Since she first appeared on The Real Housewives of Rhode Island, former journalist Rosie Woods DiMare has found it difficult to turn off her journalist brain, even amid the messiest Housewives drama.
“As a former journalist, I love to watch it unfold,” Woods DiMare said on Obsessed: The Podcast. “You know, I am a little messy, and I am ‘Nosy, Rosie,’” she said, referring to the cast’s nickname for her. “So like, I enjoy it. I’m always going to have follow-up questions. I think they also hate that.”
Woods DiMare, a former local TV news anchor at NBC WJAR Channel 10, where she started out as a traffic reporter, now stars as one of seven full-time cast members on the first-ever season of The Real Housewives of Rhode Island, alongside Alicia Carmody, Ashley Iaconetti, Liz McGraw, Rulla Nehme Pontarelli, Kelsey Swanson, and Jo-Ellen Tiberi. Woods DiMare has emerged as a fan favorite since the season’s April 2 premiere. The Rhode Islander said she believes fans love that she digs deep, which she attributes to her decade-long journalism career.
“You’re either going to project on other people or attack somebody else to prevent them from attacking you, or you’re going to be super upfront about it so you can spin your narrative,” she continued on Obsessed, recalling the season’s drama so far. “And I think with different people, we’re seeing them do both of those things.”
Her habit of sniffing around to find out which earned her the moniker “Nosy Rosie,” which she said she doesn’t mind.
“I kind of love ‘Nosy Rosie.’ I don’t see what the negative connotation is. But here’s the thing, too. I was a full-time reporter…I was 22 years old, having to go up to politicians and ask them things I didn’t want to ask them, but the newsroom said I had to go ask them. So at this point in my life, especially when I’m making friends, I mean, I want to know the truth. I want to get to know you. I want to ask you questions, and you can ask me questions, and we can get to know each other, and like, it can be a whole thing.”
“I think it’s weird not to ask your friends questions or to try to understand where they’re coming from in their life,” she added. Woods DiMare’s “questions” have gotten her into plenty of confrontations with her cast members, however, and she’s seen some fan reactions calling her an instigator online for her digging.
“One of the things online, because even though I don’t want to go on the internet, I do often, and it was like, ‘Rosie starts stuff, and then she backs down.’ And I wasn’t meaning to start stuff. I was asking clarifying questions to try to understand this group of girls I’m now hanging out with,” she explained.
Still, Swanson accused Woods Dimare of gathering “dirt” on the cast members in her phone’s Notes app before filming. Woods DiMare denied the accusation on Obsessed.
“This whole Notes app thing, I don’t know where, you know, it’s like her new spin,” Woods DiMare said of Swanson. “I think she’s grasping at straws with that. But because I can promise you, she’s never been on my phone. She has no idea what’s going on there. She would be very scared if she knew it was in there.”
“It’s one of those things where we’re grasping at straws here. You need a new reason to dislike me,” she concluded, and “Nothing’s really landed.”
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