BOSTON–Filming coast to coast, the Bravo network is back again with the reality hit series “Real Housewives,” featuring popular women with money. The reality-soap franchise has traveled from Orange County to the Big Apple and is now introducing the Georgia Peaches, in its new show “The Real Housewives of Atlanta.”
The original series concentrates on five women living behind their gated community in Orange County, Calif.; these women are cougars and provide viewers with insight into their wealthy lives as housewives. The women show the reality of their tasks of parenting, their highfalutin lifestyles, and maintaining their own girlhood.
The second installment features the elite, living-the-fast-life, hard-shell-networking women of New York City. This series can be critiqued as a copy cat episode of “Sex and the City.” “Sex and the City” portrays women living in New York City, and their mission to find love and buy high-end labels. Some of the housewives of New York have found love but all of these five women are into buying the labels. This series shows the lives as they manage their careers and busy schedules with fundraising galas, and live the social life of the rich and famous. These driven women show that money and status are a necessity of life.
The latest edition builds on the success of the previously featured cities. Bravo headed down south and stepped into the stiletto shoes of the predominantly black cast of Atlanta’s own Georgia Peaches.
Atlanta’s cast shows diversity. Housewife Lisa Wu Hartwell is black and Chinese, married to NFL professional Ederton Hartwell. She created her own success by owning a real estate company and developing a jewelry and baby line. The second Housewife is Kim Zolciak, divorced mother of two. Zolciak considers herself “a black woman trapped in a white woman’s body.” She is mysteriously dating a man with the alias, “Big Poppa,” who has chosen not to be featured on the show for privacy and personal reasons. Big Poppa caters to Zolciak by purchasing her an Escalade and spending thousands of dollars showering her with diamonds. The other three housewives featured are NeNe Leakes, an active member of the Atlanta community, who remains involved socially. Leakes is married to a real estate investor with two sons. Leakes is the founder of The Twisted Hearts Foundation, which concentrates on women facing domestic violence. Even though money can buy Leakes the finer things in life, she continues to remain active and donate money to a cause. Though she isn’t a housewife anymore, the show features Sheree Whitfield, a single mother of three and ex-wife of NFL professional Bob Whitfield. Whitfield manages to juggle her busy calendar by launching her own clothing line “SHE by Sheree.” Lastly, we meet Deshawn Snow, mother of three, and wife of NBA professional Eric Snow. Snow concentrates on the Deshawn Snow foundation, an organization that focuses on individuals on welfare and teenage girls facing self-esteem issues.
The first season of the “Housewives of Atlanta” came to a close and the reunion was just recently aired. These five women before the show were good friends, but during the reunion show, these cougars continued to cat fight. Some of their relationships were broken and much was revealed. The reunion show gave the viewers an opportunity to ask the cast questions by e-mail. Some questions consisted of why the women were gold diggers (individuals who seek to find a spouse with money), and other questions were related to their cat fights and backstabbing moments on the show. All the women answered the questions truthfully and some remained loyal to one another.
As this series continues to expand, the show might want to reconsider its name because some of these women are divorced or engaged, or have experienced the life of being a housewife but some are living their lives as single and wealthy.
The show has high demand but can also attract many critics. Some viewers criticize the show because some real housewives feel the show does not provide a positive light on real housewives. Other critics state these women are just living their life and juggling the funds of their spouses. Many are horrified by the mindset reality television brings and the lifestyle it creates. As the critics critique, these women still remain big spenders and continue their entrepreneurial skills to earn more money to buy the high-end labels.
As Bravo continues the series and goes coast-to-coast, maybe the network will feature the real housewives of Boston and feature women living in their high rises in the city and spending big money on Newbury Street.