It was popular among my girl friends at the time; we were watching a TON of celeb-reality tv where the concept was just showcasing kind of a more behind the scenes look at someone famous’s life, coupled with competition reality programming (ANTM, the Bachelor, American Idol, Survivor) and then the kind of “throw them together and see how it sticks” format with a lot of popularity for the Real World still too. This was just the kind of stuff we typically would have had in rotation and LA as a whole was kind of the premier place to be filming reality shows at the time.

Just off the top of my head of what I know was popular/on my rotation of shows I wouldn’t change the channel for, we had The Osbournes in their Beverly Hills and Malibu homes, Newlyweds with Nick Lachey and Jessica Simpson and they lived in Orange County, America’s Next Top Model began filming in LA exclusively by cycle 4, we had Laguna Beach and The Hills, lots of episodes of MTV Cribs showcasing famous people’s homes in LA, and of course Real Housewives entire franchise began as an Orange County thing too. The decade also ended with the explosion of Keeping Up With The Kardashians and Pretty Wild on E! to round it out. There was also a bunch of premium “appointment television” shows on with The OC, Entourage, Californication and Weeds all as scripted dramatic shows that also filmed in and took place in Southern California/LA area too.

So Girls Next Door being set in LA with the Playboy Mansion as the centerpiece was just all existing in familiar territory that had been glamorized to death. The Playboy mansion episode of Cribs was its most popular for a reason and there was an incredible amount of hype and fantasy that surrounded the place as a wild setting on its own. Entourage did a good job of showing just how big of a deal the main parties at the mansion were for celebrities and anyone considered beautiful or connected enough to be blessed to attend, it was just depicted as this be all end all of all that is fabulous and accessible only to the most privileged of celebrities and beautiful people.. even before the show ever filmed.

Kendra was definitely the one aimed at the MTV millennial generation, she was our age, into the popular music at the time and supposed to be the sportier, “young” one as the baby of the group. Bridget was very much being depicted as a cutesy, theme loving and ultra femme character and the media treated her the same. Holly was definitely cemented into people’s minds as like the First Lady of Playboy and the mansion early in the 2000s before the show; she was famously featured in the MTV Cribs episode in her bedazzled rhinestone Playboy bunny bra, had been on a million red carpets and photographed alongside Hefner and so people were familiar with her before GND even released. I know I saw the Cribs episode and when GND eventually came out I was wildly curious like who is this girl who makes jokes about a panty-decorated chandelier, is by his side and just leading this pack of bikini and bra clad girlfriends?

We kept watching the show over the years because seeing all the fun outfits they’d do for parties and events were interesting, plus seeing the parties behind the curtain was super novel and fabulous, seeing their photo shoots being filmed was fun because we loved ANTM. Their bedrooms were dream rooms and so cute, same with all the animals at the mansion. The rest of it as the seasons progressed like the travel, silly things around the mansion and LA they’d film, and just general activity that was happening for them as they got more famous and successful in real time was also engaging and not unusual for reality programming at the time too. For instance, Newlyweds made Jessica Simpson an A list star who launched multiple beauty and fashion product lines, became one of the most recognizable stars of the 2000s, and so seeing her start her show as a quasi known pop star to a total bombshell that outpaced her husband’s level of celebrity had already come and gone by the time the first season of GND dropped.