Vice is currently airing a docuseries, Dark Side Of Reality TV, and the long-awaited Real Housewives episode dropped this week.
Reality TV is intended to be raw, unfiltered, and messy by definition — and part of the allure for fans of the genre is the inherent darkness it involves.
Where And How To Watch Vice's Dark Side Of Reality TV: Interest in Vice's new docuseries – particularly the Real Housewives episode – is strong, but figuring out how to watch the show itself isn't easy.
Episodes of Dark Side Of Reality TV are available on ViceTV.com, where it appears that signing in to one's cable provider unlocks all eight of them. However, individual episodes and the entire season are available for purchase on Prime Video, with options for purchase on YouTube and AppleTV, too.
Vice's Real Housewives episode of Dark Side Of Reality TV aired against the backdrop of a year of controversy for the show's production side.
Loosely dubbed the "reality reckoning," some of the backlash originated with big names in the franchise, like Bethenny Frankel, who has admitted she'd become "increasingly uncomfortable with things and [had] been put in situations that weren’t safe" during her time on Real Housewives Of New York City.
Back in June, Bravo bigwig Andy Cohen confessed to Vulture that he sometimes had difficulty sleeping for fear of his past words or actions coming back to haunt him — but stopped short of analyzing his behavior, attributing his sleepness nights to cancel-happy mobs:
It’s fascinating to me, the idea that you could say something and everything would be pulled away from you ... People are just waiting to be outraged by every little thing.
Bravo has something of an uneasy relationship with the stars of its constellation of Real Housewives franchises, and the network wields an immense amount of power over the wealthy and connected women it makes famous.
In 2024, former Real Housewives stars sued the network, and others who have since left the franchise have spoken out to support cast members amid conflicts with Bravo.
Joviality is kind of Andy's whole vibe, but he has not been immune from accusations and scrutiny — in something of a role reversal, Andy has faced the kind of pushback he usually instigates among Real Housewives casts at reunions and tell-alls.
As all this Real Housewives meta-drama kept percolating behind the scenes, Vice's documentarians spoke with former cast members about their experiences with the franchise, and Bravo's "ex-wives" didn't hold back.
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Before Vice's Real Housewives episode was released, a sneak peek covered one of the more unsettling things said by a former housewife.
Vicki Gunvalson left Real Housewives Of Orange County in 2020, and in the Vice series, she spoke about how she'd "never forgive Bravo" for arranging for her to receive news of her mother's sudden death on-camera:
"'I was really upset that production knew for an hour, and they didn't tell me. They were out of line, and I think they should have taken me aside and said, 'Your mom has passed. Talk to your daughter off camera,' she shares. 'If I was a producer, that's what I would've done.'
"'Let me scream and cry on my own and be mad. It was very, very traumatic. I will never forgive Bravo for that,' she adds."
To be fair, there are plenty of strong reasons to have a mixed view of Vicki, but her point is unimpeachable.
No one ever deserves to have life-changing information withheld from them for the purposes of entertaining strangers, and it would be uncomfortable and unsettling for anyone to realize that the people with whom you've worked for years intentionally waited to break your heart so they could capture footage of your heart as it broke.
It's an objectively horrifying proposition, and it had to be difficult for Vicki to see Bravo the same way for the duration of her stint on RHOC. Wouldn't you be furious?
A user on Reddit's r/realhousewives commented to that effect, observing:
"Vicki is the OG. Exploiting her life is what built this franchise. I really dislike her, and don't want her back as anything more than a friend, but she does have a right to be bitter.
"Her life made Bravo a lot of money. Granted, she signed up, and [benefited] greatly as well. It is fair to feel spurned, especially given how her life unraveled on screen.
"So I don't really feel bad for her doing to Bravo what they essentially did to her. Probably won't make me stop watching either."
Reddit users seemed to be in agreement that former housewives who appeared in the Vice docuseries had "broken the rules of NBCUniversal in their book, and [they] will not be invited back" for future franchise projects.
Entertainment Weekly covered other major moments from Vice's Housewives episode, including a similarly uncomfortable anecdote from Real Housewives Of Atlanta alum Cynthia Bailey, who recalled being functionally forced to shock fellow housewife Phaedra Parks with unpleasant news.
The news in question involved a "cheating allegation," and the outlet quoted Cynthia's comments about how wrong it felt, and how the pressure from production exacerbated her discomfort:
"I'm like so stressed out about it. I don't like it. I'm literally praying for a power outage, anything to happen, so I don't have to say this [to Phaedra] ... I'm getting texts on my phone [from producers] and people in the corner with the teleprompter like, 'Drop the bomb, drop the bomb.'
"'I don't like bringing hurtful things to people, but unfortunately, on a reality show, we have to talk about it. And that's how it works."
Again, imagine if producers were nagging you to intentionally upset a friend for the cameras — Cynthia's discomfort was palpable.
Cynthia's statement that her boundaries being violated was "unfortunately ... how it works" echoed what Vicki Gunvalson said back in 2015 about the scene where she learned of her mother's death.
Both statements sounded as if the women were trying to talk themselves into accepting the notion that their respective levels of discomfort were unavoidable and necessary:
"It’s part of my reality. I lost my mother. I signed up for all areas of my life to be exposed — the good and the bad ...
" ... This is not a moment that I feel, as of right now, that I regret, because statistically, people are going to lose their parents, right? We’re going to be alive when our parents die, statistically."
Former Real Housewives Of New York star Aviva Drescher was on the show for two seasons, and recounted a time when she was required to film a scene with Ramona Singer, and Aviva happened to be on a course of antibiotics at the time.
Alcohol consumption is often discouraged alongside antibiotics, and Aviva asked if she could substitute vodka with water; she says she "was forced to drink" when her request was denied, an assertion the network disputes.
Aviva also echoed several former Real Housewives stars' complaints amid the lawsuits and the allegations about Bravo producers, and said:
The goal [for Bravo] is to make us look bats*** crazy, and if you didn't produce drama, you were gonna get fired.
In the same segment, Aviva delivered one of the most memorable lines from this episode of Vice's Dark Side Of Reality TV, describing Real Housewives cast members across the franchise as "gladiators with t***."
- Founded in
- 1980
- Notable shows
- The Real Housewives, Vanderpump Rules, Summer House, Below Deck
- Parent organization
- NBCUniversal
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- Frances Berwick
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- AMC Networks
