I was able to get an interview with the wonderful Laura Waller from Real World St. Thomas and the Challenge Battle of the Seasons (2012). This interview was incredible, Laura goes into great detail about her experience on the Real World, how she gotcast, and digs deep on some of her biggest regrets.

To start off, Laura’s Real World season, was somewhat poorly cast and poorly set. The entire cast had a lack of diverse characters that could come together, while being literally stuck on an island. She also acknowledges that maybe dating a guy on her season may have not been the best choice, but there was literally nobody for her to interact with when you’re locked on an island and only have the option to drink or nap.

In the last two years, Laura has become a mother and still looks great. She loves some reality television as a fan of the Bachelor. She still watches the Challenge these days, though she has little connection to the cast. She was a sweetheart who was really candid in this interview and almost makes you mad that she was not given a better opportunity to do more of these shows.

Something I found of hers online:

Her RW Audition. Whenever you can find these of someone, they are must watches.

Q/A

Q: First, I want to say thank you for replying to me, and taking these questions. Now, how are you doing lately? How has your life been the past few years?

Laura: To be honest life has been pretty great lately! I’ve got a wonderful boyfriend who is fantastic with my beautiful baby girl. We are looking to buy a house once his lease is up so February can’t come soon enough!

Q: What was the casting process for you like with Real World St. Thomas? Were you a fan of the show before watching?

Laura: Before I applied, I hadn’t really watched the Real World. In March I was watching Vegas 2 after work one day and wondered how to get on the show so I looked online and saw they were doing casting calls for the San Diego season. There weren’t any castings in my area so I sent in a decent paragraph about myself and waited. Once San Diego started I thought ‘that would have been fun but oh well’ but in August I got a random call and surprise surprise it was Bunnim Murray! I had a Skype interview, one in person interview, and a final interview in LA. Finally in January, I got the call that I made the cast and a couple weeks later we were on our own private island!

Q: So I think you and your fellow cast members are aware that Real World St. Thomas was not a top 10 Real World Season. Would you rather have been somewhere else, and how limiting was it living on an island?

Laura: Ohh man I cannot tell you how much I wanted our season to be in Miami. I guarantee it would have been soooooo much different. For one, we could barely understand the locals and they wanted nothing to do with us. I think we may have seen maybe 5 good looking guys out of the 2 1/2 months we were there — talk about slim picking! I went on 3 dates with semi decent looking guys just to get out of the house and Trey tried to sabotage each of them! St. Thomas was gorgeous but there wasn’t much to do. Believe it or not we were almost stranded on our island and we took naps on naps on naps. If it was even slightly raining we couldn’t go to the main island. The resorts were on the other side of the island and to get there we had to take an hour cab ride to get there for $20… don’t forget we had that on the way back as well. Even the shopping was out of our price range everything was for tourists — Prada, Rolex, etc are not for the poor! I use to be pretty damn good at getting free drinks and flirting with random strangers, but the bars we were allowed in usually weren’t packed — Trey was a tight ass with his money so I had to buy my own, haha. We also couldn’t take shots in our house it had to be beer or a mixed drink…. it is not a good time when you can’t slam a few back before jumping on your half hour boat ride to the main island.

Q: I saw you were hanging out with Wes a couple months ago? How did you guys become friends? I know you guys did the Challenge together, but he was eliminated after three days.

Laura: I met Wes on BOTS and thought he was nice, he wasn’t in the house long enough to get to know him better. We met up a few months after filming when I was in Kansas City for a pool party. This time I reached out to him to see if he wanted to meet up when my boyfriend and I came to town. We actually had a fantastic time and I definitely can’t wait to go back and see Wes and his group of friends again!

Q: Were you ever offered to do another Challenge? You didn’t really make sense for a ton of the formats, but I saw your names was tossed around at one point for Exes 2 with Trey.

Laura: Some of the formats I wasn’t a candidate for but I was an alternate for three seasons and each one I got passed up for. I was baffled when Trey and I were alternates for Exes…. If you look Trey and Laura up in the dictionary it will say the definition of a fucked up relationship, haha. I really screwed myself over with the whole Trey thing. It took away from what I wanted out of initially applying for the RW — to be on the Challenge. I have always been competitive and if I would have focused my game I would have had some major enemies… even my closest friends don’t want to be around me when I’m pissed. I come off as sweet but oooh boy I can put lots of mean girls to shame hahaha.

Q: Who do you still talk to from the MTV Universe?

Laura: Not many. Marie, Toya, and Robb occasionally but that’s about it. I’ve been so out of the loop that there’s not much to talk to everyone about. Also, being in Nebraska limits the amount of challengers I get to hang out with.

Q: I saw that you are a Bachelor/Bachelorette fan! What do you think of this season? Do you have a favorite Bachelor/ette?

Laura: The Bachelor/Bachelorette is my guilty pleasure! This season was alright I am a bigger fan of the bachelor. Definitely cant wait for bachelor in Paradise to come out… I am intrigued on how they are going to edit the whole Corrine and DeMario shenanigans! I was excited for Luke’s season but he got the shaft.

Q: Your boyfriend, yourself, and your child are all very beautiful. This isn’t a question, just congratulations.

Laura: Thank you. Yes, Nick is my boyfriend he came back into my life when Veya was 6 weeks old and has been unbelievable ever since. Believe it or not Nick was my substitute teacher in college. I definitely earned extra credit, haha.

Q: What’s your favorite midnight snack & to combo, if you’re binge watching something, what is it going to be?

Laura: I really like frozen mac n cheese bites and Doritos…. cheese and wine are like my crack and I am proud to call myself a junkie!

Q: Before this ends, I wanted to say thank you again. Now what’s something that people never learned about you, that you wish they knew. And/or, what’s a bigger message you wish to send to people in general?

Laura: Hmm… that’s a tough one.. I love my daughter, but don’t be a fool & wrap your tool! Haha. Seriously, something about me… I am learning how to golf and have already promised my boyfriend that I will go pro and he can be my caddy. Lets just say he’s not ready to quit his day job just yet. Haha.