By Sameer Suri and Dailymail.com Reporter 02:58 September 30, 2023, updated 09:05 September 30, 2023
NeNe Leakes insists she experienced “a lot of unfair treatment” as a black woman on Bravo during her years on Real Housewife.
The 55-year-old sued Bravo, Andy Cohen and NBCUniversal in April 2022, claiming she experienced “systemic racism” during her time on Real Housewives of Atlanta and that her complaints fell on deaf ears.
However, by August of this year, she filed legal documents to formally dismiss the case along with “all claims asserted in the lawsuit.”
But during a new podcast appearance this week, Leakes renewed her allegations of racial bias on the part of the network where she became a star.
Leakes, who appeared in over 200 episodes of “The Real Housewives Of Atlanta,” made the allegations while appearing on Bethenny Frankel’s “ReWives” podcast.
Recap: NeNe Leakes insists she was treated “a lot of unfairly” as a black woman on Bravo during her years on Real Housewife
Frankel herself found reality stardom on The Real Housewives Of New York City, where, like Leakes, she was a stunning presence.
Leakes was a regular on the Atlanta series for the first seven seasons, then had a recurring role in the eighth season and was absent from the ninth season.
She made her big comeback as a series regular in season 10 and remained on the program for three seasons before leaving the cast after season 12 in 2020.
Leaks made headlines for canceling the Season 12 reunion twice, first during an argument with Kenya Moore and then during a back-and-forth with Kandi Burruss.
During her new podcast episode with Frankel, Leakes claimed that she is “treated differently” than white housewives.
Leakes noted that Lisa Vanderpump left “The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills” “and never came back,” but she remains on the Bravo fold via Vanderpump Rules, “and she can still sit over there and hang out all day.” Talk to Andy if she wants.”
Vanderpump Rules has been airing on Bravo since 2013, nearly a decade before Lisa Vanderpump dramatically exited The Real Housewives Of Beverly Hills.
Leakes also brought up the example of Teresa Giudice, who had to briefly leave The Real Housewives Of New Jersey to serve 11 months behind bars for fraud.
As they were: The 55-year-old (left) sued Bravo, Andy Cohen (right) and NBCUniversal in April 2022, claiming that she experienced “systemic racism” during her time at the network
During her new podcast appearance, Leakes complained that Guidice “can go to prison and stay there for 10 years and they’ll wait for her to come back and then the show will start over.” But the black girls don’t get the same treatment .”
Leakes claimed that she was given fewer and fewer episodes each season as she neared the end of her run on The Real Housewives Of Atlanta.
According to IMDb, she appeared in 18 of 21 episodes of season 10, then 22 of 23 episodes of season 11, and then 20 of 25 episodes of season 12.
“I’ve been getting fewer and fewer episodes each season,” Leakes said, claiming Bravo asked her to come back for just six episodes of Season 13.
She felt like I was being excluded. I didn’t understand why I was being given fewer and fewer episodes and asked myself, ‘Why do I get less and less with each season and everyone else gets more?’ And the executives in the offices kept telling me that I was dissatisfied.’
Leakes wondered “how do you tell a person they’re unhappy,” while Frankel theorized: “They must have read on the show that they’re unhappy, I guess they said.”
Meanwhile, Leakes brought the conversation back to the question of “why” she thought she was “dropped from the program.”
“And I’m an original – the only original housewife on the show, and all the other original housewives on their shows – all white women – and they all get full episodes,” Leakes argued. “And I’m the only black original on my show and I was given less. ‘I get six, they all get 18. Why?’
Warm moment: Leakes claimed she decided to leave the show after being encouraged to argue with cast mate Kandi Burruss (right) at the height of Black Lives Matter
During Leakes’ last three seasons on The Real Housewives Of Atlanta, the entire cast was black, but Leakes was the only one who had been there since the first season.
Leakes claimed that when she negotiated her return to the series for season 13, she was only offered a paltry six episodes.
She claimed she initially decided to accept the deal after being encouraged to do so by members of her inner circle, including her husband Gregg Leakes.
However, she claimed she backed out after Bravo pressured her to argue on-air with her co-star Kandi Burruss, with whom she has feuded in the past.
At that point, at the height of the Black Lives Matter movement, Leakes felt unamenable to the idea of arguing with one of her fellow Atlanta Housewives.
She explained: “I was on the phone with the executives and they wanted me to come in for Kandi,” they said. They wanted me to be, “We want you to have Kandi.”‘
Leakes explained: “I think we had maybe a few problems, maybe the season before, and they wanted me to make sure I confront them and address them and all that stuff, and I said, ‘No, do that.’ I really don’t.” I want to do that. This is Black Lives Matter and I don’t want to do this. And I didn’t do it.’
She elaborated: “I felt like it was Black Lives Matter.” I should have been there. They tried to force me out at a time that was very important in black culture. And they also wanted me to perform – if I appeared this season, they needed me to argue with Kandi, and that wasn’t something I wanted to do.”
Confab: Leakes, who starred in over 200 episodes of The Real Housewives Of Atlanta, made the allegations while appearing on Bethenny Frankel’s ReWives podcast
During her extensive discussion with Frankel, Leakes also claimed to have been subjected to “a lot of unfair treatment” over a period of “years on the show.”
For example, she looked back on her early years as “Real Housewife,” when her old nemesis Kim Zolciak-Biermann appeared as the only white cast member on the show.
“We’re a cast of black women and we have a white woman on our show.” She doesn’t travel; we travel. She doesn’t shoot; “We’re shooting,” Leakes said.
In fact, Zolciak-Biermann gained a reputation for shying away from cast trips and skipping trips to destinations like South Africa and Spain.
“So there were a lot of different treatments on the show,” Leakes said, “and I was more of the outspoken one that was at the forefront.” For example, me and the girls would talk about it and then say, “You know, it’s unfair, that Kim doesn’t have to go on casting trips. None of us want to go on cast trips, right?”
When Leakes dismissed her lawsuit last year, everyone involved mutually agreed to dismissal. However, the application was dismissed “without prejudice”, meaning Leakes was given the opportunity to reassess her claims in the future if she wished.
Additionally, the documents stipulated that neither party would seek to recover costs or attorneys’ fees.
In April, Leakes filed the first lawsuit in federal court in Atlanta, saying the companies that produced “The Real Housewives of Atlanta” oversaw a hostile and racist workplace.
Leakes said in court papers that she reported hearing Zolciak-Biermann make racist comments to company supervisors and was faced with professional consequences as a result.
Allegations: The 55-year-old reality star previously sued the network and executives, claiming that she experienced “systemic racism” during her time on Real Housewives of Atlanta and that her complaints fell on deaf ears
“NBC, Bravo and True promote a corporate and workplace culture in which racially hostile and inappropriate behavior is tolerated – if not encouraged,” Leakes’ legal team said in the lawsuit.
Leakes said that Zolciak-Biermann – who was not named in the lawsuit – first made a racist remark during the show’s first season in 2008, when the cast was scheduled to attend a barbecue.
She claimed that Zolciak-Biermann “said words like, ‘I don’t want to sit around and eat chicken with NeNe,'” which “perpetuated an offensive stereotype about African Americans.”
That was just one of several examples detailed in the lawsuit in which Leakes alleged that Zolciak-Biermann made “racially offensive and stereotypical” comments during the show, including the use of the N-word.
Leakes said in her lawsuit that she reported the numerous racist comments to the show’s executives, who “did not terminate her relationship with Zolciak-Biermann or take any other meaningful action to stop her racially offensive behavior.”
At the time, the RHOA star’s attorney said in a statement: “From the day the series began filming, NeNe has been the target of systemic racism at the hands of co-star Kim Zolciak-Biermann, by Bravo executive producer Andy Cohen and other managers were tolerated.” .’
In the lawsuit, Leakes said the comments about racist behavior contributed to her being removed from the series in 2020, at a time when Black Lives Matter amid societal change following the killing of George Floyd by the Police made headlines.
Leakes, a vocal supporter of BLM, said in the lawsuit that executives intentionally kept her out of episodes that were being filmed at the time the issue was being discussed by the cast.
Dismissed: Leakes denied her initial claims that she reported hearing racist comments made by white RHOA co-star Kim Zolciak-Biermann to corporate superiors and was subsequently faced with professional consequences