By Taylor Crumpton ·Updated May 16, 2024
On any given Sunday in the United States, you will find Black people in a state of praise. Whether that be in the halls of a hallowed church or the stands of a football stadium, the Sabbath has a special meaning to us. For those who do not find solace in a feud of dueling rivals on the green or are unable to stomach another revival, there is another place of worship. Bravo.
It is a place, or to invoke the words of one of the network’s patron saints, Karen Huger, an institution. Although the network was not created with Black people in mind, it is Black people that brought the network into the cultural zeitgeist. Whether that be through conversations about the latest episode of The Real Housewives at the beauty salon, spirited debates about a Bravolebrity’s storyline over cocktails, or the post episode recap via FaceTime after the latest episode airs, Black people are the heartbeat of the network.
When The Real Housewives of Atlanta premiered on Bravo in 2006, there was an absence of Black television shows on major networks. The merger of UPN and WB into the CW brought an end to the Golden Age of Black TV. It would take six years for another era of Black TV to begin with Shonda Rhimes’ Scandal on ABC. In the time between those two eras, NeNe Leakes, Shereé Whitfield, Lisa Wu, DeShawn Snow, Kandi Burruss, Cynthia Bailey, and Phaedra Parks took over our screens.
They ful>Miss Lawrence, Derek J, and Dwight Eubanks of The Real Housewives of Atlanta as examples of “beautiful people with dynamic personalities” who were reduced to being the “accessories to their Black women best friends.” Mitchum was concerned about joining the cast for the first season of the Martha’s Vineyard-based reality TV series due to the mischaracterization of previous Black gay men on the network and the potential negative impact on his advocacy career. Now, on his second season, Mitchum acknowledges the importance of his presence in reality tv.
“Black queer folks are dynamic. We’re unique. We are going to enter a space and be as vibrant as we always have been, and so I think that is what people often see. I also believe that many people watching may not have a Black queer friend,” says Mitchum. “For so many of them, I can be their entry point into the Black queer experience.”
Unlike Summer House, the Vanderpump Rules spinoff that chronicles the lives of a collective of New Yorkers during their weekends in the Hamptons, Summer House: Martha’s Vineyard follows a group of young Black professionals from across the United States on vacation. Since the series’ premiere, Black Bravo fans have expressed frustrations with the shorter, condensed filming period of Martha’s Vineyard compared to Summer House, where viewers follow thecast members’ lives in New York City, where most of the cast is based.
Kemar Bassaragh, VP, Current Production at Bravo, speaks about the difference between the two Summer House series. “Martha’s Vineyard is a destination place.You normally go there for two weeks. It’s kind of finding the right rhythm of how to let the viewers know this group of friends on a deeper level, but still showing what people do when they’re in a vacation home.”
He brings up Winter House – a Summer House spinoff, currently on pause, which takes cast members from Below Deck, Southern Charm, Vanderpump Rules, Summer House, and Family Karma and places them under a winter share house for two weeks – as an example of how Summer House: Martha’s Vineyard is >Divine Nine and HBCUs in popular culture. Outside of VH1’s Sorority Sisters, representation of Black Greek life has been minimal. Haughton-Lawson views this inclusion as a way to inspire a younger generation to go to college, to pledge, and to support HBCUS.
Herein lies a distinctive difference between Summer House and Summer House: Martha’s Vineyard, the explanation of Black culture to an assumed non-Black culture. A Black culture, which can rightfully be seen as elitist and/or classist when one thinks about the resources needed to take a one to two week long vacation to Martha’s Vineyard, which is only accessible via ferry or plane. The coastal town, located seven miles off of the coast of Massachusetts, is known as the vacation destination for the Black elite, such as former President Barack Obama and his wife Michelle Obama, Spike Lee, and Oprah.
“I think that there’s a really interesting thing that’s happening there in terms of sort of what middle class Black audiences gravitating towards something like Martha’s Vineyard, perhaps they sort of identify as someone who has gone to Martha’s Vineyard as a tradition with their family,” says Professor Brandy Monk-Payton, Assistant Professor of Communication and Media Studies at Fordham University.
In the first season of Summer House: Martha’s Vineyard, the cast toasts to Black Excellence, a slogan that emerged during the Obama years to signify “a high level of achievement, success, or the ability demonstrated by an individual Black person in general.” Mitchum, taken aback by the toast, explains to his fellow cast members the reasoning behind his disdain of a Black excellence chant.
Dr. Monk-Payton names Our Kind of People and Bel Air as examples of scripted tv shows that present an ideal of Black excellence. A term that represents the “flaunting of certain values and postures around what it meant to be Black that is not radical, but is something that is incredibly neoliberal,” but, also a “point of pride” as Dr. Monk Payton explains.
The idea of the Talented Tenth existed long before Summer House: Martha’s Vineyard came into existence, but the series is one of the most visible and accurate representations of the intraracial conversations we have as Black people around race and class. And this idea of genuine representation of the Black experience is what fuels the active fan base around Summer House: Martha’s Vineyard. It was the fans who campaigned for a season two reunion of the franchise. It is the fans who vocalized their frustration when Summer House: Martha’s Vineyard was absent from a recent Bravo press release that featured a roster of fifteen show renewals and two new show announcements.
According to a 2024 report by Nielsen, “Black adults spend 31.8% more time with TV each week than the general U.S. population.” The report also speaks to the need for greater representation for Black LGBTQ individuals and Black men.
Jasmine Ellis Cooper, cast member of Summer House: Martha’s Vineyard thinks the men are the best thing about the show. “They show up, not just for us as women, but they show up for themselves.”
She brings up a recent episode as an example of the brotherhood that men have fostered as being a part of the cast. “Right now, everyone’s kind of rallying around him [Nick Arrington] as just a straight Black man on a reality show. I don’t know if I’ve seen that really. I’m kind of floored.” Compared to shows like Married to Medicine, where the men are active, but can easily fall into the background, Ellis Cooper says the men of Summer House: Martha’s Vineyard are standing on their own.
In many ways, Summer House: Martha’s Vineyard has had to stand on its own. They are the only all-Black non-Housewives show on Bravo that focuses on the experience of young Black millennials. Even within the Summer House franchise, which is actually a derivative of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills, they are shot in a two to three week period. Like Jasmine Ellis Cooper says, “We’ve had to forge our own >Bravo! We’re Black and I Ken Not with Kendrick Tucker, and leaving comments on Bravo and Cocktails, the Bravo verison of DeuxMoi.
These fans, who were birthed into existence from the first time Shereé said “Who Gon Check Me, Boo” or any of NeNe’s infamous one-liners, “Close Your Legs to Married Men” or “Bling. Bling. Bling. B*tches Is Mad!”, also supports Black female storytelling on Summer House and Southern Charm.
SUMMER HOUSE — Season:8 — Pictured: Gabby Prescod — (Photo by: Felix Kunze/Bravo) What It’s Like To Be A Black Woman In The Hamptons
Before Gabby Prescod entered Summer House, she was already familiar with Bravo. “You know what?”, she says. “The gag is that fashion and Bravo are so intertwined. Fashion people love Bravo.” The fashion professional, who currently serves as the Fashion Director of Blanc Magazine, recounts talking about the Housewives at fashion appointments, but never the younger shows on the network. When the opportunity to join Summer House in 2021 came up, her then-employer did not want her to be on the show. A year later, in 2022, when the opportunity came up again, Prescod packed up her bags and went to The Hamptons.
The series, which premiered in 2017, with an all-white cast surprisingly films in a historically Black neighborhood. “Our house is in Sag Harbor. Sag Harbor was a predominantly Black place, because in segregation that’s where they let Black people own property. It was the only place in The Hamptons,” says Prescod. “It’s just very interesting to me because The Hamptons is actually full of Black people and it doesn’t seem like that’s shown or even a known fact.”
Prescod is no stranger to the Hamptons or Martha’s Vineyard. Prior to joining Summer House she did a summer share house with her sister. When she was younger, she spent time at her aunt and uncle’s house in Edgartown, a town on Martha’s Vineyard. Despite the fact that both Summer House series are based around relaxing and unwinding, that experience looks different for Black women in The Hamptons.
Ciara Miller and Gabby Prescod are the only Black women on Summer House. Miller being the first when she joined in season five. Mya Allen was the second, when she joined season six, and Gabby was the third when she joined in season seven. The trio, now a duo, never seem to align. Yet, one has to ask if we have those same expectations for white cast members.
“I do think there is something to be said about Ciara being Black, me being Black, and seeing the lived experiences being very different. We’re still both Black women. No experience is better or worse than the other,” says Prescod. Unintentional, Miller and Prescod are modeling two very different depictions of Black womanhood, while being featured on predominantly white cast.
SOUTHERN CHARM — Season:8 — Pictured: Venita Aspen — (Photo by: Stephanie Diani/Bravo) What It Is Like To Be A Black Woman In Charleston, SC
One cannot talk about the Black non-Housewives experience without Venita Aspen of Southern Charm. Due to the show’s origin story as a reality tv series following the lives of the Southern aristocracy in Charleston, South Carolina; Aspen was bound to have a different experience than any of her Black colleagues on the network. Coupled with the racially charged, and gender driven comments she received on social media from fans of the series; it took her a long time to finally come into her own and feel safe enough to be her full authentic self on reality tv.
It helps that the new roster of fresh, young Black talent on Bravo like Jordan Emanuel and Preston Mitchum of Summer House: Martha’s Vineyard and Ciara Miller of Summer House are there as supports.
“It is very nice to have that inner circle. Now, I have a group to complain about our woes, highs, lows, and everything. When I first started I didn’t have that. The women I looked up to were older than me,” says Aspen. “It would have been advice that would have been helpful, but I still needed it from a younger perspective at that point. I needed to be able to talk to someone who was going through it with me at the same time.”
Aspen calls Miller, the sister that she didn’t know she needed. Their friendship started when Aspen reached out to Miller on Instagram to congratulate her for joining Summer House. When asked about if she feels the reception around Summer House: Martha’s Vineyard online is ushering in a new era of support around younger non-Housewives Black talent on reality tv, Aspen said no.
Her answer speaks to the unfortunate reality of being a Black consumer of reality tv. Oftentimes, the shows you fall in love with, like Sweet Life:Los Angeles are canceled after two seasons. Or Legendary canceled and removed from streaming after three seasons. There is a fear that your new favorite Black reality tv show could be here one day and gone tomorrow with no explanation to the fanbase or viewers. Fans are still asking why Southern Charm: New Orleans did not come back for a third season.
Despite this, Aspen has hopes for the newest Black non-Housewives show on the network. “I’m excited for Martha’s Vineyard. Right now, I think it’s kind of in between phase. I can only speak from my own journey because when I was first everyone hated me. Now, I’m finally at that, we like her mark, and I’m four years in.” Time is what Black reality tv shows and Black talent on reality tv shows need. The opportunity to grow into themselves, to establish and foster relationships with the audiences, and for fans to feel safe to invest in their stories without fear of cancellation.
Dr. Brandy Monk-Payton refers to this as linked fate, the idea that all of the Black cast members from the different reality tv show programs understand what it means to be Black on reality tv. And because of that shared understanding, they are actively trying to empower each other and be in community with each other. A collective that understands itself as a part of a larger community, one that includes fans who are deeply invested and feel seen in their stories. The time for the stop and go, the on and off, the hit and miss has got to end. Black shows, like Summer House: Martha’s Vineyard, and the Black cast members of Summer House and Southern Charm deserve their genuine moment in the spotlight. Now is not the time to fail them.
TOPICS: bravo Reality TV
The post OPINION: Bravo Celebrates Black Culture But We Still Have Work To Do appeared first on Essence.
