Yes, The Cast Of Laguna Beach Really Do Like Each Other Now

There are certain pop culture moments from my most formative years that are forever embedded in my brain. The periodic table? Gone. Times tables? Only a few stuck. That time on Laguna Beach when Stephen called Kristin a slut? I can pretty much recite that Cabo episode by heart to this day. For millennials, 20 years later, Laguna Beach isn’t just a reality show from our youth; it’s a sun-drenched time capsule of the early-2000s. It’s a snapshot of teenage intensity that somehow made love triangles feel like life-or-death stakes. So when I get to interview the entire cast for The Reunion: Laguna Beach, a special streaming today on The Roku Channel, it feels like I’m catching up with friends I actually went to high school with. It’s weird to tell that to strangers over Zoom, but stars Kristin Cavallari, Talan Torriero, Jessica Smith Evans, Lauren "Alex" Olsen (grouped in one room with show creator, Liz Gateley) and Lauren Conrad, Stephen Colletti, Trey Phillips, Morgan Smith, Christina Sinclair, and Dieter Schmitz (grouped in another room) take the confession in stride. I’m sure they get it a lot. 

In 2006, the fact that Conrad and Cavallari are in separate junket interviews would have added fuel to the fire of their then feud. Kristin versus Lauren was a personality-defining debate. You chose a team and that determined whether you were a good girl next door with an unrequited crush (like LC) or a rebellious party girl who got all the boys (like Kristin). With the hindsight of adulthood and a culture that better understands the patriarchal biases that permeated everything we consumed back then, we know those archetypes Conrad and Cavallari were forced into weren't fair. And we know that Colletti should be forgiven for the unfortunate slut-shaming incident that happened in Cabo and did not, in fact, stay in Cabo. With The Reunion: Laguna Beach, the cast gets to take a collective exhale and finally, we revisit the chaos with a little more clarity, and a lot more empathy. Forget any of the beefs from back then, now it’s nothing but love and mutual respect.

In our conversations, the teens who once revolutionized reality TV are all grown up now, and they peel back the layers of what it meant to be young, watched, and wildly misunderstood. And yes, we go there. The Kristin–Lauren–Stephen love triangle is revisited with the kind of honesty only time can afford. The infamous Cabo moment is looked back on as a childhood mistake. Talan's juvenile womanizing ways are laughed off. While some things have changed, some haven’t: turns out boys don’t like feta cheese. The Reunion: Laguna Beach doesn’t uncover any newsworthy gossip, unearth dormant disputes, or reopen old wounds (Colletti, Cavallari and Conrad are all producers on the special). It’s refreshingly tame. In a reality TV landscape where the drama is dialed up and the shouting matches are loud, it’s soothing to watch a group of mid-life millennials just reconnect and reminisce. Let’s go back, back to the beginning. 

Stephen Colletti: I would say I was probably one of the last to be even comfortable with the show. It took me a long time to just kind of process where it was in my life and what the show meant. And I think that doing the podcast and talking through it, and speaking with everyone, having all these guys on [the podcast] was really cathartic and a very positive experience. And so it felt like, to me, the one thing that was missing was to get everyone together and do something to celebrate the show. And so it was an exciting opportunity. It felt like it'd be the perfect bow to this whole thing. But, of course, some people took some convincing. They had to leave their families and come across the country so it was like, okay, hold on, what? What are we trying to accomplish? 

SC: I would say Lauren was probably near the top of the list. She was, like, “I did the podcast. Why are you calling?” You shot it down right away. You're just like, what? Okay, what exactly is happening? 

Lauren Conrad: I just wanted to talk it through. 

SC: A lot of questions! 

LC: In my opinion, I think something was going to happen in one way or another. It was either going to be big or small. But I know different people were getting different offers, so the conversation was, what if we do this together, and if we do this, you can come on as a producer, so you'll have some say and some control, and we can look out for everyone and make sure everyone is comfortable and happy. It just was the most appealing way to do this. I think really the only way, if I'm being honest, it was the only way I would have done it for sure. And so I'm glad I signed on, because it was a really cool experience, and I'm so happy to be here with everyone today, and that everyone was a part of it.

We had a call with the girls and Lo [Bosworth Natale]. I feel like you guys were a little hesitant.

Christina Sinclair: For me, I was just like, “nobody really cares. What are you talking about? Like, who am I?” [laughs] 

Tallan Torriero: I'm realizing in this moment and all these interviews that we're doing that this is a lot bigger deal than I thought it was. I just thought I was cool because I hung out with Kristin and Lauren. That was my claim to fame. But I'm realizing this is a big deal, and it's crazy.

Jessica Smith Evans: I was pretty excited to do it. I have older kids, so I wasn't sure if I wanted to amplify all this again, now that they have phones and more access. They're not allowed on social media, but they're kids, they'll figure it out. So that would have been my only hesitation. Otherwise, I was thrilled and excited and couldn't wait to see everybody.

Kristin Cavallari: We really didn’t have any hesitation from anyone, honestly. I mean, we got everyone on board and it was just all guns blazing. We were excited.

TT: [laughs] Oohhh! 

KC: Well, they would. [laughs] 

Morgan Smith: It's always incredible and eye opening to see just how into it people still are. I think that that's like a shocker, 20 years later, it was a reality show, but when we post these [reunion] trailers, the comments are just like “I’m crying. I'm healed. I'm healed.” And it's wild to just see. I think it's surreal for us to see people's reaction to it. 

KC: I think it's so typical, right, in a love triangle situation, for the two women to go after each other, which we should not be doing. We should be going after the men! But you live and you learn. We were so young, and I don't think it helped our situation that we had cameras in our faces. We had producers telling us, hey, Steven, why don't you go up to Lauren's house when I'm like, wait, what's going on? MTV sort of kept the love triangle going. Lauren and I talked about that in the reunion, how silly it was that we hated each other when maybe we should have just sat down the two of us and had a little come to Jesus moment.

LC: Yes, I and in the special we both say this that we regret the names we called each other, the way we spoke about one another, but I think that we're both adults now, we have perspective. A lot of us are the type of women who want to lift other women up, and when you're younger, in a position like that, it was just how we felt. I want to go back and have a chat with my 18-year-old self and be like, ‘Please don't talk about women like that.’ 

SC: We all make mistakes. We were kids. We really have so much to figure out at that point in our life. So look, it happened, and I don't look back and think, I can't believe that this exists. To me, it's just a reminder of the mistakes that kids are making and how mean we can be to each other without understanding why we're being mean, because we're insecure, because we don't know how to process emotions in a mature way at that time. So I look back, back feeling sorry for everybody in that situation, and I think that now, you know the fact that we're older, and it makes me feel more comfortable about where I'm at now, and I've always felt this way. To me, growing older is a beautiful thing, because I don't for a second want to go back to Laguna Beach High School at 18 years old and do that again. And for bad experiences aside, we had great memories, but to be at this place in life much more knowledgeable and be able to have the emotional bandwidth to process certain things, I much prefer this position.

KC: I guess I would ask what you mean by that exactly. I don't go on social media and read what people are saying. I actually don’t even see the headlines. I try to avoid that stuff just for my own sanity, good or bad, so I don't know what the public's perception is of me. I knew what it was in 2005 and I didn’t love it. 

KC: I like to hear that. I'll take it. That makes me happy.

TT:  I think the show made these characters. Like Kristin was the bad girl and Lauren was the good girl, right? The girl next door. And I'm really happy for fans to see Kristin be able to share her side of the story and see that she wasn't truly the picture that was painted. So I'm excited for them to see that. 

TT: Stephen and I joke all the time that I just slid under the radar and never got any shi— I can't say any cuss words —  I didn't get any flack right from anybody, and Stephen just got pounded. You know, that's 23-24 years ago, you know what I mean. So some of those things, if anything, it's kind of cool to watch and think, Oh man, that was cool that I said that. And then there's other times I said to myself, “Oh, what a goober!” I want to knock on his door and say, “Dude, you got this buddy. Dude, you just need to say, ‘I like you. And can we please hang out?’ Do not beat around the bush.

Trey Phillips: I love you guys. 

SC: I love you too! 

Dieter Schmitz:  Love you, man. We do it a lot, like every time we talk on the phone, I think we do sign off saying, “Love you so very much.” So yes, I think it's a special bond. And as you grow older, you realize how having friends for 35 years isn't normal, and that's what you know with these two guys and with Lauren, they're very, very special relationships. You learn to value them And frankly, like not a lot of people get that. 

DS: It's a hard no for me. Maybe it damaged me but for whatever reason, I haven't tried it since. I literally avoid it still.

MS: At the time, I didn't think twice about it, especially because I was applying to a college that was BYU, you know, a Mormon College, but now, yeah, it's really latched on and become this phenomenon, which makes sense. The whole Utah culture deserves a show. I don't think I realized it at the time, but now it is. It's just been entertaining to watch.

CS: I'm not Mormon, but, yeah, I don't find it taboo at all to talk about my faith. I think that's the most important thing in my life, and I think that I'm always happy to talk about it. Actually, in retrospect, I wish I would have spoken about it more. And I'm grateful to Morgan, because I feel like she really kept me on this straight and narrow path during filming. I have certainly acted in ways that maybe don't reflect my faith, and I'm grateful that Morgan was able to kind of go, “Christina, come this way!” [laughs]

SC: I miss some of the music from back then, you know, just like some good beach rock. I listened to a lot of Foo Fighters back in the day. It was when Blink 182 first came around. I miss that.

DS: I miss the lack of technology. Not to age us, okay, but we had phone where texting took a really long time, and you didn't have emails. Everything now is in these iPhones. We didn't have cell phones until we were in high school, right? It's a lot harder now to disconnect than it was then.

MS: We were on the show before social media, that was a blessing for us, because it's like our show didn't have confessionals where we went into rooms and just went after each other. I feel like that made it feel really genuine. And then not having social media where you just can get slaughtered online, I feel like we were really lucky. 

DS: Yeah, there was literally no social media when Laguna was on, and then when they did the trailer for this, I was looking at comments that said, “Dieter has gray hair.” I'm like, I'm not doing this. Get me out of here!

MS: I don’t know if you guys remember, but we actually met with a children's psychologist. Do you remember it was like a one on one, and they gave us a tutorial. I remember them sitting us down and saying, “You can be the prettiest, skinniest girl, and [they’re going to say you’re]  fat, ugly and you have to be ready for that.” 

TT: It’s a tough question to answer, just because as much as you want to be your authentic self, in today's reality world, it's all like competition based. And it's all about trying to make it to the next week or keep your storyline alive. 

KC: That's true.. The more dramatic you are the more camera time you get. So it is maybe even with yourself, this competition, like I have to bring it, otherwise I won't be on the show [but] I think being authentic is the most important thing on reality TV, especially now. Today, more than ever, I think people have an agenda. People see what reality TV can do for your own personal brand. And so I think people go on wanting to play a character, wanting to just be famous. And I think when you go on to a show with an agenda, I think it's pretty apparent. And I think authenticity is really what will set you apart, and what people really connect to. So that would just be my biggest piece of advice.