They’re back! And by “they” I mean both Melissa Gorga and Teresa Giudice. Yes, both of the Real Housewives of New Jersey are coming back for Season 14 of the Bravo show – despite pretty much everyone agreeing that one or the other needed to beat it. Like literally, Teresa said she planned on never seeing Melissa or her brother again. Awkward! Let’s get into the big dramatic casting news. Watch our full recap of the news in the video below.
Amid the endless speculation that Season 14 of New Jersey would have a major cast shakeup to try and take a break from Teresa and Melissa’s endless back and forth, PEOPLE reports that offers have been made to both women to return, as well as Dolores Catania, Margaret Josephs, Jennifer Aydin, Rachel Fuda and Danielle Cabral. Jackie Goldschneider and Jennifer Fessler will once again be “Friends Of” – I think that’s a good spot for them, honestly.
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Filming is supposed to begin in August – Bravo hasn’t confirmed any of this yet and contracts aren’t official-official – but I’d bet Bo Dietl that this is the Season 14 cast we get. What I’m not so sure about is how Melissa and Teresa are going to film another season together – and whether you’re Team Melissa or Team Teresa, I think everyone is kind of on the same page with that.
Remember the reunion? Andy could barely get through it with all of their back-and-forth yelling and Teresa made it very clear near the end that she never planned on seeing the Gorgas ever again. Melissa and Joe both did seem more open to building a relationship again, but I just don’t see that happening anytime soon – especially with Louie in the picture.
After the reunion, there were even reports that the show went on “pause” to allow everyone to cool off – but Andy Cohen did assure it was less of a big deal than everyone was making it. Andy said on The Elvis Duran Show last month that the pause reports were “a little blown up,” and that they were simply taking a beat between seasons after what he called a “bloodbath” of a reunion. Typically, he noted, you’d have cameras going in right away after the reunion, but things were “too hot to handle” with the cast.
And audiences loved it – the numbers don’t lie.
Even if you hated the Melissa vs. Teresa of Season 13, it was a monster in the ratings for Bravo. Total viewership was up 10% since Season 12, making it the most-viewed season overall since Season 7. Part 3 of the reunion, which I personally thought was such a mess did even better, it scored a new record for the network with 3 million total viewers and 1.5 million viewers in the key demo of adults 18-49 – making it the most watched New Jersey episode since 2016. And we thought they were going to change the cast. Silly us, right?
I am curious though, what do you think of having the same cast return? Let me know in the comments!
