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Since it began with “Orange County” in 2006, “The Real Housewives” franchise has expanded around the world. Bravo has created 11 “Housewives” franchises with dozens of spinoff series and international installments that followed. In the Sunday, January 28 episode of “Watch What Happens Live”, Andy Cohen responded to a fan’s pitch for where they’d like to see the network go next.
The fan appeared as a virtual caller on WWHL. While the virtual caller was there to ask “Married to Medicine” star Lateasha “Sweet Tea” Lunceford a question, she took her opportunity with Cohen on the line. “Andy you are my absolute idol. Hear me out, ‘Real Housewives of Grand Rapids’, RHOGR. Sounds pretty good,” the fan pitched before mouthing “Call me,” towards the camera.
Cohen nodded along before responding, “We’re good.”
Andy Cohen Opened Up About the ‘Housewives’ Franchise’s Future at BravoCon 2023
The question of adding new “Housewives” franchises came up at BravoCon 2023. At his Ask Andy panel hosted by “Bachelor” and “Bachelorette” star Rachel Lindsay, Cohen confirmed that Bravo isn’t looking into any franchise expansion.
According to The Messenger, Cohen first cleared up specific rumors of “Housewives” coming to cities including Scottsdale, Arizona, Las Vegas, Nevada, and New Orleans, Louisiana.
“This happens all the time. There will be production companies that go to a town and say, ‘We are casting for this,’ but sometimes they’re casting on their own to bring a pitch to Bravo. So it’s not necessarily us going out in those cities and casting,” Cohen explained.
The Bravo bigwig added that while cities including those three could still appear on the network on another show, “I can tell you right now that there’s no new Housewives that have crossed my desk that are in the offing. We’re in a very strong period of Housewives right now. I don’t think there’s a hole in the marketplace for a new one.”
“The Real Housewives of Dubai”, the latest addition to Bravo’s “Housewives” lineup, was announced in 2021 and debuted on the network in 2022. It is the first (and currently only) international franchise to air on Bravo.
Andy Cohen Counts Down His Top 5 Bravo ‘Side Characters’
On the same WWHL episode where Cohen was asked about a “Housewives” expansion, he looked back at one of his favorite parts of the network’s current programming. Cohen counted down his top 5 favorite “side characters” that don’t appear as frequently on the network anymore, inspired by Dwight Eubanks’s return to the network on that night’s “Married to Medicine” episode.
Cohen’s top five included Kim Zolciak’s former assistant Sweetie from “Atlanta”, Sonja Morgan’s facialist with a penchant for gossip Satoko from “New York City”, Lisa Vanderpump’s party planner Kevin Lee from “Beverly Hills”, Laura-Leigh, the SURver turned actress from RHOBH spinoff series “Vanderpump Rules”, and Kim “Kim G.” Granatell, one of the two “Kims” from “New Jersey”.
“I miss you all, let’s sit together at the next Posche fashion show,” Cohen said, joking about the often drama-filled fashion shows that used to be featured on RHONJ.
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