The Real Housewives of Atlanta returned for a surprisingly normal season 16 premiere Sunday night given the behind-the-scenes drama that has plagued the reality series in the last year— save for a lengthy set of introductions bringing the majority new cast into the fold.
“Welcome Back Peaches” is the title of the episode, which sees Porsha Williams and Cynthia Bailey return to the series after lengthy hiatuses, though only Williams has a coveted peach in the show intro, along with returning cast member Drew Sidora and Shamea Morton, long a friend of the series, who’s now been upgraded to the main cast.
Morton serves as the connector between the OG cast and the newest peach holders — Brit Eady, Angela Oakley and Kelli Ferrell — who wastes little time instigating drama, repeatedly asking why Williams, in the midst of a divorce from husband Simon Guobadia after 15 months of marriage, stole her soon-to-be-ex from Falynn Pina, who appeared as a friend of the cast on season 13 of the Bravo reality show while married to the Nigerian entrepreneur.
More snarky inquisitions continue deep into the episode when Morton hosts a lavish birthday party at her Atlanta mansion and both Williams and Kenya Moore, who’s noticeably been omitted from the season’s promo images, are introduced to the show’s new crew. As the women discuss who’s married (Eady, Morton and Oakley) and who’s going through a divorce (Williams, Moore, Sidora and Ferrell), Moore asks Eady whether she’s married or engaged since she’s only wearing a solitary ring without a wedding band.
When Eady, a former model, tells Moore the ring is an upgrade from the first one husband Michael Cunningham gave her, she remarks, “Okay, an anniversary of the first ring,” with an air of confusion in her voice that Eady didn’t take to well. “You’re going through a divorce, and I’m married,” she later says to Ferrell and her husband in a side conversation. “Why are you worried about my wedding band? You don’t see this rock? Tuh. There’s nothing to worry about.”
Though that’s the end of the ladies’ interaction in the episode, audiences already know there’s more to come as Moore was suspended and later fired from RHOA last June after displaying sexually explicit posters of Eady at the grand opening of her Kenya Moore Hair Spa in Atlanta during filming of the latest season. Moore, who initially denied the accusation of revenge porn when word of the incident spread on social media, confessed to wrongdoing during an appearance on the Tamron Hall Show this past November, telling the host, “Hindsight is always 50-50. If I could do it all over again — I believe the photos were very distasteful and I elevated the situation.”
It’s unclear whether Bravo will air the altercation that led to Moore’s exit, though if they do it could clear up conflicting reports about the fallout, as Moore claimed she was protecting herself and her daughter Brooklyn from threats made by Eady. At the time of the incident, a source close to production told Page Six, “At no time was Kenya ever threatened with a weapon, nor was there ever a weapon present during the course of production.” Another source alleged Eady made verbal threats that caused cast members to become “uncomfortable.”
Uncomfortable describes many of the interactions in this season’s premiere episode with Sidora also getting put on the spot for her seemingly questionable relationship with the father of Williams’ daughter Pilar Jhena, Dennis McKinley. Though Sidora says McKinley is only helping her work on new music, her description of him as her main source of support through her divorce from Ralph Pittman, and her failure to invite Williams to her alleged surprise birthday party, which McKinkey attended, has raised eyebrows among the group, particularly Williams and Morton, who asks Sidora outright at the end of the episode: “Are you dating Dennis now?”
How Sidora answers is yet to be seen, as is how Phaedra Parks will make her pre-announced return to the series after her departure in 2017. So far, there’s also been no mention of Kandi Burruss, who exited the series last March. Burrus recently told THR she had faith in the series’ ability to forge ahead strongly amid the many cast shakeups.
“I don’t think it has to be the end,” said Burruss. “I think that show can keep going and going and going, because it’s an audience for somebody. Now, maybe it may not be the same fans. Maybe some people might fall off, but I’ve seen it happen multiple times. When we first lost Kim Zolciak people were like, ‘Oh, nobody’s gonna watch the show,’ and the ratings went up. Then the first time Nene [Leakes] left people were like, ‘Ohhh,’ and the ratings were still good.”
Time will tell whether that same trajectory will hold up following Moore’s departure, at some point this season.
RHOA airs new episodes Sundays at 8 p.m. on Bravo, streaming next day on Peacock.
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