MTV’s Real Friends of WeHo has been off the air for three months, yet, the drama surrounding the much-maligned reality show persists.
One of the show’s most polarizing cast members, influencer Joey Zauzig, appeared this week on Dear Media’s “Everything is the Best” podcast and complained about the criticism surrounding the show.
Zauzig directed much of his ire towards fans of RuPaul’s Drag Race who were upset the Housewives-wannabe production shortened episodes by 30 minutes last season (WeHo aired directly after Drag Race).
“They’re getting their 30 minutes back, so it doesn’t even make sense to me,” he said. “Also, it was only 90 minutes for five seasons, and it’s been on for 15 seasons. They started doing 90 minutes, and then they just went back to 60. And now, they’re going back to 90.”
For a show that’s desperate for good publicity, ripping Drag Race fans doesn’t seem like the smartest strategy. The show is a gay cultural phenomenon!
An average of 609,000 people tuned into each episode last season, and few of them stuck around for WeHo. The debut episode only held onto 29% of Drag Race’s audience.
Zauzig, who was often in the middle of inner-show drama, said Drag Race fans were scapegoating the show’s cast members for the decision to cut 30 minutes off of their favorite show.
“We knew filming the show before we wrapped: we were gonna have some hate watches. Our community just does that for these sorts of shows. We knew there was going to be backlash,” he said. “But one thing we also knew was, the Drag Race community is diehard. You don’t want to f*ck with that. So when we found out we were after Drag Race, we didn’t know they never told us they were cutting 30 minutes. We were like, ‘Yes! We’re after Drag Race!'”
“Then we see all of these petitions and tweets. Who do you think people blamed? The cast.”
But Zauzig’s worst line came later, when he suggested that Drag Race comes up short in its representation of the gay community.
Strong words from a rich, cis white gay man who lives in Los Angeles.
“Gay guys, I feel like, have a hard time seeing themselves. Where Drag Race is a nice representation of the gay community, but they’re in makeup and drag – but when it comes to having a show about six gay guys who are working and doing their thing in L.A., gay guys don’t wanna see that,” he said.
Or maybe, gay guys don’t want to watch six pretentious non-friends complain about nonsense all day. Ever think of that?!
There could’ve been no drag race and that petition still would’ve had 35,000 signatures to have the show removed 🥴
— Gay Ice Cube (@devnsworld) May 5, 2023
Actually! We don’t want to watch fake stories or fake people. We had fantastic programming about gay guys living their lives, such as Will & Grace, Noah Arc, and Queer As Folk. Not to mention there is LGBTQI In Regar shows. People want good storytelling
— DJ Trevi (@DJTrevi) May 4, 2023
Derided for its focus on semi-famous and pretentious gays, The Real Friends of WeHo was facing backlash before it even hit the air.
And some cast members didn’t help matters with their public airing of grievances.
The beleaguered musician-choreographer Toderick Hall, for example, shot back at the show’s many critics by recreating the famous Regina George “fugly slut” scene (the Instagram video has now been deleted).
Days later, Real Friends of WeHo star Dorión Renaud, an entrepreneur best known as the CEO of Buttah, one of the top Black-owned skincare companies in the world, admitted the cast members aren’t actually friends.
In the same interview, Renaud said he mistakenly thought the show was going to focus on his brand.
Shortly after the show stopped airing, Zauzig ripped into his co-stars for not understanding the premise of reality TV.
“When you go on a reality show, you sign up to be vulnerable and to be yourself and nothing can be off limits when you sign that contract, btch,” he told Interview magazine. “So yeah, in the beginning, I felt like, ‘Okay, I’m the only one bringing up sht.’”
Later in the convo, Zauzig said Renaud and media personality Jaymes Vaughan were especially difficult to work with.
On the “Everything is the Best” podcast, Zauzig called out Vaughan for not promoting or defending the show amidst the tidal wave of criticism.
“It pisses me off, because who goes on a show and doesn’t promote it. It doesn’t make any sense to me,” he said.
Zauzig says he faced personal attacks about his weight and skin, too.
“It just sucked that we had to deal with that,” he said.
With the status of Real Friends of WeHo still up in the air (Zauzig says they’re unsure whether MTV will pick up another season), MTV execs may be waiting to see whether reaction around the show changes.
Zauzig’s most recent interview probably didn’t help in that regard. He didn’t just anger Drag Race fans. He angered some of the queens themselves.
Yikes!
Zauzig is most definitely in this week’s bottom three. Check out more of the blowback below…
I strongly support gay representation ! But when the representation is not accurate I will not support . Also , for Drag there’s limited representation on media now . Why limited this ? Specially on the times we are living today ? We need drag race in full force . Period pic.twitter.com/vvhOD5NF9E
— Cynthia Lee Fontaine 🍑 (@lee_fontaine) May 4, 2023
— CH (@chertz) May 4, 2023
They need to drink more water tbh
— Bombae, from TV (@ItsBomBae) May 4, 2023
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SFMike
We don’t really need more crap like the phony highly scripted “Real” Friends of WEHO staring media whores that aren’t very real or friends unless a paycheck is involved. I would rather see a gay The View rather than this made-up drivel but that would probably be fake and bad too. It sucks that it seems the producer and directors aren’t happy until you act stereotypically “gay” enough.
ShaverC
Real Housewives series is highly scripted and not real but lots of gay guys seem to watch that, so why didn’t anyone want to watch when it’s the same premise but the women replaced by men? I agree a gay The View would absolutely be terrible, just like The View is now. Everyone just parrots the same viewpoint but no other opinions are allowed to be heard. I don’t know if it’s directors and producers who want to see stereotypes but it’s the “gay audience” who won’t watch a show where every character is not a drag queen, it seems…
dbmcvey
It was problematic that the people on the show didn’t know each other and didn’t live in WEHO.
BLAKENOW
People don’t want to see real stories about who Todrick? He’s fake they all were fake boring and just not interesting to watch on that stupid show that I could never sit though more than 5 minutes, and it’s queens like he is that give zero credibility to any kind of gay programming that could potentially happen in the future, I don’t know what a idiot gave the green light to that mess in the first place I wanted to cut short I hit show like drag race down to less than an hour? That stops show with a stupid name shouldn’t have never been produced in the first place, and it probably was produced by some straight woman who just wanted to have a gay friends around her she has no idea what real marketing is. And while I’m busy trolling this idiot the girl interviewing him is a kiss ass moron.
prydefulpenguin
No one watched because they cast todrick on it after all his dirty laundry was aired and he got cancelled.
Toofie
The show was just trash tv like the housewives. Zero interest. Also as pointed out, they weren’t friends, they didn’t live in WeHo (the epicenter of gay life, lol) and every drama was so manufactured.
Ajs33308
Who or better why should we pay attention to the money hungry, attention seekers…Who the f are they? feeds of life
Godabed
I don’t know her, but it’s clear those photos are heavily edited when compared to the video of his interview.
muscledin
Lol, my thoughts precisely, I thought damn this guy is good looking the saw the video and i was like wtf.
That’s Instagram I guess.
Darson
There was a show on MTV 5Guys and a Girl?? The straight chick asked personal questions and the 5 gay guys answered as a group. Very entertaining. I have never cared for Drag Race. Not into drag myself and neither are my friend group.
Kangol2
“Aliya Jasmine!”
IYKYK!
henare
And yet, despite you and your friends’ interests, more people were interested in RPDR than they were in the real tedious friends of weho. Looks like you’re on the wrong side of. things…
ggore
“Influencer”? What is that, really? Does that label mean he is famous? For what? I have never heard of this person, so he has never influenced me one bit. These egomaniacs who are “famous” for no reason at all just bore me to tears.
Fname Optional Lname
another nobody who people will not remember in two years. Yes Drag Race fans are passionate and can be unfair at times but did he actually think he was going to cancel Drag Race so his show would soar making him an overnight A list superstar>?
PoetDaddy
My biggest problem with “The Real Whatevers of We-Ho” is not that the show was responsible for cutting 30 minutes out of “Drag Race” (which did piss me off, but I never thought to blame the cast members, who obviously never had a say in the schedule). What I hated about this show Joey was on is how abysmally some of these LGBTQ people treated others. Joey was the object of some of the worst of the show’s gay-against-gay behavior, so he should get this. There are two cast members on that show I have no interest in ever meeting. They are toxic, to themselves and others (and Todrick is NOT one of the people I am referencing here). The entitlement of some of the cast members was nauseating.
Josh in OR
So…a cis white male who’s only talents are ‘being the subject of photographs’ and ‘looking masc while doing it’ is upset that his terrible ‘reality’ program isn’t as popular as a show about talented, ‘femme’, diverse, not-entirely-cis people showing off a wide array of talents…?
Tough. Grow up and get a real job, Joey.
Looks fade. Dumb is FOR-EVAH!
timtim
“For a show that’s desperate for good publicity,”
pretty sure the show is doing okay
Invader7
More bland, boring ,rehashed, tired, FAKE,PHONY wanna be’s.. People think this is entertaining??? It’s CRAP !! Put six self centered ,self obsessed , shallow, pretentious dudes from LaLa Land.. Stir and this was the best they could come up.. Never wasted any brains cells on that lame show..
Brian
I wish writers would push back a little harder on the word “influencer.” What does he actually *do*? Is he an interior designer who offers design tips? Is he a fitness trainer? A therapist with feel-good encouragement?
The answer, in this case, is nothing. He wanted to be an actor, but he doesn’t land any gigs, and so he just posts photos of his face every day. That’s not a job. He’s not influential in any way.