A Necessary Primer On Lisa Vanderpump's Lie Detector Test & The RHOBH Rumor That Inspired It

The day is finally here. After seeing it teased at the very beginning of the season premiere, Lisa Vanderpump's apparently real lie detector test is airing on Real Housewives of Beverly Hills. At long last, we will know whether or not Lisa Vanderpump leaked a story to Radar Online about Dorit Kemsley’s dog adoption drama, if you choose to believe Lisa's claim that the lie detector proves her innocence. What a show!

It’s been clear for a while now that the Lucy Lucy Apple Juice scandal was going to be part of what led to LVP’s ousting from the rest of the cast, but now we’re swimming in specifics. As shown at the end of the March 26 episode, Dorit was sent a Radar Online story about Lisa being mad at her over how the dog situation played out. Dorit’s husband, PK, put forth that Lisa was the one who leaked the story, and Dorit said that would be “a whole other level of betrayal.” Now, LVP supposedly has proof that the rumor isn't true.

So, if we are to believe this lie detector test (we'd bet the Housewives won't), and Lisa in innocent, then someone else had to have leaked the story. Well, the only people with knowledge of the situation would be the RHOBH producers (the women all seem convinced that would never happen), Dorit and Teddi (that would be a wild, and extremely unlikely twist), and the employees at Vanderpump Dogs. Now, there's no real evidence pointing at any specific employee at the moment, but there is a rumor that Vanderpump is considering a second spinoff series to pair with Vanderpump Rules, a potential series called Vanderpump Dogs.

And let's think about the way Vanderpump Rules was introduced into the Housewivesphere — by having Scheana Marie, who'd slept with Brandi Glanville's husband, confront Brandi and deal with her "wrongdoing" (the gender politics of that are a whole can of worms we don't have time for right now), and segue right into a backdoor pilot. If a Vanderpump Dogs employee becomes the next suspect for this dog rumor business, it would make for a very similar opportunity to pull that now iconic reality TV move again (whether the accusation is true or not).

But even if that's where this is all headed, that still doesn't mean we'll ever get the full, honest truth about this story-leaking scheme.

As shown in previews for April 2’s RHOBH, all of the other women come to the conclusion that Lisa was the one who leaked the story, because it paints her and her rescue center, Vanderpump Dogs, in a positive light. While the Radar article doesn’t come down too hard on Dorit, it does make LVP the sympathetic character. For instance, one part reads, “Production insiders reveal to Radar exclusively the drama unfolded during a filmed trip to the Bahamas, with Lisa either fuming or in tears. ‘She got the dog out of the shelter and has just been so upset about it.’”

An “insider” also said, “Having one of her dogs ends up in a shelter places her rescue organization in jeopardy because it’s a new business. She doesn’t want to be known for placing dogs in unsuitable homes.”

It changes what we’ve been told on the show in one key way: Reporting that Dorit gave Lucy to a shelter, when in reality, she gave Lucy to a new family and that family gave the dog to a shelter.

It’s not just the light in which Lisa is presented that has the cast talking about the article “sounding” like her, either. As PK noted in the previous episode, the fact that a Radar source used the word “nipped” in reference to Lucy biting Dorit’s kids stood out to him, because he said “nipped” is more commonly used in British English. (Like Lisa, PK is English.)

Of course, all of this occurred months ago, and in October Radar noted in another story that Dylan Howard, the Vice President and Chief Content Officer of American Media Inc. (which owns Radar), said, “I can say unequivocally that Lisa has never been an anonymous source to the site — although I, for one, wish that she was! She’d be as rich with information as she is rich is real-life!”

Howard's colorful statement aside, a preview for the new RHOBH episode shows Kyle, Dorit, and the other women (minus LVP) at lunch, where Dorit asks Kyle if she’s ever known LVP to leak stories to the press. It seems Kyle has a hard time answering, but there has been a rumor about this before involving RHOBH. In fact, Lisa recently spoke about it in an interview with E! News’ Melanie Bromley. During Season 2, Lisa was accused of giving stories to the reporter, but in their interview, she made clear that Lisa was not actually leaking information to her. (The Season 2 situation had to do with Lisa supposedly spreading stories about Adrienne Maloof.)

Lisa has remained adamant that she did not share the story with Radar and in the new episode she points out the fact that she spoke with TMZ to clarify things after the article came out and said that Dorit did nothing wrong. In the preview Lisa says to Kyle, “You think I’m going to give a story to Radar Online and then I’m going to go to TMZ and refute a story I’ve given to Radar Online?” Kyle’s response? “That’s what everybody thinks, yes.”

And then she storms out of Villa Rosa. Is this “Goodbye, Kyle!” forever? Is this the end of LVP filming with the rest of the cast? Oddly enough for the Housewives franchise, it seems like the answer to those questions might really be “yes."