‘Vanderpump Rules’: The Real Reason Billie Lee is Leaving the Show
Say it ain’t so. The rumors are true. Billie Lee is leaving Vanderpump Rules.
Lee hasn’t had the easiest of times on the show. In fact, this past season was probably one of her toughest, but Lee is not one to back down easily, so something pretty big must have happened to get her to hang up her SUR uniform.
Lee’s struggles with the cast
Last season, Lee got into it with almost every female member of the cast. Her biggest rival of the season was Lala Kent.
Kent and Lee’s feud got so bad that Lee was apprehensive about filming the show’s reunion.
“I’m really nervous because she’s really mean,” Lee told Us Weekly ahead of filming the reunion. “I’ve heard things that, like … she’s not sorry for any of it and she would do it over and over again.”
Kent’s antics really had an effect on Lee throughout this past season.
“There’s so many children out there that are being bullied by people like her,” Lee continued. “She’s very powerful, and when someone’s powerful and they’re mean, it really hurts. I remember watching back recently how I felt when I went through that and I was really depressed and I feel like I’m in high school again, you know? It’s really weird. It makes me think about all the kids who are out there dealing with insecurities. I’m an insecure person — I have insecurities about my looks — and for her to call me ‘boring to look at,’ there’s just a lot of things that were triggering me, and I’m honestly afraid to confront her.”
Lee also fought with the rest of the women on the show when they planned a “Girls Night” at SUR and didn’t formally invite her.
What made Lee quit?
Though Lee was able to make it through the drama last go around, it eventually all got to be too much for her.
“Billie Lee was struggling handling the drama that comes with being a cast member on Vanderpump Rules,” a source told HollywoodLife. “It was truly messing with her mental well being. She also was having trouble vibing with the other cast members except [Tom] Sandoval, James [Kennedy] and Scheana [Shay], so she wanted to go.”
But there was one thing, in particular, that may have pushed her over the edge.
“Production asked Billie to partake in a storyline that she is adamant isn’t true — that she and Sandoval hooked up, which will be spoken about and [is] a big story line on this season of Vanderpump Rules,” the source continued.
“Things got so bad that she refused to wear a mic at Sandoval’s recent birthday celebration.”
Lee claims that she never signed a contract with Bravo, so leaving the show wasn’t a hard thing for her to do.
Though she let producers know that she did not want return to the show, last season probably won’t be the last that we see of Lee.
“Since she is still friends with a few of them, you will most likely see her here and there,” the source said.
She also has a few other things on her plate.
“She has a lot of other projects she is working on, like a potential book and her LGBTQ activism, so she wants to focus on that.”
