Most Successful Real Housewife: Bethenny Frankel Leads the Pack

With the RHONY trailer finally out, I figured now was the perfect time to share this.

I started this little project after seeing the awful E News Housewives ranking that people always mention and thought I could do better. Have been working on it on and off for the past year or two and didn't take too long overall to make and it was a ton of fun.

I'm a newer Housewives fan but have quickly become a Housewife nerd. I started watching in 2022 and have since watched every season of every U.S. Bravo Housewives franchise, along with several English-language international franchises.

There are currently 235 Housewives ranked. The rankings are entirely numerical and based on five categories:

1. Number of Seasons (small bonus)
2. Entertainment (1-10)
3. Drama (1-10)
4. Iconic Status (1-10)
5. Solo Storyline (1-10)

If anyone is interested in the scoring, I'm happy to share the breakdown for any individual Housewife.

FYI:

• Carmella and the three new RHONY Housewives are currently at the bottom as placeholders (TBD) until we've seen more from them.
• International franchises included are Melbourne, Sydney, Auckland, Vancouver, and London.
• These rankings are purely based on entertainment value. A high ranking doesn't necessarily mean I personally like a Housewife or agree with her opinions or actions.- EDIT: BOLDING this.

Just thought I would share and hope this brings the subreddit some entertainment. Enjoy! :)

EDIT: So happy people are enjoying! I had been debating posting it for a while but figured it would be fun to share. I will probably be doing a Part 2 responding to my thought process behind a few ranking placements that had multiple comments.

Yolanda really did use RHOBH to launch Gigi & Bella to supermodel superstardom. Gigi and Bella are arguably more famous worldwide than all of the housewives combined.

Kandi’s Broadway production of Othello with Denzel Washington and Jake Gyllenhaal broke box office records. Her production of The Wiz was also wildly successful.

I think Kandi wins this one. Bethanny must be so beyond jealous. You know she wants prestigious producer credits so bad. She’s been trying to get them forever but burns every bridge in the entertainment community by being a nightmare to work with or just not having a great creative vision. Her ego is not backed up with experience which makes someone a bad producer. She never humbled herself to learn from anyone with more experience than her. She knows it all about all aspects of life.

And the bonus for Kandi is that she is supporting her community both with artists and executives. She is KILLING it!

Angie K owns like 12 hair salons

Although you explicitly ask about fame and fortune, I would still like to add that LVP also used the show to take action against the Yulin Dog Meat Festival. In my opinion, she actually made the most of the show.

I was trying to explain to my friend that some have actually been successful. I’m watching rhony and it seems like almost every one of the housewives have businesses. Obvi I think of Bethany as probably the most successful. And then it ranges down to Miss She by Sheree of course (a fashion show with no fashion.)

I’m talking about personal brands they have developed after the show. Not full existing careers if that makes sense. Someone please educate me so I can educate her

Talking more about og housewives and need to know!!!!!!!!!!

lisa rinna. my mom doesn’t even like bravo/rhobh and is always watching lisa’s insta stories bc she knows her from days of our lives. also teresa (they covered her legal issues on national news) and nene (the apprentice)

No one can eclipse LVP. How many spin off shows has she had? She wouldn't have the Las Vegas places if VPR hadn't done so well.

Bethenny for sure, she created the most from where she started.

What I mean by this is overall, who has made the most of being a Beverly Hills Housewife? Who was the one that used the show to become even more successful/famous and create a strong brand for themselves?

For me, it will have to be LVP and Kyle. These ladies use this show platform to create even bigger wealth for themselves, became even more famous (Kyle) or became very famous (LVP) and whether you like or hate them, they made this show franchise what it is today.

Nah, except for Bethenny, LVP, and Kandi!

After watching the RHORI trailer, it's astonishing to me how every franchise needs to portray itself as "wealthy". If just Miami, BH and Dubai were considered more of the "wealthier" franchises, I'd be cool with that. I miss when everyone featured was reasonably wealthy, now every franchise feels unrealistic. How did this change happen?????

Lisa Vanderpump literally just announced that she’s opening up her own hotel & casino on the Vegas strip called The Vanderpump Hotel.

Between all the Bravo shows, past and present, who has become the most successful. Christian Sorrianao immediately comes to my mind. He won his season and years later he is still a huge part of the fashion world and being at the forefront of changes The next obvious one is Bethany, love her or hate her, she had a great idea, made a huge amount of money for that idea and still today keeps her bame in the food, good or bad! Richard Blaise from Top Chef is another one I would put in that category, actually a few from Top Chef. Curious to see what others have to say!

Depends. In terms of money, Bethenny. In terms of celebrity, the Hadid sisters. In terms of pop culture influence, Nene.

Trying to figure out which HW TRUELY transcends Bravolebrity? As in, who has the most notoriety outside of the Bravo demographic and has the most potential to rise out of C/D List stardom.

Denise Richards is known globally. She was every boys wet dream (and I’m sure girls too) My husband definitely knows who she is. The other ladies? Nope.

Also that is one badly written article. What was the criteria? Did they count liabilities? Where did Nene get $17m?

Erika has a "net worth of 5 million". She's not broke broke.

The most famous HW’s who were previously unknown and become famous through their shows are NeNe and Bethenny.

those are all great ones, I see what you’re going for!

hmm I would argue Nene just because even though she wasn’t struggling before the show per se, she wasn’t exactly crushing it either. and she became THE household name of Bravo

he has other accolades of course but James Lipton became a household name through Inside the Actors Studio. Two other who were probably successful before but became household names through Bravo were Rachel Zoe and Tim Gunn

it’s hard to come up with ones that are sort of rags to riches stories like Christian and Bethenny, though!!

This includes people who were famous from before the show or from the show? And I am going purely by fame, not necessarily rich or successful

(My poll is including the ones I heard of before I started watching, I figured that was a good fame test, so I read about them in magazines, TMZ, etc.)

If I could add a seventh it would be LVP, didn't hear of her before I started watching but had heard of Vanderpump Rules