Carole Radziwill Reveals Ex-BFF, Bethenny Frankel, ‘Had Access’ To ‘RHONY’ Producers And Showrunners’ Group Chat!

Carole Radziwill is claiming that her former bestie, Bethenny Frankel, had inside influence toward the end of her run on “The Real Housewives of New York City.” The former Bravo star dropped her allegation during an appearance on Monday’s episode of the ‘Behind the Velvet Rope with David Yontef‘ podcast. 

“I think [Frankel] acted as a producer, at least what I saw that last season as talent and as a producer, she had access to information about the show that none of the rest of us had access to,” Carole claimed. 

Carole alleged that Bethenny was part of a group chat set up between producers, field producers, and showrunners, which allowed the group to discuss scenes in real-time. 

“There was the feeling that it was unequal access to production,” she said. “There’s this thing called, like, this story chain. … It was a group text with all the producers, and they would be, all the field producers would be texting what was going on in the scene as it was going on.”

“I think [Frankel] had access to some version of that,” the journalist added. “It became kind of clear that she had access to it, whether or not directly from producers or just, you know … there were a lot of people on it.”

Carole shared her belief that Bethenny’s supposed production access allowed her inside information about storylines she had no part in. 

“She knew what was said in scenes that she wasn’t in. We never knew that,” Carole explained. “So there was clearly some communication that was happening between her and production that wasn’t happening with the rest of us in production. That did make people afraid to say things that they would have said normally, because there was a feeling that there was someone who was more protected.”

Carole dished that she got a look at the group chat when a notification popped up on a phone that she had borrowed from a showrunner. 

“I only found out about it because I borrowed one of the showrunners’ phone for something,” she explained. “And then [the notification] came up, and I was like, ‘What is this?’ And it was, like, a really long group. And he grabbed it. He’s like, ‘That’s the story text chain’ or something. I was like, ‘Oh, what?’”

Bethenny was part of the original RHONY cast but was never credited as a producer. She departed the cast twice, most recently in 2019. Carole appeared on the show for six seasons, before making her exit. 

Fans know that Carole and Bethenny were close friends while appearing on RHONY until a serious falling out shattered their friendship. 

As reported last month — ‘The Real Housewives of New York City‘ is on track for a comeback, as it appears that Bravo is “slowly” working to revive the east coast franchise for Season 14. The network is committed to revamping the once-popular franchise after a disastrous season, according to a January report by Deux Moi. 

“RHONY season 14 is slowly (emphasis on slowly) starting to take shape,” an insider revealed. 

A source dished that fans should expect to see only three current cast members return for Season 14 and only one or two of them will reportedly be veteran RHONY stars.  

“At the moment 3 from the current cast of 6 are potentially coming back,” the tipster claimed. “Expect 1 or 2 OG/Vet returns and 2-3 newbies!”

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