Bethenny Frankel Talks ‘RHONY’ Return!

Bethenny Frankel has confirmed that she was tapped to appear on the upcoming Real Housewives of New York City: Legacy spinoff series. Bethenny addressed Andy Cohen announcing that Bravo is rebooting RHONY and creating a spinoff show that will feature only OG cast members, during a recent episode of her “Just B” podcast. 

The Skinnygirl mogul dished that she had received a text from “the powers that be in the Bravosphere” to assess her interest in returning to the Bravo series. 

“Many of you have been asking me for a response to [the] ‘Housewives’ announcement,” Bethenny spilled. “So a couple weeks ago, I got a text from, you know, the powers that be in the Bravosphere saying, ‘Is there a chance? Is there a chance? Just asking, is there a chance?’ Meaning, would I come back.”

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Bethenny admitted that she “didn’t understand” what Bravo was going for in the new OG-only series, noting that the reveal “wasn’t really an announcement.”

“I know from a bunch of producers and people in the industry that they’re casting the show of new people and that they clearly don’t know who the show of old people will be because I was asked to be on it,” she continued. “So it’s not been crafted. So it felt like, sort of, a half-baked announcement. I didn’t really understand it.”

The former Bravo star added—“Years ago I said to [franchise producer] Andy [Cohen], ‘There should be an all-stars show.’ And he said, ‘One day we’ll get to the point where we have to do that. We’re not there now.’”

Bethenny gave the network credit for “finding new ways to make things.”

“They can’t give that up, because you got to tap that vein and get the last juice out of that franchise,” she said. “You got to keep going.”

The BStrong founder hinted that her “number” would likely not be a figure the network would consider. 

“When asked, I say, ‘There’s a number, but I don’t think you can afford it,’” she quipped. 

“From a business standpoint, [it’s] probably smarter for them to just keep mixing together the ingredients that they already have on the shelf: the people that’ll do it for so cheap because they’ll do it for next to nothing for the relevance and the jolt,” Bethenny continued. “From a business standpoint, you have something that’s not at the peak in ratings, put them all together in the soup. You have an audience, they’re going to watch it.”

“They don’t necessarily need my advice but unless you’re creating some new thing that you’re reviving an entire brand and doing something entirely new, I don’t even see how that applies to me because I didn’t necessarily even understand what it is,” she added. 

Bethenny was an original RHONY cast member for the show’s first three seasons. She exited the series, but returned for Season 7, leaving again after Season 11. 

“I left because it became not who I really was anymore, and you can’t do something out of fear,” she said in April 2021 on Paris Hilton’s This Is Paris podcast.

The former reality star added that she “was literally there because of the money” at the time. 

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