Bravo Pictured: (l-r) Leva Bonaparte, John Pringle, Kathryn Dennis, Shep Rose, Austen Kroll, Madison LeCroy, Craig Conover
Leva Bonaparte has been a familiar face on “Southern Charm” since the show’s debut in 2014, and for season 7 and 8 she was promoted to a full-time member, per IMDb.
But the South Carolina businesswoman has a lot more on her plate. Leva and her husband, Lamar, own several popular bars and restaurants in Charleston, and soon her restaurant empire will be featured on a Bravo spinoff, “Southern Charm: Leva Land,” which will center on her restaurant, Republic Garden & Lounge. “Leva Land” will follow the lives of staffers at Leva’s restaurant, according to E! News.
It’s no surprise that Bravo fans are already comparing “Leva Land” to Lisa Vanderpump’s long-running restaurant-based reality show “Vanderpump Rules,” which is set at her West Hollywood eatery, SUR.
In a new interview, Leva opened up about her new show as well as her issues with the cast of “Southern Charm.”
Leva Bonaparte Said She Doesn’t Want to Compare Her Show to ‘Vanderpump Rules’ or ‘Kandi & the Gang’
NBCUMVVanderpump Rules season 9 cast
Leva opened up about her upcoming new show during an interview on the “Behind the Velvet Rope with David Yontef” podcast. In an interview on July 13, 2022, Leva said her show will feature “really really interesting kids with interesting lives and interesting stories.”
“I think you’re going to see stories you’ve never seen on Bravo, which I’m proud of Bravo for covering them,” she said. “I think you’re going to see the side of Charleston [that] you don’t see that on Southern Charm and a ton of people are making their living that way.”
“And it’s a ton of young people who are just making a killing, working three days a week and then partying for three days a week and kind of living the most fabulous life you wish you could live,” she said. “They’re 23 and making bank and then three days work, three days Tulum, three days work, three days like magazine photo shoot, because they’re just that hot, you know what I mean?”
She added that some of her cast members have a lot of history working with her.
“Some have literally been with me since for seven, eight years,” she said. “And then they also have their own histories. Like they went to school together or they used to date and now they don’t or whatever. So you’ll just catch all of that. It’s a lot and I’m really proud of it. And I think it’ll be, I think it’s going to knock everyone’s socks off.”
Leva also shut down comparisons to other restaurant-based shows such as “Vanderpump Rules” or “Kandi & the Gang,” the latter of which is based at “Real Housewives of Atlanta” alum Kandi Burruss’ restaurant OLG. She said that while she admires both Vanderpump and Burruss, she has not talked to them about “Leva Land.”
“I admire them both,” she said. “I think they’re both like literally icons, but I think we’re all doing like a different thing, you know? And so I definitely think… it’s definitely like an, like an occu-soap, like an occupational-based show, but you know, my relationship with them is so different than let’s say Kandi’s and her staff or Lisa and her staff. I certainly am not, you know, either one of them…. I haven’t heard from them yet, but I hope that like maybe I’ll see them at BravoCon. I look up to them, they built some, some, you know, Kandi’s built like an empire. And so has Lisa,”
Leva Bonaparte Said Southern Charm Season 8 Was Difficult to Deal With
BravoSouthern Charm Season 8 main cast photo.
After filming “Southern Charm” this season, Leva unfollowed her co-stars on social media after hinting that they were jealous of her business achievements.
According to Reality Blurb, Leva posted, “I can’t be around people who think my accomplishments. success and future opportunities are competition. If we can’t be happy for one another, we have nothing in common.”
She told Yontef she unfollowed her co-stars for her own mental health following a draining season.
“My biggest pet peeve is like let’s say three people are angry at one person and then three other people pile on I’m like, is that really, is that really necessary? “ she said. “Because like, I will stand in defending a person I don’t even agree with if like five people are up against them. … And I don’t know if it’s just like a maturity thing or what it is, but I was just like, all right, I just need a little space. I don’t need to like your selfies right now. I need a little space from your face.”
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