Selling Sunset's Mary Fitzgerald And Romain Bonnet Give An Insider Look At Season 6 - Exclusive Interview
Netflix's original reality series "Selling Sunset" premiered in 2019, and its million-dollar homes and lavish lifestyles have kept viewers captive ever since. Though there isn't a premiere date for Season 6 yet, the series has been renewed for its sixth and seventh seasons and is sure to hold plenty of twists and turns for The Oppenheim Group's real estate office.
In the couple's exclusive interview with The List, Mary Fitzgerald and Romain Bonnet reflected on the online hate surrounding their relationship in its beginning, their experience of getting married on television, and the exciting new projects they have coming down the pipeline. Beyond their dream real estate romance — meeting when Fitzgerald showed Bonnet a potential home in LA — the couple is also combining their realty and project management skills with their desire to flip houses. The couple is stronger than ever and ready for a fresh start in Season 6; plus, they're hoping that a baby is a part of that picture.
They're unbothered by online trolls
At first, your relationship faced a lot of criticism from other cast members. Did you have strategies for dealing with that negativity?
Mary Fitzgerald: No. I wasn't expecting that, actually. I didn't care as much about my cast members, weirdly enough, because they wanted me happy. They were trying to protect me. On social media, that's where it was a bit different, though ... Everyone was nice. Most people were nice to me. Some people were mean, saying, "You're an idiot, what are you thinking? He's using you. He's a gold digger."
Romain Bonnet: Mua ha ha ha.
Fitzgerald: But when people would put him down and say stuff that was completely opposite of his character, then I started getting wound up. I would spend so much time creating the perfect message where I put them in their place but killed them with kindness, but made them understand the situation. Everybody always apologized, but I never responded to negativity. That really bugged me when people would attack him. Once we got married, it never happened again.
Bonnet: Me? I didn't give a damn.
Fitzgerald: He never cared.
Bonnet: At the end of the day, I knew how I was feeling. I knew how she was feeling. I'm like, "You can talk as much as you want. You know what you see. You don't know me completely. You don't know our relationship, what we've been through, what we have done, what we are doing together, what we don't — this whole thing. There's so many factors that come in that you can't know."
So many people look like such a perfect couple, and they are not. Some of them look like they are not that much and [are] actually the ones that make the best of it. I knew how I was feeling, and I'm like, "It's good publicity. Go ahead. Comment."
Fitzgerald: We're solid. I just don't like people attacking my man.
Bonnet: Sometimes I was sitting [and reading the comments] ... I'm like, "Keep going. It doesn't affect me at all." I have this ability ... In some ways, it was good for me. I didn't care. It makes me more love than anything else, but I know it was affecting her. Many times, even, I was laughing to read it. It was funny to me.
But I was biting my tongue because I wanted sometimes to tell her ... There [are] a couple times I actually said it, but I know she got upset and it affected her more than it [affected me] ... I was telling her that in a way, it was funny. I knew it was totally wrong, but it affected her. After, at the end, I wasn't saying anything — I was just reading it. It makes me mad more than anything.
It sounds like you guys received [criticism] really differently. You're kind of unbothered.
Bonnet: Not at all, yeah. But it's true that once we got married ... Once in a while, someone's going to say something. But once we got married, it's true that everything went away.
Fitzgerald: I don't care if people say stuff about me, but I don't like people saying stuff about people I love.
Bonnet: Aw. You're so cute.
Mary Fitzgerald's job gets harder in Season 6
Mary, you've proven yourself at the O Group and have risen through the ranks. What has it felt like to take on the new managerial role in Season 5?
Fitzgerald: Stressful. Well, Season 6 was stressful. Season 5, I don't ... That was so long ago. I don't think it was that bad; no, it wasn't bad on Season 5. Season 6, it got a little rough. But I am honored that Jason [Oppenheim] trusts me with the role, and it's a good opportunity to try something like that out. Nothing's perfect, but it definitely challenged me, and I like a challenge. Once you guys see Season 6, you'll understand exactly why I'm saying this, but I'm not going to give anything away.
Well, we have a lot to look forward to in terms of your leadership. It seems like you're doing a great job as far as the audience has seen so far. Romain, it's been fun seeing you work with Mary on real estate projects. What are you working on at the moment?
Fitzgerald: Our house.
Bonnet: Yes — before Bali. A little bit less now, because we came back from Bali, and we said we're going to slow down a tiny bit because I was working an 18-hour day.
Fitzgerald: We were killing ourselves.
Bonnet: [I was] sleeping and working at the same time. No, that was brutal. I was going to bed at 1:00 or 2:00 a.m. and waking up at 6:00 a.m. every day to go to work. That wasn't healthy. But I've done most of the work that I wanted to be done that was necessary. Now that most of it has been done, we came back, and I'm just going to work during the weekend — a couple of things here and there at night, but mostly during the weekend. Otherwise, we are working on the new Oppenheim office.
Fitzgerald: Our new office.
Bonnet: He is going to have a new office at some point, maybe even more. I'm not going to say much more because I don't know if it's even yet out there. But this, we've finished completely the ... What the penthouse is, we're completely done, as you probably saw online. We've done also the lobby, and there's a couple other projects there that we've been working on, and also the new place. Jason's going to move in soon.
Congratulations on the next place. I'm excited to see what hasn't been revealed.
Bonnet: Actually, I'm glad, because in Season 6, they are showing you a bit more of everything that I'm doing as project manager — especially because a lot of projects are in the group. We also do a lot of projects on this on our side, not only working with the O Group, but on our side. There's a lot of those projects that you don't get to see, but a lot of those projects during Season 6 were [with] the O Group. I'm glad that you guys are going to get to see a little bit more.
The couple is hoping for a baby
Mary, you were open about your decision to freeze your eggs. Was it difficult to have that fertility journey talked about on the show?
Fitzgerald: No, I don't think so. It was difficult to have it fail.
Bonnet: We don't like failure.
Fitzgerald: I don't like to fail, so I didn't anticipate that. It came as a shock to me, and that was difficult. Talking about it, I don't think that was hard because I know there's so many people that are going through this. Everyone's winning a little bit later in life. All my friends are focusing on careers, stuff like that, or you're in a second marriage and trying to start over. Most of the time, it's in your forties. But there's so many of my friends that are actually even in their mid-thirties, and they cannot get pregnant. I felt like with my platform, it's the right thing to do. I don't care about talking about it. It is what it is.
Bonnet: Actually, it can help a lot of people that might feel like this is a sensitive subject.
Fitzgerald: They don't think that it's urgent, because I didn't think it was urgent. When I tested and did my fertility testing — two or three years ago? — I was 39.
Bonnet: Season 4, probably. But [she was] close to being 40. Then when she went, they were saying that she was off the chart still.
Fitzgerald: Back then ... but it was only a couple of years. They did tell me that once you hit 40, it halves. Every year, your fertility halves. I was like, "Oh, I've still got time." Because I was so fertile at that point, they were not lying. It definitely took a dive.
If I would've known ... I froze egg embryos a long time ago with my ex. If I would've known, I would've frozen some eggs too and kept them, because I disposed of all the embryos back then. I was like, "Dude, I could have had 30-year-old eggs." That would've been amazing. Now I'm struggling for it, but we're trying naturally now.
Bonnet: We'll see. We tried once; it didn't work.
Fitzgerald: We just started trying to do it naturally. It happens.
Bonnet: We might have made a —
Fitzgerald: A little Bali baby?
Bonnet: A Bali baby. Who knows?
Not all of their family members were ready to appear on TV
What was it like having your wedding featured on TV? Did that add some extra pressure, or was it more exciting?
Fitzgerald: It did. Well, not pressure — but it added more complications.
Bonnet: Yes. You have count everything you need, and you want to make it ... There's stuff that you want to be more careful of.
Fitzgerald: There are filming restrictions. Our first venue fell through because of restrictions with production and the venue. The venue wanted a bunch of stuff, and Netflix was like, "No." We couldn't do that one, and we'd already planned everything for it. We didn't have a signed contract, but I was an idiot and I was like, "Got to keep this moving." I was signing everything, doing all this stuff, hiring vendors, and then found out we couldn't do it there. We got our second venue, and the couple [who owned it] got divorced.
Bonnet: They were getting divorced.
Fitzgerald: Then they were like, "We don't want a wedding here."
Bonnet: In some way, [that] might have been a sign, getting married with someone else that was getting divorced ... But we [had] to change that. It's a big crew that's coming that's following us — it's over 30 people, cars and everything. You had to make sure that we have the space for everyone and then them and a private room.
Fitzgerald: It turned out really well because it was my dream venue. When I went and saw it to list the property, I was like, "Oh my God, this would be an amazing wedding venue. If I didn't already have mine, I would totally want to do it here." Then ours fell through. That's when we were like, "Okay."
Bonnet: Was it you or was it Jason [Oppenheim] that said that you should ask?
Fitzgerald: Jason said we should ask. I wouldn't have asked. I'm way too polite for that. I would never ... I'm not going to mess up my listing. Jason's like, "No, I don't care. I'll ask him."
Bonnet: You sold it on your day.
Fitzgerald: I did promise him. I was like, "I will not let this get in the way."
Bonnet: What could have happened better? Seriously — the amazing thing about having it filmed on TV [is] that sometimes, we do watch it again, and it's amazing to be able to. You have pictures; you have everything. That's fun. But to be able to ... Even if you don't have all the details, it reminds us of all the details as you watch it.
Fitzgerald: You feel it again.
Bonnet: It's so nice to be able to see it as a movie. It's pretty great.
Fitzgerald: I felt sorry for my dad because he's not a big city guy. He is a small town, country, very quiet person. You can even see me on there — when we started to walk down, I was like, "Are you okay?" Because he was not liking all the cameras and all the people and everything. He was like, "Get me out of here." He's like, "I'm only doing this for you, babe. I love you, but I would never do this ever again." I really appreciated him being there and doing that because that's his worst nightmare.
New Selling Sunset cast members could change everything
Fans are aware of some big changes afoot on "Selling Sunset." Can you tell us anything about the new season?
Romain Bonnet: New cast. That's a big change.
Mary Fitzgerald: We have two new cast members. There's no shortage of drama.
If you could be on any other reality show, which one would it be?
Fitzgerald: I would do something ... I would do some sort of a travel show.
Bonnet: Yes — travel the world. By the way, if Netflix is watching this — if you want to do a spin-off on Romain traveling the world? That's a done deal. We'd sign it. We love traveling.
Fitzgerald: We'd take tours through all the best villas and the best hotels in the world or something like that.
Bonnet: I don't even need villas. I just want to travel the world [and] meet people.
Fitzgerald: There has to be a point.
Bonnet: Okay, fine. But what I'm saying is I don't even need to have a villa. I can go and —
Fitzgerald: Go show villas. There has to be a point to a show for a spin-off.
Bonnet: No, just show people what is good to see in each city of the world.
It could be like "House Hunters International."
Fitzgerald: We'll give it some more thought.
Bonnet: Whatever it is, I'm signing up to travel the world.
Fitzgerald: You're ready to go.
Bonnet: We love traveling so much and meeting people, new cultures and foods and everything. It's so fun.
Fitzgerald: I want to move every time I go someplace.
Bonnet: She wants to buy something in Bali right now.
Fitzgerald: I'm British, I'm ... Every place I go.
Bonnet: Italian.
Fitzgerald: Yes. I'm Italiano. I go there and I love every single culture in every place I go to. It's incredible.
It sounds like you have some traveling you want to do in the future. Any other hopes for the future on the show and in your personal lives?
Fitzgerald: Well, start a family ... keep building our real estate portfolio ... [We] want to get some income properties and start flipping.
Bonnet: Either flipping or ... Maybe at the beginning we'll buy, fix, and sell, but eventually, [we'll] keep building our portfolio and renting it out.
Fitzgerald: I have another project I'm working on right now — I can't talk about it yet, but I will be able to in about ... I don't know how long. Maybe in the spring? I'm not sure.
The first five seasons of "Selling Sunset" are available to watch on Netflix.
This interview has been edited for clarity.