“Real Housewives” alum Brandi Glanville isn’t ready to make nice with Andy Cohen — despite the Bravo honcho’s apology Friday for sending what he admitted was a “totally inappropriate” video.
Indeed, it appears that Glanville and her legal team are determined to use the ubiquitous media personality, Bravo host and executive producer of the “Real Housewives” franchise to show that powerful men in entertainment continue to get away with bad behavior.
Five years earlier, the #MeToo movement exposed rampant sexism, harassment and abuse in the TV, film and music industry. That includes Matt Lauer at NBC; Bravo is owned by the NBCUniversal Media Group division of Comcast’s NBCUniversal.
BEVERLY HILLS, CA – DECEMBER 11: Brandi Glanville attends WE tv celebrates the return of “Love After Lockup” with panel, “Real Love: Relationship Reality TV’s Past, Present & Future,” at The Paley Center for Media on December 11, 2018 in Beverly Hills, California. (Photo by Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty Images for WE tv)
In a statement provided to the Daily Beast, Glanville’s lawyer Bryan Freedman in fact cited the Lauer controversy at NBC to argue why Cohen’s actions toward Glanville shouldn’t be tolerated. Glanville has alleged that an “obviously inebriated” Cohen sent her a video in 2022, in which he “boasted” that he wanted to “sleep with another Bravo star” and invited her to watch via FaceTime.
“Any boss, clearly inebriated that contacts their employee by FaceTime video and invites the employee to watch the employee’s boss to have sex with another employee constitutes sexual harassment plain and simple under any definition of sexual harassment as defined by NBC,” Freedman said.
“Why is Andy Cohen getting a pass?” Freedman continued. “Any other supervisor at Comcast who did that would be fired on the spot especially if the excuse was that this was a joke.”
In Cohen’s apology, he said that the video he sent to Glanville was “clearly” meant as a joke. He wrote: “It was absolutely meant in jest, and Brandi’s response clearly communicated she was in on the joke. That said, it was totally inappropriate and I apologize.”
But Freedman fired back that Cohen, who also hosts Bravo’s “Watch What Happens Live,” questioned why he felt the need to apologize if Glanville was in on the joke.
“If it was such a known joke then why did he apologize?” Freedman said. “Because he knows he is in a position of power to control where and how much she works so he can do what he wants and behave in a fashion that is abusive and harassing.”
Freedman’s statement then ended with his reference to Lauer, who was fired from his high-profile “Today” show gig NBC in 2017 after being accused of sexual harassment and abuse by multiple women.
“Has NBC learned nothing from the cover up at NBC News?” Freedman said. “Here we go again with the protection of those in power. Does Andy Cohen make too much money for Bravo to fire? That is the message Comcast is sending. Mr. Roberts (Comcast CEO Brian L. Roberts), it’s time to step in and do the right thing. The only thing worse than his excuse is saying it’s okay because he thought it was a joke.”
Glanville’s accusations against Cohen surfaced on Thursday when Page Six obtained a letter sent by her attorneys to NBC. The letter described the video that the “Watch What Happens Live” host sent and said this “extraordinary abuse of power” left Glanville “feeling trapped and disgusted.”
However, Glanville also has been accused of engaging in problematic behavior, as the Daily Beast reported. “Once a Bravo darling,” Glanville was accused of sexual assault by Caroline Manzo, her costar on “Real Housewives Ultimate Girls Trip: Morocco.” Meanwhile, Marco Vega, the butler from “Real Housewives Ultimate Girls Trip: Ex-Wives Club,” also said that Glanville and co-star Phaedra Parks subjected him to sexual assault.
These allegations against “Real Housewives” stars and executives come as the genre of reality TV faces a reckoning. “Real Housewives of New York” star Bethenny Frankel has accused executives of systemically mistreating and exploiting the people in front of the cameras on their biggest reality shows.
Frankel also is represented by Freedman, as well as by high-profile attorney Mark Geragos. Last July, Geragos told Variety that he had heard from around 50 people who alleged that they had been abused and mistreated on the sets of the docuseries and reality shows.
“Something has to change because the current system is broken,” Geragos said. In a legal letter sent to NBC and Bravo in August on behalf of “a significant number of individuals,” he and Freedman accused the networks of “grotesque and depraved mistreatment” of its stars.
