Dolores Catania addressed the Real Housewives of New Jersey salaries for first-season castmates, and shared why she called out Luis Ruelas for wishing suffering on Margaret Josephs and her son. She also dished on feeling “pressured” to pick a side amid the cast divide, and what it was like filming the latest season of The Traitors.
The 53-year-old joined RHONJ in season 7, and she’s never wavered from her determination to stay friends with almost everyone in the cast. This was particularly hard in the latest season, as the ‘team’ of Teresa Giudice barely filmed with the opposing players: sister-in-law Melissa Gorga and her allies.
On the “Trading Secrets” podcast, Dolores claimed first-season ‘Housewives’ get “very little” pay – around $50,000 – but they earn more with each subsequent season.
“[But in my first season] I wasn’t going to compromise … who I was for that money, no matter how much it was or how much I needed it,” she recalled. “And there were very big decisions in that first year … cause I wasn’t in a good place financially.”
Though Dolores was “very happy” with the salary she eventually earned, she didn’t feel the “need to be the highest paid.”
Dolores hinted that, in her first year, she was told, “‘Maybe you would be better if you did this or said this to your friend’ — and I said, ‘No, that’s not me.’”
She then told listeners, “You can’t succumb to the pressure of taking a side when you don’t want to. If you’re friends with two people and they’re fighting, you don’t have to support that fight. You just have to be a supportive friend … and not everyone’s going to be happy with you all the time.”
Dolores shared that castmates and others have “pressured” her to pick a side, or to “be mad when I didn’t want to be.”
“I get texts, everybody’s pissed off at me. They get pissed off at me, but they’ll get over it because I never hurt them,” she said.
Dolores was then asked about the reunion scene when she called out Luis for wishing suffering on Margaret and her son.
“It was kind of a visceral reaction,” she shared. “But … it’s for two reasons: For one, he’s gonna get flack for that. And number two, it shouldn’t have been said, right? … But, you know, he’s gonna get hit for that … We don’t have to have a reaction to everything.”
Dolores said her father once told her, “I didn’t teach you to be a friend when it’s easy to be a friend.”
The star also shared her excitement about filming The Traitors.
She said the gameshow, like ‘The Real Housewives,’ “breaks you down,” but the missions on Traitors were “unbelievable.”
“It’s just so amazing. This season is going to be off the hook,” she teased. “We had some gamers. Gamers are a different breed … I’m not as street smart as I thought I was.”
The Bravo star grew close with castmates Gabby Windey and Chrishell Stause, who “inspired” Dolores through their confidence and strength.