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After seeing Lauren Conrad on Laguna Beach, Whitney Port could barely contain her excitement when she realized she’d be on The Hills, a spinoff of the original show, with Conrad. 

Port told the story of how she came to be on The Hills in an April 2020 episode of her podcast, With Whit, according to People.  Ahead, find out what the 35-year-old had to say about the reality show and her first meeting with Conrad. 

‘The Hills’ premiered in 2006

Due to the success of MTV’s reality series, Laguna Beach, the network revived the show with a spinoff. The Hills premiered in 2006 and followed Conrad as well as Port and others as they navigated life in Los Angeles, Calif., as young adults. 

Lauren Conrad and Whitney Port
Lauren Conrad and Whitney Port; cropped image | Jeff Kravitz/FilmMagic

Whitney Port’s road to ‘The Hills’ began with an internship

On her podcast, Port took a walk down memory lane recounting what started her off on a path to becoming a reality TV star. Turns out, it all started with her applying for an internship. 

As a college student at the University of Southern California, she applied for a position as an intern at Teen Vogue. The publication had offices in the same building where Port had previously worked for Women’s Wear Daily and one day she went to the Teen Vogue offices to submit a resumé. When she did, Port had been told being on camera was a must.

“They said, ‘We’re actually accepting applications but only for people that are only interested in being on camera,’” Port said, adding, “I thought, ‘OK, whatever.’”

Whitney Port and Lauren Conrad
Whitney Port and Lauren Conrad | Donato Sardella / Contributor

Not long after, Port received a phone call from MTV about her joining the cast of The Hills. “I did a casting tape, everything was all good, producers were calling me to set up my first interview, I was supposed to have my first on-camera interview with Lisa Love,” she said. 

At the time, Love had been the West Coast editor of Vogue and Teen Vogue and on The Hills, Port and Conrad reported to her as interns. 

She fangirled over Lauren Conrad when they first met

Getting ready to be in front of cameras, Port got a surprise when she saw Conrad enter the room. “Next thing I know, Lauren Conrad walks in,” Port said. Not realizing The Hills had been pitched as the follow-up to Laguna Beach, Port didn’t know she’d be starring on a reality show alongside Conrad. 

“At this point, Laguna Beach had been on, so I knew who she was. I was like ‘Whoa, I am on her spinoff show. This is insane,’” Port said. 

She continued, saying she had a moment of disbelief. 

“I was so fangirling and freaking out I couldn’t believe that I would now be on the show with her,” Port said. “The rest is history,” she added, saying, “We just starting working and filming the show and soon the show became our lives and such a crazy, crazy thing.”

The Hills ran for six seasons before ending in 2010. Port left the series in 2008 to start her own spinoff, The City.

Whitney Port says she and Lauren Conrad haven’t spoken in years 

While the two seemed like such good friends on The Hills when they would talk in the Teen Vogue offices behind their desktop computers, these days Port and Conrad don’t stay in touch. During a live taping of her podcast in Aug. 2019, Port said she and Conrad hadn’t spoken since around the time they both became parents in 2017. 

Without Conrad as a fellow cast member, Port returned to reality TV in 2019 to appear in a reboot of The Hills called The Hills: New Beginnings. The show has been renewed for a second season. 

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