'The Real L Word's' Romi Sets the Record Straight - Interview

Since her auspicious television debut on season one of Showtime’s The Real L Word Romi Klinger has been a polarizing figure, at turns loved and loathed by the show’s devoted fan base. And this season, which ended Thursday, Romi became the catalyst for frequent and heated online discussion about the B in LGBT.

Since her auspicious television debut on season one of Showtime’s The Real L Word Romi Klinger has been a polarizing figure, at turns loved and loathed by the show’s devoted fan base. And this season, which ended Thursday, Romi became the catalyst for frequent and heated online discussion about the B in LGBT.

Through the seasons fans have seen Romi through triumphs and tragedies including getting married, launching her jewelry line HIJA por Vida, delving into the music industry with some dance tracks and an EP called Love, dealing with break ups and make ups and addressing alcoholism.

She’s also been one of the most literally exposed Real L Word cast members renowned for her hot and heavy on-screen sex scenes, having bared all in the series premiere in a scene with the show’s focal personality Whitney Mixter.

The Real L Word’s third season kicked off with Romi announcing she was back with her ex boyfriend Jay and ended with her Vegas wedding to Dusty Ray, a man she’d dated several years ago. In between dating Jay and marrying Dusty, Romi got back together with her ex girlfriend Kelsey, whom she dated on and of throughout the show’s second season. Collective outcry to Romi’s story came fast and furious once the news was out that Romi had a boyfriend. Fans of the show, via social media outlets and websites (including SheWired), fervently denied accusations of biphobia and rather called Romi  "crazy, a cheater, a slut, a fame whore” and so on…

Call her what you will - by the Real L Word season’s close, Romi’s story put the word bisexual smack on everyone's lips. 

Romi set the record straight with SheWired about her marriage to Dusty – and just whether or not she planned it for the same weekend as Whitney and Sara’s wedding—her break up with Kelsey, sobriety, the biphobia she’s faced since coming out, the famous strap-on scene and much, much more…

Thanks so much for chatting with me Romi. I know you are heading to Vegas for -

I’m here for Gay Days. It’s a day after the finale (The Real L Word) so it’s definitely exciting just to bounce back with what I love doing with my friends and with the community. And it’s Gay Pride, and I want to be a part of that. It’s been my whole life, and I fight for equality, and it’s for LGBT, and this is who I am.

The finale’s big reveal was that you married Dusty in Vegas. What sort of feedback, backlash, positive reinforcement, have you gotten since it aired?

It’s really crazy – there’s the support and people saying we love you no matter what and we appreciate what you’re fighting for, and then there’s just been the absolutely horrendous comments that are literally insulting me down to the style of my wedding, the choice of how I got married, the fact that I got married in Vegas, the fact that I got married to a man.

And my argument is that it’s my love, it’s my wedding, it’s my marriage – I’m not judging yours. And at the same time they’re telling me, by me getting married that I am telling them that, pretty much, I don’t care about their rights. And, you know, Whitney and Sara got married. Does that mean, because it’s not legal here, that they didn’t care about people’s rights? Cori and Kacy got married. They did that for themselves and for their love, and some people may choose not to. If you want to get married, and it’s what you choose for your relationship, that’s all that you’re doing it for. I don’t think that Whitney and Sara got married so that they could stand up for the entire community. I think they got married because they wanted to for themselves. And so did I. And we didn’t get married on the same weekend. You know, it’s a television show.

In watching the finale it did kind of look like there was some creative editing for impact. The editing was…

Really active this season. And it’s very hurtful because I’m such an open book, and anyone who knows me knows that. Showtime knows that, and so I really do open up with every aspect of my life, and when you’re somebody like that, when you’re limited to 10 minutes (of air time) each week it gives almost too much material that’s going to come off wrong.

Tell me about the biphobia you’ve encountered since the start of the season.

It’s incredibly strong. And people are saying it’s not that we don’t like you because you’re bi, we don’t like you because you’re crazy. But then the comments that are being written to me are about penis, are about a man. And during the season, when I was with Kelsey, I got all of this love back. I mean, all of a sudden all of the hate that I was getting disappeared. “We love you, you’re back on our team. You guys are amazing.” They hated me when Jay came on the show, and then I went back to Kelsey. And then I’m awful when I leave Kelsey, and it’s not a bi thing?

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