The Big Picture
NeNe Leakes, the breakout star of Real Housewives of Atlanta, is still open to returning to the show if her fans demand it, despite her strained relationship with the show executives. Leakes has had an active career off-camera, including being a striptease dancer, writing a memoir, starting a clothing line, and taking on multiple television projects. Leakes’ career hit a downfall due to her bad and unprofessional attitude, according to her RHOA co-star Claudia Jordan, who called her irrelevant and difficult to work with. Leakes also filed a lawsuit against the show executives for mistreatment and discrimination but later withdrew it.
The Queen of Bravo had humble beginnings in her career, starting out modeling and acting in minor roles in TV shows like The Parkers. But after landing a spot for an original cast member on RHOA, Leakes went on to set her sights on a bigger ambition and ended up in Hollywood. So far she has established herself as a successful businesswoman, author, actress, and fashion designer. Let’s take a look back at NeNe Leakes’ once in-demand career.
Nene Leakes Always Had an Active Career Off-Camera
Before her acting career took the tide, Leakes was working as a striptease dancer to support herself and her son Bryson Bryant. This ended up landing her a role on the show The Fighting Temptations alongside big names such as Cuba Gooding, Chloe Bailey, and Beyoncé. Then in 2008, one year after her popularity from RHOA she wrote a memoir, Never Make The Same Mistake Twice, which talked about struggles with her family, single motherhood, and working toward her dreams. This won the hearts of her supporters as they praised her for sharing her story. Being on RHOA did not stop her from exploring other opportunities. Leakes started a clothing line and then expanded to launching her SWAGG boutiques across several cities. And while bagging peaches for eight straight seasons, she also took on multiple television projects.
Leakes’ Acting Career During and After ‘RHOA’
We, of course, know Nene Leakes from RHOA. The reality star’s journey with the show ended completely in 2020, when she announced that she wouldn’t be returning for Season 13. But because of her popularity she became a highly in-demand actress even outside the show. Guest starring on Kevin Hart’s Real Husbands of Hollywood to recurring roles on Rayan Murphy’s Glee and the NBC comedy show The New Normal. Leakes also starred in the Broadway adaptations of Cinderella and Chicago — Leakes was on fire. In 2011, she was a contestant on Donald Trump’s NBC series Celebrity Apprentice, a show that was also once co-hosted by the former RHOA Housewife Claudia Jordan. She has experimented with her career by going on shows like Dancing with the Stars, Miss USA, and Celebrity Show-Off, and starring in Tamar Braxton’s music video “If I Don’t Have You.” On top of that, she even released her own song titled “Come and Get This Hunni.” In addition, she has also dabbled with several talk shows including Anderson Live, The Talk, Betty White’s Off Their Rockers, and The Price is Right. She worked with Entertainment Tonight for 11 years until her departure in 2020. The list just goes on and on!
Leakes was clearly not satisfied with acting alone, because she set up her own television production company in 2013 named NeNe Leakes Entertainment. This is the same company that gave us her RHOA spin-off, I Dream of NeNe: The Wedding.
But How Did Leakes Manage to Enter Her Flop Era?
Nene’s career was soaring. Apart from her television career, she has earned through her fashion line, jewelry collection, real estate properties, and various endorsements. She is in the list of top RHOA Housewives with the highest estimated net worth. But as they say, the higher you go, the further you can fall. So what led to her downfall? Many are saying that Nene Leakes has already hit her peak and is slowly becoming a nobody in the entertainment industry. Leaks’ RHOA co-star and co-host of Cocktails with Queens, Claudia Jordan, recently gave her opinion about how Nene ruined her own career. In an Instagram interview with The Domenick Nati Show, She said “To go from nothing to something, then to something great and to have burnt so many bridges where no one’s rushing to the rescue to put you on anything, it’s sad.”
According to Jordan, it was Leakes’ bad and unprofessional attitude that led to her downfall. She even went as far as to call Leakes irrelevant. She said, “I think she needs to take a little bit of time because she is charismatic, and she is funny. I’ll give her that. She’s also obnoxious and difficult to work with, and a victim. But she’s absolutely irrelevant right now.”
Leakes did not just leave RHOA after Season 12, but she fired cannons, launching an all out public war on the show executives. She went to court filing a lawsuit against Andy Cohen, True Entertainment, Bravo, NBCUniversal, and Truly Televisions. She claimed mistreatment, discrimination, and racism on the set of the show. The lawsuit claimed, “NBC, Bravo, and True foster a corporate and workplace culture in which racially-insensitive and inappropriate behavior is tolerated — if not, encouraged.”
However, even though the claims she made were very serious, a year later in 2022 she still decided to withdraw her lawsuit. Now, NeNe Leakes is suddenly interested in returning to RHOA. During an interview with Carlos King on Reality with the King she said, “I don’t have any hard feelings. I’m a Sagittarius. So at some point, I may be mad with you, but then I get over it. I’m not the kind of girl that carries a grudge or hold[s] the grudge forever. I’m also not [an] ass kisser.” After this, it seems that fans are reluctant to give her their trust again.
Meta Data: {“keywords”:”NeNe Leakes, Real Housewives of Atlanta, RHOA”}
Source link