Real Housewives of New York Bio

Aviva Drescher Biography

Born and raised in Manhattan in 1970, Aviva attended The Fieldston School and has a BA from Vassar College. She went on to get her Masters in French Literature from NYU and her JD from Benjamin Cardozo School of Law. Aviva has four children ranging from the ages of ten to one and is married to Reid Drescher, Wall Street investment banker.

HOW SHE LOST HER LEG:

“…she lost her leg in a horrifying farm accident upstate at age six.
“It was a genius idea to go ride a conveyor belt in a barn that was meant to remove cow manure,” Ms. Drescher said, rolling her eyes.
Along with a black pencil skirt from Dolce and Gabbana paired with a burgundy bow blouse and cashmere sweater vest by Gucci, Ms. Drescher was sporting a pair of thigh-high black boots. She always wears thigh-high boots.
The initial amputation was not the ideal surgery, she recalled. “The problem was, as a child, they only amputated several inches above ankle, so the amputation was very awkward. I’d get abrasions all the time. I constantly had infections.” At 26, Ms. Drescher underwent elective surgery to remove more of the leg, which gave her more skin and padding.
She told the story casually, with self-depreciating wit—eager to make us comfortable and to dispel any tiny violins that might launch into an overture.
“When I was growing, I’d have to get a new prosthesis every six months,” Mrs. Drescher noted …”

HOW AVIVA MET HER HUSBAND, REID… AND RHONY:

Ms. Drescher makes allusions to The Brady Bunch when talking about her current husband, Reid Drescher, who is the CEO and president of investment firm Spencer Clarke LLC and a partner and portfolio manager of the private hedge fund Cape One Financial. (Their estimated net worth, by the family’s own account, is in the seven figures, though Internet speculation suggests much higher numbers.) They have four children together, including the two oldest step-children they “merged” over from former marriages.Ms. Drescher met her Prince Charming at Bed, Bath and Beyond when Mr. Drescher told his daughter Veronica to go play with her son Harrison, so he’d have a reason to approach the statuesque single mother.
Even their engagement story is too adorable: “When Reid proposed, he gave Harrison a ring to give his daughter Veronica, and Harrison asked her to be his sister,” Ms. Drescher recalled. “So we ended up merging his daughter from another wife and my son into a single family.”
Then came the two children with Reid: Hudson and Sienna, four children altogether, ranging from 10 to one and a half. Her life, by Ms. Drescher’s own account, is pretty home-oriented.
“The biggest difference between Reid and Harry is that Harry was more a going-out type of guy…he was into socializing. Reid is all about family and work. I’m not a golfing widow. He’s hands-on.”
Aha! There’s the proof that Ms. Drescher cannot, will not be a Housewife: Of the eight women who have starred in the New York version of the show, just three were married at the time of filming. (Bethenny Frankel’s spin-off shows Bethenny Getting Married and Bethenny Ever After documented her marriage to Jason Hoppy after she left Housewives.)
Traditionally, a married Housewife is also a busy Housewife (think of Jill Zarin, who spent so much time running her own business and hosting charity events that her family is portrayed as an afterthought). Or she’s a co-dependent Housewife (like Alex McCord, who was never onscreen without her flamboyantly accented hubby, Simon Van Kempen, who usually had more drama with the rest of the ladies than his wife did).
Housewives almost always have jobs—which makes “housewife” sort of a misnomer—while Ms. Drescher doesn’t.
A stay-at-home mom who doesn’t party (“I can honestly say I’ve never inhaled…I’ve never even been drunk!” she said) joining up with Bravo’s cast of egoists? Um, no.
She was born in Manhattan, where she grew up as Aviva Teichner on the Upper West Side. Her parents, George and Ingrid, were beautiful and wealthy; her mother a strict German former model, and her father, an investment banker. Ms. Drescher went to private schools like Fieldston (where she dated a “really hot” football player), then Vassar and then NYU for a Master’s in French Literature—which led to some time in France where she dated a club owner and hung out with Claudia Schiffer and Naomi Campbell. Then she grabbed a J.D. from Cardozo.  

FROM AVIVA’S “ONE STEP AHEAD” FOUNDATION:

Aviva is currently anticipated to star on the newest season of the popular reality TV show, The Real Housewives of New York City. Backstabbing friends, bickering husbands and finding a fabulous designer handbag are some of the “hardships” faced by the women of Bravo’s Real Housewives franchise. But Aviva Drescher experienced, and overcame, a horrifying real-life tragedy before she was even a teen.
Aviva, 41- one of three new women reported to be replacing Kelly Killoren Bensimon, Cindy Barshop, Alex McCord and Jill Zarin on the series—was just 6 years old when her left foot got caught in a barn-cleaning machine’s conveyor belt at her family’s upstate New York dairy farm in 1977. Rescue workers spent “three hours sawing free my mangled, manure-ridden leg,” she later revealed, but gangrene eventually set in, and her food and ankle had to be amputated two months later.

 Heather Thomson Biography

• Thomson is a fashion designer for her shapewear line YUMMIE TUMMIE. (Sounding a little reminiscent of Jill Zarin?)

• She was the founding Design Director for Sean “Diddy” Combs’ fashion line and has also worked alongside Beyonce Knowles and Jennifer Lopez to create and launch their labels.

• She has received three CFDA nominations.
• - Thomson has two kids. Her son was born very sick and was in need of a liver transplant. Since then she created the “Survivor Tank,” which is inpsired by women battling breast cancer and donates 100% of proceeds to research. (Ok, she is definitely Jill’s replacement)- She was honored at the City of Hope’s annual 2010 Spirit of Life Award alongside Kristin Chenoweth and Kathy Lee Gifford.

A savvy and highly successful businesswoman, Heather Thomson is the creator of "Yummie by Heather Thomson," a popular and innovative shapewear line. Fifteen years as a successful designer and stylist, she's worked with some of the biggest names in entertainment, including Jennifer Lopez, Beyoncé, and Tina Knowles and Sean "Diddy" Combs. She was the founding Design Director for his Sean John line, and is credited as a major force behind multiple CFDA award nominations. A married mother of two, Jax, 6, and Ella Rae, 4, the idea for Yummie by Heather Thomson was born shortly after having her children. Disappointed by existing shapewear, she set out to create something sexier, comfier, and "yummier." She came up with the patented 3-panel system that is now Yummie Tummie's signature. Since the launch of the original tank, Yummie by Heather Thomson has expanded into ready-to-wear and denim. In addition to her professional work, Heather supports several charitable initiatives including Kelllner Family Pediatric Liver Disease Foundation and City of Hope.

 Carole Radziwill Biography

 

Best-selling author and award-winning journalist Carole Radziwill grew up in upstate New York. She moved to New York City at age 18 to attend college, earning a Bachelor of Arts at Hunter College and a Masters degree at New York University. In 1988 she landed a life-changing internship at ABC News. It was the start of a long and rewarding career. Carole's work with Peter Jennings' documentary unit and the news magazine shows PrimeTime Live and 20/20 garnered her three EMMYs, a Robert F. Kennedy Humanitarian award, and a GLADD award. Carole has traveled all over the world for her work, reporting on hard-hitting stories from places like Cambodia, India, and the Middle East. She was stationed in Israel in 1991, to cover the first Gulf War. And in 2001, during the Afghanistan War, she spent a month documenting the 101st Airborne Division in Khandahar for the ABC docu-series Profiles From the Front Line. In 2003 Carole left ABC News to write her first book, What Remains: A Memoir of Fate, Friendship and Love. It is a moving account of her life, her marriage to fellow ABC News producer Anthony Radziwill, and their heartbreaking battle with cancer. What Remains spent over 12 weeks on The New York Times Bestseller List and was nominated for the "Books for a Better Life" award. Carole is a frequent contributor to Glamour magazine and her first novel, The Widow's Guide to Sex & Dating, will be published in summer 2012.

Career

DiFalco began her news career at ABC in New York in 1986 as an unpaid intern in postproduction for 20/20, a news magazine show. She was later assigned to “Close Up” as a production secretary. She eventually worked for Peter Jennings‘s documentary unit, producing shows on abortion and gun control, and covering foreign policy stories in Cambodia, Haiti and India.
In 1991, DiFalco was stationed in Israel and reported on the SCUD missile attacks during the Gulf War. In 2003, during the War onAfghanistan, she spent six weeks in Khandahar, embedded with an infantry unit of the 101st Airborne Division. She produced segments for an ABC-TV show called Profiles From the Frontline. She has won several awards, including three Emmys, one for a story she produced on land mines in Cambodia, and a Peabody. She is now part of the cast of the Real Housewives of New York City for Season 5.

Personal life

On August 27, 1994, DiFalco married fellow ABC News producer Prince Anthony Radziwill in East Hampton, New York. Radziwill was the only son of prince Stanislas Radziwill and Lee Radziwill (younger sister of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis). He died on August 10, 1999 at age 40 after a five-year battle with cancer.
DiFalco was close friends with Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy, who was married to her husband’s cousin John F. Kennedy, Jr.. Bessette-Kennedy and Kennedy Jr. perished less than four weeks before her husband’s death.

Work

After her husband’s death, Radziwill left ABC News to write a memoir about her childhood, her career at ABC News, as well as her effort to manage her husband’s cancer. What Remains: A Memoir of Fate, Friendship and Love (Scribner, 2005) made the New York Times Best Seller list. A review of the book in the New York Times called it a “bittersweet account” that emphasized “graciousness over disclosure”.
In 2006, Radziwill signed with Glamour magazine to write a monthly column called “Lunch Date”. Her Lunch Dates have included former mayor Rudy Giuliani and Hollywood actorsAntonio Banderas,Rachel Weisz, and Alec Baldwin.