Kristen Doute survived the first eight seasons of Bravo’s “Vanderpump Rules,” but apparently there comes a time in the life of every server, hostess or bartender at Lisa Vanderpump‘s SUR Restaurant & Lounge when the siren song of a slower life comes a-calling.
“The concrete jungle, the hard-core city life, that’s for when you’re in your 20s,” says Kristen in the opening minute of “The Valley,” the “Vanderpump Rules” spinoff that premiered on Bravo on Tuesday, March 19.
“But I’m 40 now,” she continues. “The Valley is where I need to be.”
And where, pray tell, is this peaceful valley of which Kristen speaks? We’ll give you a hint: It’s not the lost Tibetan paradise of Shangri-La. And it’s not the farm in the country where my dog went to live when I was a kid.
No, this is the Valley of San Fernando. Kristen has settled in a Studio City apartment that’s approximately 6.4 miles north through Laurel Canyon and over Mulholland Drive from the restaurant where she first staked her claim to reality TV fame. She’s not exactly been put out to pasture in other words.
The premise of “The Valley” is simple: A trio of former “Vanderpump Rules” stars and a handful of their friends have decided it’s time to grow up and start families. And the concrete jungle of West Hollywood is just too harsh when compared to the asphalt jungle of Valley Village – where former “Vanderpump Rules” stars Jax Taylor and Brittany Cartwright live with their 2-year-old son.
The cast also includes Danny and Nia Booko, and actor and a past Miss USA winner, who live with their three young kids in Reseda. (That’s 20 miles from SUR and west of the 405, so don’t forget to stock your SUVs with provisions and a barrel or two of water.)
Also in Valley Village, approximately 8.3 miles from SUR, are Jason and Janet Caperna – he’s a lawyer, she’s part of the Greater Vanderpump Universe, a friend of many current and former cast members. (Valley Village probably needs to be on the reality star tour maps – “Vanderpump Rules” stars Tom Sandoval and Ariana Madix bought a home there in 2019, years before their relationship exploded in a supernova of scandal.)
Married real-estate agents Jesse Lally and Michelle Saniei Lally are Hollywood holdouts, living a few streets north of Sunset Boulevard less than 2 miles from SUR – walking distance!
“We don’t live in the Valley,” Lally begins.
“We don’t like the (bleeping) Valley,” Saniei Lally interjects.
“– because the house we have right now, right behind Chateau Marmont, just screams ambition,” he finishes.
And then there are the sassy single friends, Zack Wickham, Brittany’s best friend from back home in Kentucky, and Jasmine Goode, who’s not only a former SUR employee (though she wasn’t on the TV show), but a past contestant on “The Bachelor” and “Bachelor in Paradise.”
In the premiere, Zack and Jasmine seem unconvinced that the Valley wagon train from West Hollywood really knows what it’s doing.
“All these people move to the Valley, get a house, pop out a couple of kids, and then they think they’re so grown up,” Zack says. “But these people don’t grow up.”
Which, you know, he’s got a point.
When we meet Kristen, she’s still unpacking in her new apartment. She, like two of the other couples, once owned a home in Valley Village. But the heart wants what the heart wants – the boyfriend who convinced her to sell and move in with him – even if the heart doesn’t really know what it’s getting itself into.
She and the now-ex-boyfriend lived together for five months, during which they broke up seven times, Kristen says. But never fear, when there’s a wedding to attend!
“Two weeks after my (lousy) breakup, I attended a wedding,” she says. “Luke was one of the groomsmen. I thought, ‘He’s sweet, he’s kind, he’s funny.’
“Then, we had sex behind a tent and the rest is history.”
Luke Broderick is the show’s fish out of water. He traveled to the wedding – the one where Kristen met up with him behind a tent – from his 70 acres in Colorado, which probably has a valley of an entirely different order.
The wedding hook-up stuck, though, and now Kristen and Luke are talking about having a baby. “We pulled the goalie,” he tells the other guys at one point, which they all understand has nothing to do with hockey.
While most of the guys seem bemused at how unlike them Luke is, Jax is openly hostile. “Vanderpump Rules” veterans may remember that Jax and Kristen once hooked up – and if you don’t remember it, there are flashback clips to remind you – though neither of them seemed to really remember it even though it apparently happened twice.
Luke has agreed to stay in the Valley at Kristen’s apartment all summer – the first season was apparently shot in the summer of 2023 – which will surely melt him long before the Rocky Mountain snowpack has even thought of trickling down the towns and cities below.
Jax seems poised to be the bad guy of the series. Not only is he mean to Luke, and in turn, Kristen, at a birthday party thrown for Janet, who is six months pregnant at the time, he decides to pants Danny as he and Nia pose for a photo, not realizing that Danny was in a swimsuit and had nothing on beneath.
“I honestly thought Danny was an underwear guy,” Jax explains. “It’s kind of a hard way to find out he’s not.”
Nia, who had twins six weeks earlier, does not take these shenanigans well. She departs, in tears, to a bedroom where all the women, including current “Vanderpump Rules” cast members Scheana Shay and Lala Kent, console her.
Judging from the previews, these will not be the last dumb things done or tears shed on the first season of “The Valley.” It is, after all, a Bravo unscripted series, and tears and stupid stunts are what make the reality world go ’round.
