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Bethenny Frankel Jon & Kate Plus Eight

Awful talk show host Bethenny Frankel makes Kate Gosselin seem sympathetic

by Andy Dehnart 7 Oct. 2013 | 9:25 am

Bethenny Frankel used her low-rated talk show last week to grill former Jon & Kate Plus Eight star Kate Gosselin about her finances, and ended up making the former TLC star look good, especially by comparison to the former Bravo star whose talk show will hopefully be cancelled soon.

Bethenny began her line of questioning by paraphrasing gossip reports and acting as if those were accurate, saying, for example, “you’ve got some plastic surgery–so they say, but it looks like it.” Then she repeated another rumor by qualifying it with the word “theoretically”: “You were theoretically hanging out with your security person.” Kate dismisses that.

Bethenny, who’s awful, then tries to get her studio audience to gang up on Kate: “Do you guys want to know where the money is?” Hilariously, there’s just light, awkward applause. Then Bethenny says, judgmentally, “I don’t judge you at all.”

Kate revealed that the earnings from the show and put it in a college fund for her kids, saying, “I took this amount of privacy from my kids–I’m fully aware of that.” Had Bethenny actually been listening instead of being myopically focused on grinding Kate down to try to create some news, she might have actually found that to be an interesting topic of discussion. But why discuss when you can talk at your guests and make yourself look awful?

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about Andy Dehnart

Andy Dehnart’s writing and criticism about television, culture, and media has appeared on NPR and in Vulture, Pacific Standard, The Los Angeles Times, and other publications. He has covered reality television for more than 18 years, and created reality blurred in 2000.

A member of the Television Critics Association who serves on its board of directors, Andy, 41, also directs the journalism program at Stetson University in Florida, where he teaches creative nonfiction and journalism. He has an M.F.A. in nonfiction writing and literature from Bennington College. Learn more about reality blurred and Andy.

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about reality blurred

reality blurred is your guide to the world of reality TV and unscripted entertainment, with reality show reviews, news, and analysis. It was created in 2000 by Andy Dehnart. He's still writing and publishing it today.

reality blurred is regularly updated with highlights from the world of reality TV: news and analysis; behind-the-scenes reports; interviews with reality TV show cast members and producers; and recaps and reviews of these reality TV shows, including Survivor, Big Brother, The Great British Baking Show, Shark Tank, The Amazing Race, The Bachelor, Project Runway, Dancing with the Stars, Top Chef, and many more.

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