NeNe Leakes Addresses Wendy Williams + Why BRAVO Has Turned On Her This Season

NeNe Leakes is in full promo mode, pushing her latest venture as a contestant on season 18 of Dancing With the Stars. And in the midst of season 6 of the Real Housewives of Atlanta, all types of questions for the VERY RICH star are being asked. One of them surrounding Wendy Williams’ recent prediction that NeNe would not win on DWTS. While NeNe hasn’t shared why her and Wendy are on ‘the outs’, she did comment on Wendy’s jab.

She tells Essence:

Wendy was not going to win because she had two left feet [Williams was a contestant on season 12 of DWTS]. That was her issue. I know she might want to put me in the same box that she’s in but I’m not. I don’t have two left feet. I have a left and a right foot. And I have rhythm. Now, I’m not saying I’m going to win—that’s not even my thought. I just want to take it one week at a time. If we make it all the way to the end, that’s great, but I can’t go in thinking that far in advance.

And as far as her friendship with RHOA regular, Marlo Hampton, NeNe says it has nothing to do with Kenya Moore. In fact, she points back to her wedding, where Marlo was a bridesmaid. She shares:

I considered Marlo a friend. She was in my wedding. I supported her when nobody supported her. As in, not one housewife wanted her around. Not Kandi, not Sherée, not Kim Zolciak, not Cynthia, not Phaedra, Andy Cohen, Bravo, or True Entertainment. In fact, Bravo said she was not their brand. That’s how they described it. So, they didn’t want her on the show. On the season prior to this, you didn’t see her on the show at all because nobody wanted her around. I called Bravo; I called True Entertainment trying to ask them to let her be on the show. And all I can say is what you see on the show is not what happened to Marlo and me.

Adding that her good friend Cynthia Bailey knows the REAL reason, she continues:

No one can step in our relationship and break us up if we’re real friends. So, that’s not it. Our stuff is deeper than Kenya Moore. If you watched my wedding show, you saw we had issues there. I felt like Marlo came in and caused a big divide among the girls. From there other things happened. But I see what they’re trying to portray on the show. She knows, I know, Cynthia Bailey knows what happened between me and Marlo is way deeper. I wish her the best. I think she has a good heart. I do. I’m not interested in going to the media and bashing someone that I once called a friend. I do wish her the best, but I will never be friends with her again.

NeNe has been on the receiving end of criticism this season for her behavior. She doesn’t blame editing but points the finger at some of the manipulating going on within the network and production companies. She explains:

I feel like these networks and production companies—I’m just keeping it real—I just feel like they build you up to tear you down. I feel like they’ve done whatever they could do to try to not show me in the best light. There are so many things that happen on the show and they… I don’t even want to talk about editing, because I feel like so many people cry wolf on editing. I’m just saying that they’ve done whatever they could to try and diminish anything that I’ve done and I’m okay with it because I know about reality TV. Every season there has to be a villain, there has to be somebody that straddles the fence, and there has to be a little s**t stirrer. All of those things make the show. They decide who’s going to be the villain this season or who’s going to be this person or that person. We don’t have any control over that. I think that the show has gotten great ratings. As much as people say they don’t like drama, and why don’t you guys stop doing this and that, they continue to tune in. And even more people have tuned in.

Catch NeNe Leakes on the season premiere of Dancing with the Stars tonight at  8|7c on ABC.

[Essence]

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