“I thought that was the funniest,” the momager shared of the E! show, which centered on the late Hugh Hefner and his then-girlfriends’ lives at the Playboy Mansion.
Kris Jenner is looking back — way back — to the Kardashian-Jenner family’s humble beginnings on reality TV.
During an appearance on the Not Skinny But Not Fat podcast, the momager shared a surprising connection between the family’s OG reality series, Keeping Up with the Kardashians, and another E! show, The Girls Next Door. The reality series — which premiered in 2005 — centered on the late Playboy founder Hugh Hefner and his then-girlfriends — Kendra Wilkinson, Holly Madison, and Bridget Marquardt — and their lives at the Playboy Mansion.
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Kris, 69, said the show made her interested in the possibility of her blended family entering the world of reality television.
When host Amanda Hirsch asked if it was Kris’ friend, Kathie Lee Gifford, who “convinced” her on the idea of KUWTK, Kris said, “It was actually … many of my friends used to say, ‘You really should do a reality show, like what goes on here is crazy.'”
“Kathie Lee Gifford, who is a very dear friend, she often would say, ‘You guys need a reality show, this is just nuts,'” she continued. “And one night, a friend of mine who is a casting director of Dancing With the Stars and different shows, she was over and saw whatever the chaos was that night and said, ‘You guys, you’ve got to meet Ryan Seacrest, because he just has a deal now over at E! and NBC Universal, and they’re looking for a family, and a reality show.'”
“The rest is history, so it really worked out,” Kris added.
After Hirsch brought up other shows, such as The Osbournes, Kris then revealed that she was “so inspired” by The Girls Next Door.
“I thought that was the funniest. I’m like, ‘What is happening?'” she said. “So between all of those different reality shows, I thought, ‘Oh, this would be such an interesting category to slip into, because I have so many kids.'”
“And here we are, all these years later,” she added.
When asked if she could have ever imagined the family’s empire would become what it is now, Kris said, “You gotta dream big.”
Keeping Up with the Kardashians premiered in 2007, and of course, made Kris and the Kardashian-Jenner family famous and reality TV royalty. The show — which ran for 20 seasons on E! from 2007 until 2021 — followed the personal and professional lives of Kris, her then-husband Caitlyn Jenner, and her kids, Kim, 45, Kourtney, 46, Khloé, 41, and Rob Kardashian, 38, along with Kendall, 30, and Kylie Jenner, 28, with the show catapulting the family to superstardom.
Less than a year after KUWTK concluded, the family returned to reality TV with Hulu’s The Kardashians in 2022. Season 7 of The Kardashians premieres later this month.
