that world now. But it's part of, it's the, it's been the last ten years of my life. And, you know, I don't think anybody can sit there and say they're nothing to do with it. I mean, of course, I'm part of the problem for sure.

• 16:26Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 16:27Speaker 02

  Do I feel it's been fair and justified? No, I don't. There are periods that I know it's not fair.

• 16:33Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 16:33Speaker 02

  But you have to still own the shit, don't you? I mean, who started it, you know?

• 16:38Speaker 01

  You do.

• 16:39Speaker 02

  All that stuff. I didn't realise how much it would affect me emotionally and drain me and put me back into a place that I didn't want to be in. Do you understand? So then you say, well, how do you get out of this? How do you get out of this place? Would you fight your way out? Do you joke your way out?

• 16:57Speaker 02

  How do you get out of it?

• 17:00Speaker 02

  And I didn't manage to.

• 17:01Speaker 01

  How, if, if you could take us back there, if, if you're willing, to talk about the, the darkest moment? So that we can understand how you felt and what was driving that, that emotion for you?

• 17:18Speaker 02

  I think there were a lot of dark moments. I, I think this sense of, for me, this inability that I experienced to, to be clear. I had no clarity. I was, I had no clarity with my marriage, with that show, with business. I couldn't focus. That's when I decided to blame it on drink and say, right, I'll give up drink and that will get me clear.

• 17:53Speaker 02

  And actually, there was enormous clarity when I did that. And, but I also learnt out, learnt that that wasn't the issue. The issue was me and delving into all of the mistakes that I'd always made, seeing myself making the same mistakes, having that sense of deja vu. Thinking about Loretta and the kids and the distance. It was too much distance between me and my older kids. I mean, thank God, it's all, but I was too absent. I didn't want to be absent this time around. And then I was being accused of being absent and I wasn't absent.

• 18:30Speaker 01

  Right.

• 18:31Speaker 02

  But I think I was absent in terms of my ability to address how I was actually feeling. I actually made myself second. I didn't, I still don't, but I didn't love myself. I didn't, I didn't respect myself. I was just doing it for this thing. I'd lost even any thought as to why I was doing it.

• 18:58Speaker 01

  And, and, and you just said something, so, so today, as you said, do you love yourself?

• 19:04Speaker 02

  Not yet.

• 19:06Speaker 01

  Are you proud of yourself?

• 19:07Speaker 02

  Nope.

• 19:08Speaker 01

  Do you respect what you've created?

• 19:11Speaker 02

  Nope.

• 19:13Speaker 01

  You don't?

• 19:14Speaker 02

  Not yet.

• 19:17Speaker 02

  I'm aware of what I created. People like you who show me respect and, you know, and, you know, in a really beautiful way and say, this is amazing what you do. But no, I'm not there yet.

• 19:32Speaker 01

  You're not there, PK?

• 19:33Speaker 02

  No.

• 19:35Speaker 01

  You know, since, when, when you came in, uh, before you came in, I was talking to different people, getting ready to interview PK, and I'm just bragging about you.

• 19:45Speaker 02

  Thanks.

• 19:47Speaker 01

  That, that, that is a bit shocking to me that you don't love yourself.

• 19:53Speaker 02

  Not yet. How can I at the moment in terms of, I'm always, I'm always in a situation. It's like, at the moment, I'm in this divorce situation, you know? My kids, I'm worried about them. I'm worried them, about them being affected. I don't see this noise stopping. The only way I can stop it is to remove myself from it. I even was asked last night, why am I doing this interview?

• 20:30Speaker 02

  I said, I don't, I don't really know. I'm in London. I guess I've got a story to tell. You asked me at the beginning, maybe I, my lessons, maybe my journey can help someone else, right? But I haven't finished my journey and I definitely don't sit there in the mirror and go, oh, love you, PK. You know, that you read all, you have to start loving yourself, put yourself first. I, I'm not there yet. I'm not. Will I get there? I hope so. I hope, I really hope so. And it's, yeah, people are inspired by some of the things I've done. I think that I have

• 21:08Speaker 02

  a few ways to get better that I've not managed to do yet, right? I know that I'm very affected emotionally and I'm very sensitive to, for example, social media commentary. People are so vile. And as it happens on my own feed, people are beautiful. Very rarely, but I've still had to block nineteen hundred people in the last twelve months, you know? They write terrible things and then you say, well, why are you even reading it? So the secret, the secret is definitely, definitely not to read it. But I, I because of the addictive nature of my personality is difficult to do.

• 21:53Speaker 02

  Am I getting better at it? Hundred percent. Don't even watch the show anymore. Don't watch it. And I, but, but I can't avoid the clips and the trailers and the and the papers, what they're saying and every, everybody around you, the people you love are affected.

• 22:08Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 22:08Speaker 02

  You know, people don't realize, my mum, you know, my dad's eighty-eight. He has to listen to his daughter-in-law speaking as she's speaking and it affects him.

• 22:18Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 22:18Speaker 02

  So now he's trying not to see it. Yeah. The good news is his eyes are going, so now he can't see.

• 22:24Speaker 01

  So it now is, is hard, but the fact, I, I think that's something that a lot of people don't realize. It's incredibly nasty and unkind to troll. But the ripple effect that it creates in that person's life, their parents, their children.

• 22:41Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 22:42Speaker 01

  It's unfair.

• 22:42Speaker 02

  And we, we've protected our kids. But I've always said to Dorit, don't do this. The kids are going to read it at some point. Don't do it. But I'm not in control of her decisions.

• 22:55Speaker 01

  Right.

• 22:55Speaker 02

  And she's not in control of my decisions.

• 22:58Speaker 01

  Are, are there, from what you, if, if, only if you'd like to, to, to say this, are there any storylines from the show that are particularly challenging for you that you want to address?

• 23:11Speaker 02

  Not really. I mean, I don't think that I need to address storylines on The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills. I think I'm better off to focus on my own healing, my own growth. I mean, I, look, Mauricio is one of my great friends now, so I took a beautiful friendship out of that, out of that show.

• 23:30Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 23:31Speaker 02

  Beautiful friendship. Transparent, honest, we share. And we don't have any secrets. Such a great guy, inspirationally and business. But the world's got an opinion of him based on the show. So that was a gift from the show. I got a great friendship, funny enough, out of one of the producers. Alex Baskin, the big one.

• 23:55Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 23:55Speaker 02

  I consider him a true friend of mine. Great guy. So there have been some wins. You know, in my, you know, in terms of friendships.

• 24:05Speaker 02

  But everything else, no, it's not great.

• 24:09Speaker 01

  Okay. Would you ever do reality TV again?

• 24:13Speaker 02

  It, it depends in what context. So it depends what you call reality TV. If I thought it was a positive, uplifting, beautiful thing to do that was going to help other people and be fun and funny and humorous. And we got into a serious mode in this thing, but I like to joke around. I like to mess around. Yeah, I do that. Yeah.

• 24:37Speaker 01

  And if you want to hear the full, unfiltered stories from today's guest, you can check them out on the We Need to Talk page. Drop a like, leave a comment and hit subscribe. See you next week.

• 25:04Speaker 00

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