THE WOW FACTOR

With their plunging necklines and backstabbing shenanigans, “The Real Housewives of Orange County” are a hoot to watch, sort of like “Mean Girls” with Mercedes. But Season 4 of Bravo TV’s reality series took it to a new level. At the center of this year’s drama was new cast member Gretchen Rossi, a 30-year-old blond bombshell engaged to 50-something auto magnate Jeff Beitzel, who was battling leukemia.

There were those on the show who didn’t take Rossi’s relationship at face value, and that’s when the claws came out. What with secret phone calls and accusations of gold-digging, there was an explosive reunion finale that made for startling TV. So what do the participants have to say about it all now?

“People don’t understand it unless they’ve gone through it,” Rossi says of her life with Beitzel, who died in September. “They make judgments.”

Doug Ross, co-executive producer of the show, says that Rossi’s story, while tragic, has been TV gold for the series, which has begun filming Season 5 -- with Rossi back on board.

“Gretchen is a va-va-voom gal, and she’s always a knockout,” he says. “When we first met her, the situation with Jeff was much less severe. It wasn’t until we had started production that he took a turn for the worse. She let us see what it’s like to go through that and see her in her sweats with her hair pulled back and no makeup on.”

Even as Rossi learned to nurse Beitzel -- rigging his feeding tubes and such -- fellow housewife Tamra Barney says she suspected Rossi of using Beitzel for his money after she received phone calls from a man claiming to be Rossi’s boyfriend. “I really did try to get close to her,” Barney says, “and then I got these phone calls, and I wasn’t sure. It just put a lot of doubt in my mind.”

The tensions first erupted in the episode in which Barney seemingly tried to embarrass Rossi at a dinner party. After confiding to a pal that she wanted to get Rossi “naked wasted,” Barney encouraged her to drink more and more tequila shots, until Rossi was slurring her words and lurching toward the bathroom.

“That was the worst episode ever for me,” Barney says. “I didn’t mean to take it to a bad level. We had been drinking, I had not eaten, we were hamming it up. . . . I just knew that Gretchen was really funny when she drinks.”

The Barney-Rossi rift really went public at the reunion show in February, during which Barney revealed having received the phone calls and accused Rossi of working “in cahoots” with another man to fleece her late fiance.

Producer Ross now says even his crew was stunned at Barney’s accusations and raunchy language. “Our eyes were wide open, going, ‘Oh, my God, she didn’t just say that, did she?’ ”

Rossi has denied being romantically entangled with the “other man,” identified as Jay Photoglou, and had received a restraining order against him in March. In the nine-page court document, she accused Photoglou, whom she calls a former boyfriend, of harassment and threatening to kill her.

So, with all the drama and antagonism, why go back for another season?

“If people have issues with me, quite frankly, I think that’s their own issue,” she says. But this time, “I’m a little more savvy about what’s going on behind the scenes and what people are saying about me. I’m going to be a little stronger about voicing my opinions.”

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