'The People v. O.J. Simpson' : Who Is Connie Britton's Breakout Character Faye Resnick?

Faye Resnick made quite the impression in Tuesday’s The People v. O.J. Simpson premiere, with Connie Britton playing the close friend of the late Nicole Brown Simpson.

Speaking to Kris Jenner (Selma Blair) in the dramatization of the O.J. Simpson trial, the fictionalized version of Resnick remarks that Nicole was the reason she went to rehab, and that Nicole was terrified of O.J.

“Did you ever see the pictures of her face after he laid into her? You know she hid them away just in case something happened,” Britton’s Resnick says.

Viewers of the show who recognized Britton may not be as familiar with the woman she is playing. So who is the real Faye Resnick?

Reality fans may be know the interior designer from appearances The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills – where she’s been seen with close friend Kyle Richards. She’s also friends with Jenner and has appeared on Keeping up with the Kardashians alongside her.

But she first rose to prominence in connection with the O.J. Simpson case when she co-authored the 1994 book Nicole Brown Simpson: The Private Diary of a Life Interrupted about her friend’s life, as well as the 1996 book Shattered: In the Eye of the Storm, about her own experiences during the O.J. Simpson trial. Following the trial, she parlayed her fame into a modeling gig for Playboy in 1997.

Her first book has come back into the public consciousness recently, in part because of claims it made about Nicole and former NFL pro Marcus Allen – a close friend of O.J.’s who Resnick said had an affair with Nicole while he was engaged to Kathryn Edwards. Allen has denied this claim, and Edwards, currently a cast member on RHOBH confronted Resnick about the book during a recent episode.

Resnick says she continues to mourn Nicole, and opened up to PEOPLE about her friend for last week’s cover story on American Crime Story.

“All I can say is, for me, it was personally the most heartbreaking tragedy that altered my life forever. On average, two women every week die from domestic abuse. To lose my loving friend Nicole, who seemed at one point to defy these odds, is beyond devastating. The thought of reliving the events of her death and the trial that followed is catastrophic for all who knew and loved Nicole and Ron [Goldman],” she said ahead of American Crime Story‘s premiere. “My only wish is that the series will bring to the forefront the horrors of domestic abuse that roughly 3.5 million women continue to experience every year. Instead of opening painful wounds for many people, or becoming a pointless media circus, I’m hoping this series serves as another chance to remind the American public that domestic abuse remains a lethal issue, even 22 years after this nightmare.”

The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story airs Tuesdays (10 p.m. ET) on FX.