In March of this year, the second season of The Hills: New Beginnings was just two episodes into filming when they had to halt production due to the coronavirus pandemic. According to a new report from Page Six, filming of the highly-watchable series is set to resume at the end of July .
“Production is working with health officials in Los Angeles County to assure a healthy filming situation,” the insider told the publication. “They will be doing some self-shooting but mostly back to filming with the new health regulations in place for filming.”
In 2006 in a 10pm time slot, MTV aired its first episode of its newest reality program, one that would follow the personal and professional lives of four young women living in Los Angeles: Lauren, Heidi, Audrina and Whitney. It would go on to become a phenomenon which lasted ten seasons.
In 2019, eight years after the finale aired, The Hills: New Beginnings revived the fraught relationship between the Pratt siblings as well as Audrina Patridge and Justin “Bobby” Brescia’s complicated romance. Was it on, was it off – or was it just for show?
Speaking with GRAZIA in 2017, Patridge related her early days dating Brescia. “I was in my early 20s and Justin didn’t want a commitment so I’d go and date other guys and he’d get mad at me,” she said. “The fight was always the same. I’d say ‘Well, you can’t get mad at me if you don’t want to be committed, so I’m allowed to date other people.’ But he didn’t want me to but you can’t do that, that’s not fair. It was a constant struggle and I wasn’t used to that and then I had to go through it on camera.”
READ: Audrina Patridge: “The Hills Always Made Me Look Desperate And Always Wanting Justin”
But producers pressed on – because audiences were so invested in this pair. As I wrote many years ago, “the duo remained the couple you rooted for. You wanted them to have that happy ending. You wanted Brescia to mature and turn his light on and want Patridge in the same way she wanted him. Because they could have been great together.”
“The show still wanted me to be in love with Justin and they wanted me to fight with Kristen. At that point, it was ruining my real life relationship because I had to keep faking all these scenes and it was starting to affect my reputation and my work. I had to eventually talk to the producers and say no,” says Patridge. “It was definitely looking like I was always desperate and wanted Justin all the time and that was probably the hardest thing for me because it wasn’t like that.”
READ: Justine and Audrina: It’s wasn’t Over. It Still ISn’t Over.
To be honest, the revival show followed this same narrative as the on-again-off-again couple joined Heidi Montag, Spencer Pratt, Stephanie Pratt, Frankie Delgado, Whitney Port, Brandon Thomas Lee, Jason Wahler and Kaitlynn Carter. The latter was Jenner’s wife during the show but soon-after season one aired, they announced their split. It’s unclear if Kaitlynn will return in season two.
Jenner will reportedly be seen living the single lifestyle which I can attest to as I spotted him on Raya just last week.
I am interested in seeing how exactly producers will pick up where they left off in March. Surely the show will need to account for the changed humans we all are in light of the experiences we’ve been dealt the past couple of months. And will Justin and Audrina factually, finally get together? I guess, as Justin Bobby profoundly pointed out all those years ago, truth and time tells all.
Very true, Homeboy. Very true indeed.
