Tamar Braxton Reveals Why She Turned Down The Real Housewives of Atlanta: ‘All Money Ain’t Good Money’
“It’s not worth my mental to sit up here and get into an argument with another Black beautiful women about nothing so ‘other people’ can think this is what we’re about,” she said
Tamar Braxton has revealed that she was asked to be on The Real Housewives of Atlanta, but turned it down.
The singer and reality star told podcast host Carlos King, “At some point you have to have responsibility about what you put on the TV screen.”
Her comments come as Bravo is in production on season 16, which will feature a major casting shakeup due to declining ratings.
Don’t expect to see Tamar Braxton on The Real Housewives of Atlanta anytime soon.
During an live interview with podcast host Carlos King last month at City Winery in Atlanta, the Grammy nominated singer revealed that she had been approached to join the long-running Bravo series, but had turned them down.
“I’ve had conversations but the truth is, it’s just no way I’m going to sit and get a wig put on and get my face beat to argue with a bunch of bitches about nothing,” Braxton told the crowd on the show, which uploaded to Reality with the King’s YouTube page on May 21. “I can’t do it. What does that do for me in my life? What’s the argument?”
“Let me tell you something, all money ain’t good money. It’s just not,” she continued. “This is what I say: What’s for me won’t miss me. It’s not worth my mental to sit up here and get into an argument with another Black beautiful women about nothing so ‘other people’ can think this is what we’re about.”
Braxton — who has appeared on reality TV many times before, including Braxton Family Values and Celebrity Big Brother, which she won — went on to say that she chooses her projects carefully.
“At some point you have to have responsibility about what you put on the TV screen,” she said, “I don’t want to I want be a part of that television. I want to make feel good, funny, good, relatable epic television.”
PEOPLE reached out to Bravo, who famously does not comment on casting.
RHOA was long Bravo’s top-rated Housewives franchise in the years after its 2008 premiere. But once a ratings juggernaut for the network, the show’s popularity has been waining in recents seasons have blamed on conflicting casting dynamics.
After season 15 wrapped in September 2023, production on the series took a pause while the show recast. Cameras picked back up earlier this month, led by the franchise’s longest running Housewife Kenya Moore and Porsha Williams, who returns to the series after a two-season absence (and amid a messy divorce from estranged-husband Simon Guobadia).
Joining them will be returnee Drew Sidora and a crop of new Housewives including author, businesswoman and podcast host Brittany Eady; restaurateur and Food Network alum Kelli Ferrell; and Angela Oakley, wife of NBA great Charles Oakley.
Shamea Morton Mwangi, who has appeared on the show in a guest and Friend role dating back to season 5, has been upgraded to a full-time Housewife. And supermodel Cynthia Bailey — a Housewife from season 3-13, and part of the initial cast of Real Housewives Ultimate Girls Trip — will also be back, as a Friend.
Exiting RHOA will be Shereé Whitfield, Marlo Hampton and Sanya Richards-Ross. All three joined as full-time Housewives together back in season 14, though Hampton has been a recurring Friend/guest for years while Whitfield was a founding cast member on RHOA when it premiered in 2008 and has appeared as Housewife on multiple seasons since.
Kandi Burruss also won’t be returning, leaving RHOA after 14 consecutive years on the show.
“I put myself on pause,” she told PEOPLE exclusively at the 2024 People’s Choice Awards, hinting that she hopes to come back to the series one day. “They didn’t have to put my on pause, I put myself on pause.”
