The ratings for The Real Housewives of Atlanta hit a record low, and the cast members are shook that their peaches are on the line.
Source: AB+DM (Ahmad Barber and Danté Maurice) / Bravo
According to a new report from Radar Online, viewership is steadily dropping week to week.
The Season 15 premiere on May 7 reportedly brought in 834,000 viewers. The following week, only 738k sets of eyes locked on the Peaches. The latest episode on May 28 had nearly 100,000 fewer viewers, with only 657k fans tuning in.
Sources from the production team told the outlet that cast members are aware of the low ratings. The fiesty women are fearful that they will get the axe — even the OGs of the show.
“They are worried Bravo will pull a recast on them as they did to the cast of the Real Housewives of New York,” an insider told All About the Tea. “None of them feel safe, even Kandi.”
Fans on social media noted how Bravo eliminated the entire cast of The Real Housewives of New York after the popularity faded. Many of the RHONY alums will appear on the Peacock spinoff series, Real Housewives: Ultimate Girls Trip, as Bravo introduces a fresh cast for the original show.
Check out which stars fans say are the missing MVPs (Most Valuable Peaches) after the flip!
Are the Real Housewives of Atlanta’s Ratings Tanking Because Too Many MVPs Are M.I.A.?
Source: AB+DM (Ahmad Barber and Danté Maurice) / Bravo
This season’s ratings are a far cry from how the Bravo show performed in the past. Last season, The Real Housewives of Atlanta averaged roughly 950,000 viewers per episode. Season 13 performed even better at 1.25 million viewers every week. None of the ratings compare to Season 7, when NeNe Leakes was a peach-holder as the program raked in 3 million viewers weekly.
Fans have been begging the network to recast NeNe for years. Unfortunately, Ms. Leakes may have burned that bridge after she sued Bravo in 2022 for a racist and hostile work environment.
NeNe — born Linnethia — alleged NBC and the Bravo network “maintain a corporate culture that is insensitive to Black talent and fosters racially offensive behavior that goes unpunished,” US Weekly reported.
The Linnethia Lounge owner notoriously brings the drama to RHOA. Fans continuously complain that the new season is “boring” and lacks spicy storylines.
Porsha Williams was also a fan favorite who departed in 2021, which likely contributed to the ratings dip.
Porsha opened up about the effects the show had on her as she guest hosted The Breakfast Club in March.
“We were at a reunion and I had a longtime beef with Kenya, and there was this one reunion that we were going back and forth,” Porsha explained.
Instead of using the profane term to describe a peen, Porsha used the word “eggplant” to reveal what Kenya spewed.
“And she said, ‘You don’t know what you’re saying unless you have an eggplant in your mouth.’ It was like a mic drop moment,” she continued. “I was so discombobulated, and I was like ‘damn.’”
The mother of one said the disgusting comment reverberated in her head. Later, people would frequently repeat it to her, even her sister, Lauren Williams.
Fans would even like to see Phaedra Parks return after departing in 2017. However, that may be an impossibility if Kandi remains in the program. In addition, the network likely washed its hands of the attorney after her alleged lies came to light at the Season 9 RHOA reunion in 2017.
You may recall that she previously almost ruined Kandi’s life and career by categorizing her as a “Cosby” as she convinced Porsha that the songwriter and her husband, Todd Tucker, planned to date rape her.
It’s still pretty mind-blowing she went to those lengths.
Kim Zolciak’s Messy Divorce From Kroy Biermann Amid Million-Dollar Debt Put Her High On RHOA Fans’ Wish List
Source: Paras Griffin / Getty
Fans are also advocating for Kim Zolciak’s return to the show. She would have an interesting storyline. In addition to digging herself out of millions of dollars in debt, she is divorcing former football player Kroy Biermann.
The television personality told People in 2020, “I think, and this has kind of just come to my mind over the last couple months, that the first season, all of us — Shereé [Whitfield], Nene [Leakes] and I—[we] were friends before this ever started for years,” she expressed.
“They should just bring back the whole cast from season 1 and like, ‘Where are we now?’” Zolciak-Biermann, 42, said. “Like, go out to dinner and do this all over again. Because I think we’re really fun, you know, in all honesty.”
The “Don’t Be Tardy” singer did say that there was no way she would return without her original castmates.
With the deplorable ratings this season, Bravo clearly needs to make a wig-shifting change if they plan to save the RHOA franchise.
Which stars do you want to see spice things up on Real Housewives of Atlanta?
