A change of heart? Vicki Gunvalson withdrew her defamation lawsuit against fellow Real Housewives of Orange County star Kelly Dodd, Us Weekly can confirm.
Gunvalson, 57, initially filed legal documents with a Los Angeles courthouse on Friday, November 1, over accusatory remarks Dodd, 44, made against her. She was also suing the show’s producers at Bravo and the cable network’s parent company, NBCUniversal. However, a source close to production tells Us exclusively that the More Than a Housewife author pulled the papers.
“Vicki withdrew her suit against the network, production company and Kelly,” the insider says. “No scenes were edited out. Their confrontation will still be seen in an upcoming episode. And Vicki is planning to attend the reunion.”
Dodd allegedly dissed Gunvalson while filming an episode for RHOC’s 14th season when she claimed her castmate preys “on older people,” is “a con woman” and is “engaged in ‘fraud.’” As a result, Gunvalson chose to take legal action against her castmate, which she filed under the pseudonym “Jane Roe.”
The Coto Insurance CEO, who was seeking an injunction on the airing of the episode and damages, later requested to pull her complaint against Bravo and NBCUniversal, but had not dropped her lawsuit against Dodd.
Gunvalson and Dodd’s animosity toward each other is no secret to RHOC devotees. Gunvalson, for her part, accused Dodd of doing cocaine during the season 13 reunion episode.
Speaking with Us exclusively in August, Dodd addressed her feud with her Bravo castmate. “I will never be friends with Vicki again. … And I can promise that,” she explained. “Tamara [Judge] and Shannon [Beador] for four years said that they hated Vicki, they’ll never be friends with her again. Over and over again. I can promise you, I will never be friends with her.”
Dodd also admitted to Us that she was “jumping up for joy” when she found out Gunvalson was demoted to being a friend of the Housewives for season 14.
“I think that she uses everybody as a story line. She doesn’t really have anything in her life,” Dodd explained. “You know, her kids are gone, her grandkids are gone. It’s just her — what are we going to watch her and [fiancé] Steve [Lodge] drink wine on the couch? … All good things come to an end.”
Dodd continued, “I think, you know, everyone was kind of sick of their story, money, Tamra and Vicki. So you know, I think it’s kind of time for them to go bye-bye. I feel like, out with the old, in with the fresh. It’s stale, it’s getting stale.”
People was first to report the news.
With reporting by Brody Brown
